(07-16-2017, 06:29 AM)The Real Marty Wrote: I almost posted this in the thread titled "Questions you were afraid to ask" but that seems more like a humor thread and this is a serious question. 

Why is it so difficult for the gravitationally enhanced to slim down?   I see so many people who have a serious, life-threatening problem, and the solution is simple, but it must be very difficult, or there wouldn't be so many people in this condition.  What's the deal? 

This is not meant to be critical of anyone.   Obviously, this is a very very difficult problem to solve.   So I am asking a genuine question.   Why is it so difficult?

I think because its a combination of things that is best summed up as Epigenics in my opinion. Your grandpa is fat, your parents are fat, you will be prone to getting fat. Everyone may have the 'fat gene' etc, but some of us come with it on right out of the box, while others do something to get it on. Epigenics is this idea that its not just genetics but its environmental also. You don't just get super obese because you eat more, you also have to be predisposed (although you can, of course get fat from just eating more, but I don't think you hit 500 lbs etc unless theres something else going on).

Take me for instance, my parents are obese, my grandparents are obese, and since I was about 12 I have had a yo-yo weight problem. I gain weight if: a. I am stressed, b. if I have the slightest deviation from a very healthy diet, c. if I don't have a lot of exercise (think multiple miles a day). I have been skinny before, so it is possible, but the amount of maintenance it takes for me to get there is just monumental.

Compared to my wife, who is Korean, she doesn't gain weight. No one in her family has ever been obese (unlike my family where only my one grandmother is skinny and literally everyone else has hit morbidly obese, BMI over 40, at some point). Now I will admit that the foods her culture taught her to like really help in this regard. Koreans don't eat a lot of dairy and their food is fairly simple. But even when we are on the same diet, there are lots of things that if I eat them I will gain weight like crazy, and she won't (think alcohol, meat).

All that said, I know plenty of people who restrict nothing from their diet, eat less healthy than me, and weight less. I am certain that if every person had to be vegetarian, not drink, and run 3 miles a day to stay in the normal weight range, then we would have a lot less skinny people. That being said you can lose weight, the problem is that the people who need to do it the most usually have the hardest road to go: between what they like, and what their body is predisposed to do, i.e. become fat, its tough. I do think that people who are morbidly obese have stopped trying, but you can certainly get to regular obese (BMI of 30) even if you are trying.

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(07-25-2017, 10:48 AM)wrong_box Wrote:

(07-25-2017, 07:24 AM)The Real Marty Wrote: I know it's not easy to eat less when you're fat.   I've read some articles that say your fat cells will constantly tell you they are starving.   That's why eating less is very difficult once you become overweight.   Fat cells are extremely demanding.  

Most articles I read about how hard it is to lose weight are really about how hard it is to eat less.  

But if you can eat less, I can't understand why it would be hard to lose weight.  Isn't it pure math?  -calories in vs calories burned?  Fat is just stored calories, after all. 

I personally know quite a few fat people, but I've never known one that ate healthy and was still overweight.

But really, and this is a sincere question, for all the horizontally enhanced people out there.   What goes through your mind when someone offers you a piece of chocolate cake?  I know the mind is a very tricky thing.   Is it like drug addiction?   Do you think, I should not eat this, but then, do you find a way to rationalize it?

Ok lets say a person does not eat too much to being with, but simply eats the right portions of bad for you foods such as fast food, or foods high in saturated fats or whatever...after 20 years the person is now 5 feet 8 inches tall and 260 pounds at the age of 50 and decides to start eating healthy meals...eating less isnt the answer as he has been eating the proper portions, just wrong foods, so he begins a high protein low carb low sugar diet which if the most common diet for obese people...

after a month or so of being vigilant on the diet and exercising he has lost only a pound or 2... Same thing next month...While he is doing what he is supposed to the weight is very slow to come off, which is what makes people depressed and wonder why they can't lose weight and give up after a month or so...

What I'm getting at is once the fat is there its very hard to get off...Losing 20 or 30 pounds is a monumental task 10 is difficult if it's already there and is a [BLEEP] too...If someone is already fairly lean with just a few pounds to lose it's not too hard to lose, but once you become fat, losing it is incredibly hard

Agree, it is much harder for someone with fat cells to lose weight, and when you do the fat cells only shrink, they don't die for like 7 years. And of course, if you gain weight they split. Marty is also correct that fat cells increase hunger, but not directly. They release leptin which is a hunger suppressor, but your body becomes over saturated and desensitized. Then you are over sensitive to ghrelin (the hunger hormone), and under sensitive to leptin (the suppressant).

The other issue is that say you stop taking in calories to lose weight, your body will go into starvation mode and decrease your metabolism, making weight loss very slow. Plus as soon as you try to go back to a 'normal' amount of calories your body will start trying to replenish its 'fat reserves.' This is why is hard to lose weight and keep it off if your fat. You really have to have a commitment to eating a very healthy diet for a long period of time before you could get away with occasional cheating that many normal people have no trouble with. Asking someone who is predisposed towards gaining weight to do all this, and then never ever cheat, is something that is beyond what most normal weight people could do, much less a food addicted morbidly obese person.

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