Is this pathetic or what?

I would think your buddy's gonna be in trouble pretty soon. If he has lost 200 pounds (out of 400 pounds) then it must be because his current food intake (post op) was not providing him with enough energy and he was using some of his stored fat. Fine and doodie, cos he had lots of it... but what does he do when it's gone? When he's 150 pounds and he cannot eat enough (with a tiny stomach) to get enough energy for a normal day? Huh?

If one takes the 3600 calories in one pound of fat and multiplies it by the 200 pounds that this guy lost than that turns out to be 720000 calories if you take this over the entire year this is 1972.6 calories that this person is deficient for. This means that if he is burning we will go with a high number here since he is a big guy 3000 calories this means that his body is only taking in 1027.4 calories this is extrememly unhealthy and will eventually kill this guy. The thing about weight loss is that everyone looks to lose weight in a week but weight loss is a long gradual process just as weight gain is. Someone cannot put on 200 pounds in a year just like someone cannot lose this much is a year in any healthy matter. The key is to excercise and to eat fewer calories than are consumed. It may not be fast but it is what works and any person can do it

My idea of a vacation is to sit on the couch and eat chips and drink lots. No workouts just the boobtube. That is lifestyle of a lot of obese folks. Getting off the couch is the first step. The body's natural tendency is to gain weight and conserve energy. Calories stored as fat are energy. Our genetics require the body to sustain life not be fit. Women stop having menstral cycles if their body fat goes below the percentage they entered puberty. No cycle; no getting pregnant. This is the way for all life forms. To lose weight is not natural for the body. I applaud all those 'fat' people out there that realize their health is in danger and do something about it. Till you walk in their shoes....

third choice wrote:

Be careful... the definition of overweight is a strict weight/height ratio that was changed recently. In essence, tens of millions of people woke up one day a few years ago and were "overweight" when they weren't the night before.

By the new standards - some world class sprinters are "overweight" and most football running backs, quaterbacks and wide receivers (people I would generally consider in great shape) are "extremely obese."

So, the majority of Americans may be legally "overweight," but they're not fat.

The definition is based on BMI (body mass index). BMI correlates well with overall health of a population. It is true that there are exceptions (weight lifters and other power athletes), and the media has trotted these out as apparent failures of the measurement scheme. The reality is that these exceptions are rare in the overall population, and to counterbalance that, there are some people who do NOT show up as over-fat via BMI but who are (typically older people with very low muscle mass).

BMI is properly used to measure the "over-fatness" of populations and should not be used as the final determiner for individuals (it was never meant to be). Thus, the current percentages of "overweight Americans" as measured by BMI are not "out of wack".

One of the advantages of BMI is that it is very simple to compute and can thus be used on raw data collected years ago (and remain accurate and consistent).

BMI = Weight in kg/Height in meters^2

(or 703 * Weight in lbs/Height in inches^2)

This is rediculous. "Idiots like you would instantly judge them as being lazy, undisciplined slobs." Well, I'm sorry, but no I am not an idiot, and yes you're friend is lazy and undisciplined, I wouldn't know about him being a slob though since I have never met him. What i do know is that your coworker apparently ate huge amounts of food after college. I know this becuase he now has, or rather had, an extremely large stomach adn gained 100lbs. The stomach stretches when you cram food into it and shrinks if you don't. No one is born with an enormous stomach that never shrinks. You're friend stretched his stomach out by a huge amount by overeating. It took him 10 years to gain over 100lbs and realize he had problems. So he screwed himself. I suppose he couldn't even exercise at that point, which is nobody's fault but his own. He tried to lose weight by dieting and doing 1500 cal a day diets and ended up eventually losing 20 lbs. If he needed, say, 2500 calories a day to maintain wieght, that means he was losing 1000 calories of fat a day. A pound of fat contains 3600 calories. So he was losing a pound ever 3.6 days about. He lost twenty pounds, so I'm assuming he dieted for about 8 weeks then gave up because 20 lbs wasn't, "much of a dent," and decided the diet wasnt working. It was though; he lost twenty pounds. IF he had kept the diet up he would have dropped 100lbs in a year. It took him ten years to gain 100 lbs so it's gonna take a very long time to lose it. I'd say a year is extremely fast. Instead of keeping up with the diet to lose another 30 pounds so he could begin exercising, which would have allowed him to eat more and continue to lose wieght, he gave up and opted for LIFE THREATENING surgery. Now it sounds like he is gonna be in a lot of trouble when he hits around 160lbs or so, depending on how tall he is. Your friend has my pity, but he brought it all onto himself. He is undisciplined because he had no patience with his diets, and lazy becuase he never exercised. Please, don't try and cover for him. I don't eat tons of food and I workout aerobically about 90 minutes a day. This is why I am not fat. I doubt your coworker did 90 minutes of serious aerobic exercise in a month during that time he was gaining weight

Catman,

Your brothers have suffered but only because they brought the suffering on themselves. How can you applaud them for ending it without correcting the actual problem? If someone is extremely obese they have a problem, and it's not just physical. they don't have control over themselves and need to gain it back. By working really hard and losing weight they will learn this. By getting an operation they will not. Does the brother that had the operation exercise at all? Or does he just maintain weight by virtue of his small stomach? If he continually ate bad foods, like chocolate or candy, before his surgery does he still eat them now?

