Economic impact laid bare by findings has implications for UK where about two-thirds of people are overweight or obese
Archived version: https://archive.ph/H65uz
Economic impact laid bare by findings has implications for UK where about two-thirds of people are overweight or obese
Archived version: https://archive.ph/H65uz
So the movement you’re referring to is “health at every size” and various studies have shown that following it leads to overall better physical health outcomes compared to “traditional” weight loss/dieting. Here’s a short article with links to various studies: https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/health-every-size/#
The movement isn’t promoting that everyone is healthy at every size but that weight and health may not be causal as people seem to believe (research shows they can be correlated but the methods behind it have also been quite flawed and do not consider a vast majority of covariates that have been previously identifed as having negative relationships with health). Unfortunately, we live in a society (mostly US but also all Western nations) that pushes the idea that only one body type is “healthy” and that our body shape/type is largely within out control and neither of those are previous statements are true. In fact, these ideals have been shown to be negatively correlated with physical and mental health and can be a major contribution to disordered eating and associated symptoms/behaviors.
Obesity is a serious risk factor for many, many conditions. It is not always the cause, but it never helps.
Folks with obesity need better healthcare, which is massively underserved in the west (and everywhere, for everyone).
Nothing beats CI/CO ever, no excuses, nowhere in the universe. It’s thermodynamics.
The primary issue is mental health, and it is a very serious issue Indeed.
Obesity can be a risk factor for certain individuals but more research has been pointing towards family history, genetic, and even environmental effects to explain more of the variance for health outcomes over obesity as a standalone variable. It can definitely makes things more complicated but isn’t the single point of health as we’ve made it out to be.
As for the CI/CO, that has also been disproven quite some time ago and continues to perpetuate because it is a simple way to try and understand weight. Here’s another short (non-scientific) article to dive into that: https://immattersacp.org/archives/2021/06/understand-obesity-before-treating-it.htm#:~:text=Treating%2520obesity%2520isn’t,be%2520OK%252C”%2520she%2520said. In short, individuals vary in how their bodies store and utilize calories and calories themselves vary depending on the source. Some bodies do fall under the fairly simple ci/co addage but the majority do not and continuing to understand it from that lens maintains weight stigma, which we also see as a major contributer to negative health outcomes in individuals living in larger bodies.
While I agree that mental health is a primary issue (it is literally my field of study, practice, and research), I also like to try and share some of the more recent findings and understanding in our field, especially as we continue to learn and correct old findings. I apologize that you’re getting so many long messages but I just find it important to try and speak out where I can, especially after working with and treating folks with eating disorders.
How has cico been disproven? The mental health component is the real issue. As in, for very legitimate reasons, humans can’t maintain the diet, due to failing to maintain discipline. Disproving cico would mean humans create perpetual energy.
If you lock someone in a room and give them only water, they will lose weight. (Set aside vitamins)
Then try a single spoonful of rice a day. Still lose weight.
Continue to increase food, you’ll find eventually they maintain a consistent weight.
Continue to increase food and eventually they will gain weight, as they will be consuming more calories than they burn.
Ci/co as a thermodynamic rule hasn’t been disproven but it works in a vaccum with no other factors considered. Humans are complex and vary in their biological processes that change how calories are utilized, processed, stored, etc. Two people can be put on the exact same diet and exercise plan and have completely different outcomes, that’s where the simplified idea of ci/co has been “disproven” as far as it is commonly understood.
As far as the mental health piece, it is one part of the puzzle but its not necessarily the main component, and also cannot be simplifed to maintaining discipline. Basically, all I’m trying to say is people are complex and just saying an individual needs more discipline or needs to lose weight really reduces the nuances between the relationship of weight and overall health.
Discipline is mental health. Mental health is the real issue.
Edit discipline is not the only relevant mental health topic here, just replying to that in particular.
Am I misunderstanding something or is that article saying “it’s not CI/CO, it’s actually CI/CO”? The incorrect assumption people make is that somehow the only change to energy intake and expenditure is food and exercise (which we have known for very long to not be the case and it’s insane to me that people believe that), not that the law of conservation of energy somehow doesn’t apply. If you expend more energy than you take in, you will lose weight. But measuring either of these things properly is close to impossible and certainly not as simple as “put your height and weight and what you eat and how much you exercise into a calculator”.
