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After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

nytimes.com

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Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#21

Post by rayiner »

bb85 wrote: post #8

I wonder why, when we talk about obesity, there is this tendency to use language that removes responsibility from the person, or at least move it from their mind to their "body", as if they were different entities. I think obese people fit the definition of addicts. Most of the time, other addictions are fought by pushing awareness on the person, forcing them to recognize they have a problem and that they need to cha…

> I wonder why, when we talk about obesity, there is this tendency to use language that removes responsibility from the person, or at least move it from their mind to their "body", as if they were different entities.

I wonder why, when we talk about obesity, "responsibility" even enters the discussion. Obesity is a nationwide phenomenon, which means for "responsibility" to be the root cause, we have to posit that people as a whole are "just less responsible" than previous generations. It's ridiculous to posit that a basic biological process such as the ability to regulate food intake has changed so dramatically in just one generation.

"Personal responsibility" as the root cause of obesity also leads to questionable conclusions. 20% of black children are obese versus 14% of white children. Are black people just "less responsible" than white people? I think that conclusion requires a special level of justification for obvious reasons.

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#22

Post by bb85 »

amelius wrote: post #13
dempseye wrote: post #2

> The difficulty in keeping weight off reflects biology, not a pathological lack of willpower affecting two-thirds of the U.S.A. Fifty years ago, two-thirds of the USA were not obese. Biology has not changed in that time. What has?

Intake of refined sugars. The amount of time spent sitting at a desk.

That doesn't explain how someone can just let it happen to the point of suffering of it every day without taking simple measures to reverse it.

Most of the time the difference between steady gaining or losing weight is a few hundred calories a day. That's far from a lifestyle change.

When moving around becomes difficult, when dating becomes harder, when the aches and pain start... there's gotta be more to it than just a lot of sugar in your everyday stuff.

I always wonder (for other drugs too), if they're a way to slowly remove yourself from situations, or whatever it is, that make you uncomfortable. A way to permanently disqualify yourself from the race, because the idea of running (no pun intended) makes you anxious?

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#23

Post by pjc50 »

varelse wrote: post #18
blfr wrote: post #3

Boxers and other people doing martial arts competitively have always known this. There has been a "walking around weight" concept since I can remember. Maintaining lower or, even more importantly in that context, higher weight takes concentrated effort. BTW it's a really weird post-Christian belief that there is some you apart from your body and it can do things against your will.

Extending the Christian motif and treating obesity as a sin, one could consider the extra work needed to keep off the weight as penance, no? I'm smelling a new California quack religion(tm) already.

It's called 'weightwatchers', and it allocates sin points to food as a simplified form of calorie counting. Participants go to confessional weigh-ins weekly.

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#24

Post by tim333 »

blfr wrote: post #3

Boxers and other people doing martial arts competitively have always known this. There has been a "walking around weight" concept since I can remember. Maintaining lower or, even more importantly in that context, higher weight takes concentrated effort. BTW it's a really weird post-Christian belief that there is some you apart from your body and it can do things against your will.

>weird post-Christian belief that there is some you apart from your body

The body/mind have a lot of different parts doing different things. In the article the folks conscious minds tried to lose weight and the body's mechanisms tried to regain it. Not sure that's that weird?

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#25

Post by simonbarker87 »

dempseye wrote: post #2

> The difficulty in keeping weight off reflects biology, not a pathological lack of willpower affecting two-thirds of the U.S.A. Fifty years ago, two-thirds of the USA were not obese. Biology has not changed in that time. What has?

Fat cells never go away once you've got them. Fat cells also really don't want to be empty. When you loose weight the fat is broken up in to H2O and CO2 (you literally breath and pee fat away) but the fat cell generally holds onto the water for a while and then, along with a load of other fat cells, will expel that water in one go(which is why you tend to keep a stable weight for a few days and then find you've lost 1 or 2 lbs "overnight"). It's called the Woosh effect I think?

Problem is that the body doesn't want to get rid of that fat cell because "hey, it might be handy one day to store extra energy when we can't eat for a few days because the baboons ate everything" and so it's fairly easy to top that cell back up with fat in the future.

With regards to the slow metabolism refereced in the article (I skimmed it) this is tied to leptin levels which needs to be topped up with "refeed days" every now and then just to kick start you metabolism again. A refeed day is basically a day where you eat a lot of carbs and keep your protein and fat as they usually are on the normal diet days.

Very broadly speaking (and short cutting lots of science and variations), it is easier for a previously fat person to get fat again than it is for a skinny person to get fat in the first place.

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#26

Post by emodendroket »

bb85 wrote: post #22
amelius wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intake of refined sugars. The amount of time spent sitting at a desk.

That doesn't explain how someone can just let it happen to the point of suffering of it every day without taking simple measures to reverse it. Most of the time the difference between steady gaining or losing weight is a few hundred calories a day. That's far from a lifestyle change. When moving around becomes difficult, when dating becomes harder, when the aches and pain start... there's gotta be more to it than jus…

The food industry has a significant number of people employed whose whole job is to make you think foods are healthier than they are and get you to eat more of them. I mean it's not by accident that almost every food in the supermarket ended up with some health claims on the box (my favorite examples of this are, like, "natural" eggs and "gluten-free" meats).

That's assuming you're buying your own food; if you're eating in a restaurant or something you don't even really know what you are consuming.

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#27

Post by jazzyk »

dempseye wrote: post #2

> The difficulty in keeping weight off reflects biology, not a pathological lack of willpower affecting two-thirds of the U.S.A. Fifty years ago, two-thirds of the USA were not obese. Biology has not changed in that time. What has?

The food has changed a lot - as other commenters have pointed out.

But our lifestyles have changed a lot, too.

Most people in sub/urban areas spend 1-2 mins walking to/from their cars and the rest of their waking hours (12+ hours) sitting/eating.

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#28

Post by varelse »

pjc50 wrote: post #23
varelse wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Extending the Christian motif and treating obesity as a sin, one could consider the extra work needed to keep off the weight as penance, no? I'm smelling a new California quack religion(tm) already.

It's called 'weightwatchers', and it allocates sin points to food as a simplified form of calorie counting. Participants go to confessional weigh-ins weekly.

So add penance points for daily exercise milestones as measured by a fitness tracker and it'll be the next thing(tm), no?

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#29

Post by pjc50 »

dempseye wrote: post #2

> The difficulty in keeping weight off reflects biology, not a pathological lack of willpower affecting two-thirds of the U.S.A. Fifty years ago, two-thirds of the USA were not obese. Biology has not changed in that time. What has?

See HN passim "The Sugar Conspiracy" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11444941

Re: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight

#30

Post by tim333 »

gnur wrote: post #12

This is a truly horrifying piece of information. It basically amounts to that going on a diet will make it harder to stay at the weight you had before your diet.

Severe dieting has long been know to do that. Mild dieting combined with exercise seems to work better. We're a bit lacking in quantification on that though. It was interesting to get some numbers from the article.
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