No-one will understand the agony of obesity unless you’ve suffered from it.

I posted a while back wondering how everyone had become ‘obese’ according the government.

In my day you were ‘obese’ if your stomach was bigger than your chest;
You were ‘fat’ if your belly hung over your trousers;
Otherwise you were ‘normal’;
Unless you were cadaverous and then you were ‘skinny’.

People that have never had weight problems don’t understand the pain their comments cause. Overweight people know they have a problem every time they look in the mirror or try to buy clothes. They don’t need constant reminding from others, the weight loss moneymakers or the puppet government of big business who fatten people up and then offer ‘miracle’ cures.

Overweight people will hide their pain in humour, but every mindless ‘joke’  or comment from others cuts deep and will be remembered until the day they die. If they could solve their problem by just eating less and moving more, don’t you think they would have done?  The same as a drug addict would ‘just stop taking drugs’ and an alcoholic would ‘just stop drinking’ – it’s not that simple.

People are overweight for a variety of reasons:
Physical disability meaning they cannot move around much.
Illness such as fatigue and immune disease.
Emotional stress resulting in an addiction to food.
Medication that causes obesity.
A genetic disposition towards that body shape.
Ignorance towards their dietary requirements.
Yo yo dieting.

A surgeon’s mistake resulting in 2 life threatening infections, 14 surgeries, powerful drugs and antibiotics that resulted in serious arthritis in  both shoulders, the loss of quadriceps in both legs, one metal knee and one totally fused leg meant constant pain, very little mobility and drugs that increased obesity and damaged gut mobility meant I put on a lot of weight whilst dealing with those problems. I couldn’t lose weight on 1200 calories a day!

Luckily I’m a natural skeptic of big business, the government, ‘miracle cures’, the diet and fitness industry and the general moneymaking machine. Everyone is different and there is no ‘one size fits all’ that the NHS would force on us. I’m vegetarian, my body doesn’t deal with starchy and sugary carbs easily, it doesn’t digest food eaten in the evening well and requires reasonable periods without any food to do it’s work. So I fast between 18 and 20 hours a day, eat low carb foods and eat between midday and 5pm, during my fasting period I only drink water,  black tea and coffee. In 2 months I dropped three and a half stone despite trying every other diet and failing.

I monitor my diet by my general health, energy and inflammation levels, the colour and frequency or my urine, the shape and colour of my faeces and my weight. All have improved.

People suffering from obesity need help and support, not victimisation, vilification and isolation (often hidden in well meaning measures). It’s an illness like any other but like many other ‘hidden’ illnesses needs an individual approach to have any success.

We also need to stop listening to the political and financial profiteers and start looking inwards and studying ourselves, our lifestyle, exercise, our current diet and our genetics to find the answers!