The emphasis of my argument was not that, but the fact that the "BMI" scale had changed in the last 5 or 6 years, and that it's gotten to a ridiculous level. I think that someone who is 6 feet tall has to be under 180 pounds or something like that. I mean, I'm 6 feet tall and 170 pounds, and I'm a serious D-I middle distance athlete. I shouldn't be that close to legally "overweight."

third choice wrote:

The emphasis of my argument was not that, but the fact that the "BMI" scale had changed in the last 5 or 6 years, and that it's gotten to a ridiculous level. I think that someone who is 6 feet tall has to be under 180 pounds or something like that. I mean, I'm 6 feet tall and 170 pounds, and I'm a serious D-I middle distance athlete. I shouldn't be that close to legally "overweight."

You're not that close to "legally overweight". You're in the normal range. 170 lbs at 6' yields a BMI of 23. The upper bound is about 185 lbs for that height. Obese comes in at over 220 lbs for a 6 footer.

But again, I reiterate that BMI is properly used to measure entire populations, not individuals. I'm sure that you can go down to the gym and find a bunch of people with BMI's of 30+ that have <10% body fat, but they make up only a small percentage of the population. The fact remains that in the general population the vast majority of people with a BMI over 25 have excess body fat. I suggest that you go to the CDC site and have a look-see.

I've done some research with some gastric bypass patients and the lifestyle changes do not occur after surgery, activity levels are pretty similar pre and post. there is a pretty big change in fiber type and a loss of type II diabetes almost instantly, and to cap it off most of them are still considered obese (>30 BMI) after they have lost half of their body weight!

Well said..100 lbs lost in one year would be great!!!..we live in a instant gratification world...his getting fat may have been because of instant gratification..his not losing weight could be from instant gratification.....sometimes we have to work for things..and it isnt alot of fun..but in the end...its worth it...most things that are worthy are difficult

Whenever I see an extremely overweight person pounding the pavement, walking or jogging, I try to give them a little nod of respect. Kind of a supportive thing to encourage them because I imagine they are pretty self conscious about getting out there in public and working out.

I agree that fatness is out of hand in our society. I have a hard time buying into the argument that fatness is a disease. It is a function of society and the given person's inability to demonstrate self-control. How many extremely obese people are there in Kenya or Ethiopia? Not many. And not everyone is starving in those countries either. There isn't one other country that has nearly the level of obesity that we have in the US. And since as a nation, we immigrated from all those other countries, that strongly negates the heritage/genetic excuse in my mind. And for the 1 person who maybe can't help it, there are 99 others who can. That 1 out of 100 person just draws a lot more attention.

I don't think fast food should be blamed either. They have fast food in Europe and it doesn't seem to create the problems it does here. I eat at McDonalds and Taco Bell occasionally. I did so now that I am training again and I did so when I almost didn't run at all for 4 years. It is just a matter of self-control. I gained very little weight when I wasn't running. However, I don't eat Burger King for breakfast, McDonald's for lunch and Taco Bell for dinner. It's called moderation, which leads into my next point.

The biggest issue is quantity in this country. The portions we tend to eat are huge. When someone walks into a McDonald's and orders 2 quarter pounders with cheese, a super-size fries, and a super-size Coke, the outcome is pretty obvious unless this person is doing some serious working out. Wherever you eat in other countries, portions are just less.

And with regard to people with their "large stomachs", it is still an issue of self-control. Large stomachs and being addicted to food are two of the quality excuses you hear. That and "I have no friends, so I eat." Well, if you have no friends, become a compulsive runner instead of eater. (These people would regard 40 miles a week as impulsive) Somebody who is 5'9" and 250 or 300, they are in no danger of starving to death. I don't care how hungry they are. I was once watching a show where this person who was like at least 700 pounds and bed-ridden was claiming that just drinking water was causing her to gain weight. Oh, really? Water, which has so many calories was causing weight gain. Ship these people off to Africa for a couple of years and I guarantee not one of them is going to come back nearly as fat as they are now or complaining about water causing them to gain weight. However, another year back home and I'm sure they will be well on their way to their former fat self.