I'd like to point out that the thin=healthy truism is pretty

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Amen, Jainaday!

There's a professional aerobics instructor in the SF area who either has a web site or has published on this. She's 'supersized" and so much fitter than most of the population.

Do you know whether any research has been done to quantify the detriments of stress from trying to lose weight? And/or from the self-hatred society incites in anyone who doesn't exactly match some mythical measure of "acceptable" size and proportion? Not to mention the benefits lost b/c time and thought are spent on body hatred rather than on fulfilling, soothing outlets.

So much of this is all symbolic. Weight carries, well, weight that has nothing to do with our bodies per se. They don't just go away b/c someone's told to slim down.

For years, I thought my parents didn't love me b/c I was fat, frumpy, not girly etc. They seemed very happy when I attained their standards through artificial means, and were let down and judgmental when I quit that and got fat again. Well, years after I began the acceptance route, despite ambushes by someone with his own issues, I happen to meet their superficial standards. That wasn't the goal; it's a pleasant side-effect of the progress I've made toward neutrality. What do you know? the 'rents have made it VERY clear that that's not sufficient. They aren't capable of loving me. The fat was a nice smokescreen. Maybe my young siblings will see that more clearly than I did, and go straight to working on the messages that they're somehow not acceptable b/c they're beautiful people inside.

A few years ago, before my middle brother came here to work for a summer, our father asked me to "get his weight under control." ???! The cruel fervency of his insistence that my brother was pretty much Hades-bound b/c he was pudgy alarmed me. My brother was 18; I have great faith in bodies finding their own way, if our minds can return to intuitive self-nurture. I tried to explain that expectations of losing weight were pretty much a guarantee it would never happen just fueled the Patriarch's ire. His health arguments were just an excuse for hatred, which probably covers a lot of fear. Feminism stopped short of humanism in this realm; women co-opted the former male privilege of consumerist evaluation of others' bodies, so now men get driven into this vicious cycle as well. Nobody's better off, and nobody looks better for all the frenzy of diets and research. I'm sick of coddling people who warp their own fears into pseudo-moralistic judgments about others' bodies.

The new NYC regulation requiring restaurants to list calorie counts has me feeling ill. Maybe I should fly over and do compliance consulting for restaurants. I'd have fun with that ... Seriously. There's a place in Brooklyn where I get a wild vegan fresh pita before facing my doom and driving to the airport. They throw it together according to my whimsy. How is calorie count - which they won't be able to calculate anyway - going to make me happier or a smidgen closer to healthy?

Not about health, but maybe of interest:
Studies refute common stereotypes about obese workers

Me too. I have some redundant protoplasm on my frame.

I would like to point out that being healthy should be the top priority for all of us.. My dad is overweight, to the point that he cannot buckle his seatbelt, nor get up easily from sitting.. Both my parents are overweight, and I wanted to be more in control of my weight .. for me.. If you are comfortable in your skin, do not become a candidate for diabetes due to obesity,are strong enough to carry your groceries without huffing and puffing, enjoy walking, eat right, etc. and you are happy within, than you are doing alright..When I was in school, I remember wearing 10-11 size jeans, and I was always feeling dumpy . Today I wear size 6, eat right, have had 5 children, and I am at peace within me..Just being healthy is the first step to feeling in control of your life..enjoy your day!

Ahhh, must have been rambling on , quite tired from the hectic days....will be taking a little vacation from here...ta ta.

I think healthy has more to do with what your own body wants. You are genetically programmed to be a certain height and weight. Whether or not that weight matches up with what the medical community says. There is plenty you can do to move your body away from what it wants your weight to be, but that's where I think the health issues come in.

I grew up being considerably smaller than my peers. By the age of 23 I think the highest my weight ever got was 135 lbs, and I was sick all the time. I wasn't intentionally trying to be skinny, I just really don't like to eat. I decided to try something new and put on 50 lbs. I haven't been sick since. My body is where it wants to be. I've known people who were naturally small and tried to get bigger and people who were naturally large and tried to get smaller. It doesn't work out because that isn't what their bodies want from them.

Is there a cause and effect relationship between body composition and overall health? I'm skeptical, but if there is it's the opposite of what seems to be the popular opinion. Being too fat or too skinny doesn't make you unhealthy. Being unhealthy can cause you to be too fat or too skinny.

My advice, throw away your scale. Eat a clean balanced diet without denying yourself the occasional treat. Stay active, whatever that means to you. Pay more attention to how you feel than anything else. After a year or so of that you will weigh what your body wants you to weigh. That is the most healthy weight for you.

I agree completely with the OP. I don't think we are all meant to be the same size, and thin is not the same as healthy. My lean body mass weighs more than what doctors recommend I weigh, for my height - they want me to weigh 108lb, and just my LBM is 113lb. I weigh 135lb, with a body fat percentage of 20%, which doctors agree is healthy (I've had it lower, at around 17%, but it sucked the life out of me. I had to watch what I ate like a maniac), but since that is 3lb above their medical Holy Grail, the Healthy Weight Range, and I have a small frame according to my wrist measure (nevermind that my shoulders and calve are huge, the wrist is all that matters), so I need to be at the low end of the HWR, weighing 108lb. That sounds like a plan, I just need to lose 27lb of muscle and bone mass, and I'll be healthy! I piss doctors off cause I ask whether they suggest amputation or osteoporosis as the most effective way to lose those 27lb of lean mass.
Also? I have weighed 10lb more and I was still healthy. I was just as strong and active, my cholesterol was still 87 (you read that right - not 187. 87 is my total cholesterol), my blood pressure was still 110/70, my blood sugar was still 68. But at 10lb more, I am at BMI 27ish, which prompts doctors to tell me I am on a "deadly path to obesity". It is so hard to keep a straight face when they say crap like that.

Half of overweight adults may be heart-healthy By LINDSEY TANNER, AP Medical Writer


CHICAGO - You can look great in a swimsuit and still be a heart attack waiting to happen. And you can also be overweight and otherwise healthy. A new study suggests that a surprising number of overweight people — about half — have normal blood pressure and cholesterol levels, while an equally startling number of trim people suffer from some of the ills associated with obesity.

The first national estimate of its kind bolsters the argument that you can be hefty but still healthy, or at least healthier than has been believed.

The results also show that stereotypes about body size can be misleading, and that even "less voluptuous" people can have risk factors commonly associated with obesity, said study author MaryFran Sowers, a University of Michigan obesity researcher.

"We're really talking about taking a look with a very different lens" at weight and health risks, Sowers said.

In the study, about 51 percent of overweight adults, or roughly 36 million people nationwide, had mostly normal levels of blood pressure, cholesterol, blood fats called triglycerides and blood sugar.

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