BMI CHARTS are ridiculous!

[lblondon 34]

I'm 7 pounds from my goal weight in 6 months, but still in the overweight category, I'm 5ft10in tall and wearing a US 10/12, UK14/16 depending on the shop. if you saw me in the street, you would see a slim, healthy woman.

To be at the top of the normal range I would actually need to lose a stone, if you then saw me in the street, you would no doubt think I was slightly emaciated and could do with putting on a few pounds, my weight seems to be plateauing at the moment and frankly I don't really want to lose anymore. Whilst I have always know that the bmi charts are ridiculous I can really "see" the truth at my current weight.

Am working on toning now but am NOT going to be a slave to my BMI!

[1Sleevecomingup 185]

???? I dont go by that.. I go by how I feel...

[KMCarlson 30]

I've thought the same thing. I'm 5'9" or 10" depending on the day and who does it. My original goal was 180#, but then I saw that that is still "overweight," so I changed it to 160#. I'm not sure it's doable. Congrats to you on your awesome weight loss!

[hiccupingduck 44]

BMI doesn't account for muscle mass either. Most olympic athletes are in the overweight category due to muscle.

I never liked BMI much. Definitely don't go by it and like 1sleevecomingup, go by how you feel.

[lblondon 34]

I've thought the same thing. I'm 5'9" or 10" depending on the day and who does it. My original goal was 180#, but then I saw that that is still "overweight," so I changed it to 160#. I'm not sure it's doable. Congrats to you on your awesome weight loss!

It's totally doable, I did exactly the same with 180 vs. 160 but kept at 180 with a view to seeing how I looked/felt and remembering when, back in the day I was an incredibly toned, fit 18 year old and still weighed 12stone 7lbs.

#hiccupingduck - very true about muscle mass.

[Bufflehead 6,358]

My PCP told me that BMI charts don't really work for people who have been obese for a significant amount of time and then lost a bunch of weight. First, unless they have had plastic surgery, they will be carrying 5+ lbs of extra skin. Second, that whole "I'm not fat, I'm big boned" thing does actually have some merit for us! The stress of carrying extra weight on our skeletons for several years causes our bodies to react in a protective way and deposit much more Calcium in our bones. The same thing happens with impact-bearing exercise -- it stresses the bones and causes the body to build them up with calcium. It's why exercise is more important than calcium supplementation in preventing osteoporosis and fractures! Anyway, we tend to have much thicker and denser bones than people who have never been obese. This article touches on it:

http://www.netdoctor.co.uk/diseases/facts/osteoporosis.htm

And, of course, those thicker, denser bones weigh more, and BMI doesn't account for that at all.

[Forsythia 882]

BMI is a terrible way to judge if one is healthy or not. I know a woman who is buff. Instructs aerobics and weight classes. She is a tiny tiny woman, but overweight on the BMI charts. Same with those weightlifting dudebros you see in the gym. they are all considered overweight because of all their muscle mass. Add to that that (at least here in the US, I do not know this stat for the UK), BMI used to be 27.8 as the threshold for being healthy vs overweight to match the WHO definitions. So that magically made people who were healthy all of a sudden fat. So that who BMI classification is arbitrary.

Also, ironically I have a BMI ticker at the bottom of my posts. lol!

Edited November 14, 2014 by Forsythia