Health at every size...

[theantichick 2,204]

My first rant (well, here at least)!!

I started typing all of this out in response to another thread, and realized I'd gone off on a rant. Decided it was better to move it here.

So I have a psych that I"m seeing. She's actually really great for what I'm seeing her for. (I have a ridiculously deep aversion to eating most vegetables that stems from my father force feeding them to me as a child.)

My rant is about her determination to make me accept the healthy at any size stuff. Now, don't get me wrong, I agree with and support the general concept. Being overweight does not mean you are automatically unhealthy. Being thin doesn't mean you are automatically healthy. BMI is crazy stupid as a measure of anything. Doctors all too often focus on the weight and don't give heavy people the same treatment options as thin people. People are not bad or lazy or whatever because they are heavy. People should not be treated as less than, no matter what weight they are. I absolutely 1000% support all of that.

My problem is that the HAES movement wants to make people think that they can be healthy at 300, 400, 500 lbs. I'm a nurse, and you will never convince me that anyone 300+ lbs (unless they're over 6' tall and play defensive lineman) is healthy. You can show me all the normal bloodwork and normal blood pressure and normal glucose/A1C in the world, and you will not convince me that you're healthy if you're that heavy. All it means is that your body is coping with the weight. And it will keep coping with the weight until it can't anymore. Some people's bodies can cope longer than others. But it is going to all fall apart, and while weight is not the only factor, it is a big one (no pun intended).

I've always been heavy. The idiotic charts say that at 5' 9" (though I swear I was 5' 10" through my 20's) I should weigh some ridiculous amount like 140 lbs. I weighed 160-180 through most of high school. Once I lost down to 160-165 and looked and felt amazing, but it was hellish to maintain and I kept it up less than 6 months. When I was a Paramedic, I gained weight and got up to about 210. I got down to 185 for about 2 years after I quit emergency medicine, but then life happened and I was at 230-ish when I got pregnant 19 years ago. I bounced around between 220 and 240 for many years. I felt pretty good, liked the way I looked (mostly) and could do whatever I wanted to. I used to belly dance, go roller skating, hiking, whatever. Honestly, if all I manage with the surgery is to get back down to below 230, I'll be happy. (Though I'm really going to try hard for 185.) I felt sluggish but mostly OK and still was able to do most things when I was ranging from 250-265. Once I pushed past 270, I've felt like absolute crap. Now I'm hovering around 300, and I feel horrific. Any level of exercise, no matter how moderate, pushes my pulse up past 150, and I am out of breath and drenched with sweat just from walking in from a parking lot. I can't go dancing, I can't even go to a festival because I can't walk that much. My blood pressure which had been textbook 120/80 for all of these years heavy is pushing into hypertension territory. Every medical condition I have has worsened exponentially with the last 50 lbs.... allergies, IBS, arthritis, etc. I barely have the energy to get through my day, much less clean or cook or do any normal thing when I get home in the evenings. I do NOT accept that this is healthy, normal, or desirable. I don't hate myself, or even they way I look. I hate feeling this way, and I am NOT healthy.

Why in the heck are people determined to make me feel good about the weight I'm at, and convince me that my weight isn't affecting my health adversely??

[LipstickLady 25,682]

Because there stoopid.

[Inner Surfer Girl 12,015]

I guess because it is better to be healthy and fat than to be unhealthy and fat.

I was a healthy fat person until I wasn't. I will take healthy and fat over unhealthy and fat any day.

Plus, building healthy habits while we are still fat will pay dividends as we lose weight. If we have WLS and do not develop healthy habits, then WLS will likely have very short-term benefits.

[Christinamo7 4,042]

I agree. I do not want to be treated as if I am worth - less because of being obese, and thank God my husband has found me attractive at any weight I've been (highest 267) but - I do believe it would have shortened my life, and was certainly beginning to cause health problems once I got into my 40s.

I hope in the future we will see more science looking into why and how people become obese. I would love to see long term studies on WLS differentiating between those who were always heavy from childhood - those who gained at puberty - those who gained after a trauma and those who gained later in life. I became obese *after* all my children were born and I went to work at a sedentary job, but I really believe I piled it on to protect myself, my middle son is severely disabled and I needed to be able to handle him and to handle his explosive outbursts. He is in a group home now in his 20s, really needs the around the clock support - he is doing well and enjoys his visits home, but only wants to stay a couple of hours. I am ready to let the weight go. I don't need it.

I have an aversion to fish I think because growing up in Michigan there were always commercials focused on PCB. I truly believe that is where my dislike came from - I continue to work on it, but so far, I just don't like it.

[theantichick 2,204]

Because there stoopid.

LOL. My Ex-SIL (divorced the guy, kept the sister) says "stoopid" that way, so I heard this in her voice.

[theantichick 2,204]

I agree. I do not want to be treated as if I am worth - less because of being obese, and thank God my husband has found me attractive at any weight I've been (highest 267) but - I do believe it would have shortened my life, and was certainly beginning to cause health problems once I got into my 40s.

I hope in the future we will see more science looking into why and how people become obese. I would love to see long term studies on WLS differentiating between those who were always heavy from childhood - those who gained at puberty - those who gained after a trauma and those who gained later in life. I became obese *after* all my children were born and I went to work at a sedentary job, but I really believe I piled it on to protect myself, my middle son is severely disabled and I needed to be able to handle him and to handle his explosive outbursts. He is in a group home now in his 20s, really needs the around the clock support - he is doing well and enjoys his visits home, but only wants to stay a couple of hours. I am ready to let the weight go. I don't need it.