No, that’s the correct interpretation, essentially we’ve simplified the “formula” to be easily digested (ci/co) and people have a tendency to understand it as an easy cut calories or expend more. But as you’ve noted, it’s extremely complex and doesn’t take into account individual needs or variability which makes the generalized health advice of “just lose weight/diet/exercise” pretty unhelpful. Especially as we have no true recommended options that contribute to weight loss with long term maintenance.
I got something that beats CICO. And it’s called addressing your specific health concerns instead of just dieting.
You’ve got poor heart health? Cardio will help you more than fasting.
You’ve got diabetes? Limiting sugar intake will help you more than restricting everything.
You’ve got depression? Antidepressants or going outside will help you more than losing weight.
You’ve got a broken arm? Rest and a sling will help you more than losing weight.
HAES is about actually fucking treating your health problems at whatever size you’re at, instead of blaming it on your weight and continuing to fail to lose weight.
CICO ain’t worth shit if the patient can’t lose weight. And if you’re thinking “it’s just a matter of willpower”, well tough shit, people have limited willpower. And being sick doesn’t help willpower either. It’s way more likely for someone to get healthy at their current size, see a willpower increase, and then lose weight, than it is for a sick and suffering person to stick to a diet, lose weight, and then get healthy. HAES is about doing it the right way around, the way around that actually works.
None of that beats cico, it addresses other concerns.
I clearly identified mental health as the critical issue, and to restate: the reason people fail at cico is due to mental health. People can’t create energy and therefore weight from thin air.
Okay so what’s going on in this thread is that I assumed the point was to help people, and you assumed the point was to lose weight. And I think that illustrates what Health at Every Size means perfectly. HAES is about helping people, and the people complaining about HAES aren’t interested in helping people, they only want people to lose weight.
Well, I want people to get good mental health, but I also am aware of the risk obesity causes.
So 2 topics, which both matter. Obesity is a dangerous condition.
Edit Losing weight, when weight is significant enough.to cause risks is helping people.
You started this conversation saying Health At Every Size is bogus and harmful. Now you’re saying both topics are important. I agree. I’m going to assume you’ve changed your mind and now understand the benefits of Health At Every Size at improving people’s health regardless of weight, and also that HAES makes it easier to lose weight if that’s what they also want.
No, I’ll be quite clear: being obese and lacking mental healthcare are both harmful. I’ve been consistent on that.
There is not “health at every size”.
What I can extract and appreciate about that movement is that it champions the need to holistically address the many needs of folks with obesity, beyond simple calorie management. I’ve been consistent about that too. I believe every CICO content I’ve made mentioned mental healthcare.
Obesity is a very dangerous condition that should be removed with great urgency. But I acknowledge that CICO alone will likely not result in long term success.
Health is relative. Health isn’t an absolute boundary between healthy and unhealthy, that’s silly. Health is a polydimensional spectrum. If you want to categorise health “objectively”, well then seeing as men live shorter than women, we’d be forced to classify maleness as an illness and put every man in the world on estrogen pills. And that’s ridiculous. No, health isn’t a single standard that’s the same for everyone.
Health isn’t a point, it’s a direction. Like South. South is a direction. I see Americans say all the time that they’re from the south. They mean Texas. But I live in Australia. From my point of view, they’re from the north. But it’s not like they’re lying. In terms of America, they’re from the south. It’s true.
Health is like South. If you’ve lived your entire life overweight with poor health, then getting healthy can mean a lot of different things. If you start jogging once a week and get healthier, well congratulations, you got healthy. It’s relative. It’s unreasonable for you to demand somebody in that situation meet the ideal of human health. If you do that, if you belittle their progress and say the best they’ve done in their life isn’t good enough, you’ll kill their motivation and ruin what little health they’ve achieved.
And if you go around saying there’s no such thing as health at every size, well then I’ll tell you there’s no such thing as men’s health, because being a man is unhealthy. The two statements are equally ridiculous.
Also encouraging fat folks to improve their health where they can is far better than chanting cico and attempting to shame them. Shame is bad at motivating people. Except to eat, shame is great at getting people attempting to lose weight to eat an entire pizza in a sitting. But instead by encouraging a healthier diet and to increase movement you help them lose weight, and more than that you help them keep it off.