It’s easy to become obese in America. These 7 charts explain why | Hacker News Reader

It’s easy to become obese in America. These 7 charts explain why

vox.com

13 pointspaulpauper8 comments

The only way I got my weight under control was to limit calories and eat less junk. It's way harder than it sounds, but I used a lot of tracking (just a phone app, any diet app with a food journal should work). You have to learn to eat "all over again" as my dietician said a bazillion times. It took a few months to break the old patterns. I stopped eating anything sugary (except one day a week), I stopped eating out more than once a week, I learned to have options at home (quick options that tasted good but were still healthy). I stopped obsessing over fats or carbs. I ate a lot better, cut my calories down to 1600-1800 a day, and took long walks every day or two. Most importantly I didn't beat my self up when I messed up, but I did write it down in my food journal and marked the day as "red" on a spread sheet. At first I had a lot of red days, but I didn't give up, then I started getting almost all green with an occasional red day over time. I picked Saturdays as a "day of rest" where I relaxed my moderately strict dieting requirements, but still kept calories under 2400 (which figured was my break even). I lost about 50lbs doing it this way and learned to "eat" again probably 80% good stuff and 20% questionable stuff these days. I weigh myself on the weekend and if I've gotten above my goal weight by a couple pounds then I watch it for the next week, and that's been enough for a couple years now to maintain my goal weight

Similar story for me, though I only roughly count calories. Stick to it aggressively during the week, relax at little at weekends, don’t beat myself up if I go out and get trashed occasionally then eat a whole tub of ice cream.

I’ve been weighing myself every morning and tracking it in a google sheet and that’s been key for me. it’s interesting watching the spikes on the weekends. Makes it really easy to understand the consequences of my choices.

I’ve lost nearly 20kg over the past 6 months or so and it’s been… easy? Just a few more to go.

Those are all good reasons but they are not the root cause per se.

The attraction to such foods starts with the normalizing of them (and their eventual result). Human behaviour is very much a function of environment / nature. Our evolution and survival came from observing our neighbors and following suit. When everyone at the supermarket has soda in their carts we naturally assume - without even thinking - it's ok for us too.

Put another way...Availablity is a problem. But acceptability The Problem.

Along the same lines, previous social friction / deterrents are no longer fashionable. Call someone "chubby" and your labeled a bully and instantly marginalized or cancelled. On the other hand it goes unnoticed how calebrities (e.g., Oprah) spent years promoting "love your body"* and now push their own diets / meals. For all intents and purposes for a health perspective sugar is the new cigarettes. Unfortunately, social norms aren't interested in the dangers.

The food is a problem. But people refusing to come to terms with the truth about those foods is ultimately the root problem.

* Promoting love your body is fine. Unfortunately, the health implications are rarely mentioned. That type of deception needs to be denormalizes.

supermarket has soda in their carts we naturally assume - without even thinking - it's ok for us too.

But everyone is aware of the obesity problem or that soda is bad, no? It's in the media a lot. Popular reality TV shows not uncommonly feature weight loss challenges. I think it's more of an addiction and tastiness problem than a groupthink or cultural problem. Modern food is not satiating and digests too easily. Those huge Starbucks Frappes are not much different from protein shakes bodybuilders drink to add weight but tastier.

Aware? Yes. Unfortunately, once you get to the supermarket - i.e., the place of purchase - you see a butt-load of signals that say otherwise.

You don't get to the addiction and tastiness without social acceptance first.

Think about it...there is more pain, suffering and death from obesity (and conditions triggered by it) than say cocaine. Why? Because sugar is socially ok and cocaine is not. Give sugar the same stigma and the appeal is greatly reduced. We are social animals. We want to be accepted. We are wired to conform to the norms around us.

The bottom line: We've normalized the abnormal, and have made saying so socially unacceptable.

You don't get to the addiction and tastiness without social acceptance first.

Hmm...the size of the dieting, weight loss, and fitness industry would seem to suggest people are aware it is bad. Few fat people want to be fat.

Step 1 - Recognize and accept the behaviour of others around us

Step 2 - Parrot the behaviour.

Just because few people say they don't want to be fat doesn't mean zillions of years of evolution (and their subconscious) isn't working against them.

When nearly everything around you says your decisions + behaviour is ok it is - being human - very hard to change. This is why users who try to quit relapse, they continue to surround themselves in the same environment.

If you want an easy on ramp, try any of the Jonah Berger books. That should get you started. As it is, you're not recognizing how being wired to be social can backfire when unhealthy becomes the norm. When it comes to such things, the norm is far more powerful than your recognizing.

https://jonahberger.com/

Everything has sugar added. Even sausage has sugar added. I noticed recently products without sugar/corn syrup are labeled as keto. So yogurt without sugar added is keto yogurt.

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