I have an aversion to fish I think because growing up in Michigan there were always commercials focused on PCB. I truly believe that is where my dislike came from - I continue to work on it, but so far, I just don't like it.

My hubby finds me attractive at 300, and since I don't think I'll ever look like "oh my gosh that girl needs a sammich" I don't see that changing.

I agree that we need a lot of research into weight gain, especially in light of the research on the biggest loser contestants and their metabolic rates. I hope that my childrens' generation will have better options for weight control than surgery based on things they're learning about weight gain in our generation. Right now, we have to do the best with what we have.

I think some things we never really gain a taste for. I was raised in a religion that doesn't eat seafood, and though I don't practice it anymore, I just can't develop a taste for it. (However, I have noted that I was raised not eating pork either, and I had no issues learning to eat ham and bacon!!) I don't expect to ever LOVE vegetables. I just want to get to a point where my body isn't revolting (gagging and throwing up) when I decide for whatever reason I am going to eat them.

[gowalking 10,790]

Because there stoopid.

Today is not a good day for me @@LipstickLady but this made me laugh. So...thank you.

[James Marusek 5,244]

For years I was obese and felt good about myself. But as I aged I picked up several conditions including high blood pressure, diabetes, GERD, sleep apnea. And these conditions would probably hasten my journey to the grave. So I took appropriate action.

Mortality studies show that the individuals that fell into the normal BMI category lived the longest. If you were overweight, your life was shortened. But also if you were underweight, your life was shortened. If you stepped back 100 years in time, the ideal weight was a little on the heavy side. Think "Mae West". There was a practical reason for this. If you suffered a serious illness or accident, your body relied on your stored fat to help you survive until your body had a chance to recover. Today medicine has advanced and so has antibiotics, so your chances of surviving a major illness or accident has significantly improved. Some individuals have focused so much on maintaining a low weight that they developed anorexia/bulimia. BAD CONDITIONS. So there is a downside to too much focus on being attractive as judged by ideal magazine cover images.

[jane13 2,256]

@@theantichick - I had surgery 1 year ago (at 52) TODAY, all I am going to add, is my thoughts on VSG at 53.

wished I had done it earlier

HW 282

CW 177

"stoopid" ROTFLMAO

love it!

[theantichick 2,204]

@@theantichick - I had surgery 1 year ago (at 52) TODAY, all I am going to add, is my thoughts on VSG at 53.

wished I had done it earlier

That's what I keep hearing from the majority of those who had bariatric surgery. I have been avoiding this for so long, at some point I'm going to wonder why I waited so long when I could have been living my life.

[Babbs 14,681]

Because this generation got participation trophy's and god forbid you say anything realistic or non encouraging to anybody.

Have you ever seen an x ray picture of an obese person? Their organs are literally being crushed by the fat. That's not healthy.

It's kind of like smoking. I knew it was bad for me, but I wasn't going to do a damn thing about it until I was good and ready. I knew being fat was bad for me, but I was still relatively active and cute so until it actually started affecting my health, then and only then I thought "Damn this is gonna kill me!"

Young people don't see the consequences until it starts affecting them.

[Christinamo7 4,042]

@@Babbs those x ray pictures sure got me! YIKES. yikes. yikes.

I am really looking forward to my 6 month check up because I will have had my next cat scan about a week earlier, and I want to ask my bariatric doctor to look at the last one and this one and talk to me about changes they may see. my oncologist and bariatric doctor are in the same hospital system so they will have access to my tests.

[OKCPirate 5,323]

I get the rant. I always thought of myself as a healthy, albeit big, fat guy. I could perform, still exercised and led a vigorous life. Hey I looked like Teddy Roosevelt, and he did great things. But I could not ignore the health warning lights that were showing up. If I had chosen to ignore them I'd be diabetic, or have a heart attack. I'm glad I chose the path I did. And actually everyone who counts in my life is very glad that I did.

[VSGAnn2014 12,992]

@@theantichick ... I agree completely with everything in your post -- the nuances, your irritation, the idiocy of your therapist's affection for some weird ideology she's bought into.

Completely agree!

[theantichick 2,204]

Because this generation got participation trophy's and god forbid you say anything realistic or non encouraging to anybody.

Have you ever seen an x ray picture of an obese person? Their organs are literally being crushed by the fat. That's not healthy.

It's kind of like smoking. I knew it was bad for me, but I wasn't going to do a damn thing about it until I was good and ready. I knew being fat was bad for me, but I was still relatively active and cute so until it actually started affecting my health, then and only then I thought "Damn this is gonna kill me!"

Young people don't see the consequences until it starts affecting them.

What really made me believe it wasn't healthy was the BodyWorks exhibit (hope I got the name right) - it's the one where people donated their bodies and this guy plasticised them and turned them into models of the various body systems... it was awesome. But they had one exhibit where they showed what visceral fat looks like inside. Wasn't enough to push me to do anything about it back then, but it made a huge impact on me. I don't think I'll ever be in the "normal" BMI range, but I'd sure love to get down to the "just overweight" category.