Anti-Obesity Programs

November 25, 2022

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving yesterday was turkey roasted in a bag; stuffing with mushrooms, water chestnuts, and cashews; green bean casserole; followed by apple crisp. Fridge is full, but it’s not like we emptied it beforehand. Today I had a blueberry muffin with coffee. Around 11 I heated a bowl of leftover veggie curry, then around 2 a… Continue reading

Anti-fat bigotry, Anti-Obesity Programs, Dieting/WLS, Recovery

December 29, 2016

Workplace “Wellness” Programs

Slate has a good article on how “wellness” programs aren’t. There’s good details on why they tend not to actually improve health. But the money quote is: Under the ACA, wellness programs are a legal way to shift a significant portion of the cost of premiums onto employees deemed unhealthy. Wellness programs don’t save money… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, WellnessIndustry

February 25, 2015

Frustration

[Note: Includes discussion of weight loss and history of intentional weight loss. Please avoid if you don’t want to read it.] Visited the endocrinologist again to follow up on my med changes. On my way into the office, the doc asks how the meds have made me feel; I said that I haven’t noticed much change… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, DayInTheLife, Dieting/WLS, fat acceptance, Ingress, My health

January 26, 2015

No, Really, Treat the PROBLEM

A comment for Treat Weight First? that I did not approve, but found striking for its ability to completely misunderstand, was: There must be some powerful drugs in that koolaid you’re drinking. You admit you are morbidly obese, you have multiple health problems directly related to obesity, yet you shun the doctors that are trying to help… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, health, Healthcare, My health

January 21, 2015

Treating Weight First?

The Twitterverse has been busy talking about some new treatment guidelines for fatties. Ragen Chastain posted about a piece from Medscape called “New US Obesity Guidelines: Treat the Weight First,” which also has quotes from the lead author. I also clicked over to the guidelines themselves. They start with an extremely helpful objective, to wit:… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, health, Healthcare, Mental health

September 14, 2014

“a successful weight loss drug could potentially have huge sales”

Wow, so many people want to lose weight! Wouldn’t a weight loss drug make piles of money? Check out this business article on the new drug the FDA approved! In a clinical trial involving patients without diabetes, those who took Contrave had an average weight loss of 4.1 percent beyond those receiving a placebo. About… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, News

March 15, 2014

QOTD: Workplace Wellness

Much criticism of “employer wellness programs” have been focused on privacy concerns and angering employees. But now we’re seeing more practical concerns (also known as “does this even work?”). Which leads me to this quote of the day, directed at CEOs: Suppose a vendor made you this proposal: “Pay us to take your employees off the… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, quotes, WellnessIndustry

February 12, 2014

Tell Me Again How It’s “For My Own Good”

Lara Frater wrote about this and I wanted to boost the signal. The Rudd Center recently came out with a study (PDF link) showing that weight stigma affects the stress hormone cortisol. Exposure to weight-stigmatizing stimuli was associated with greater cortisol reactivity among lean and overweight women. These ﬁndings highlight the potentially harmful physiological consequences of exposure to weight stigma.… Continue reading

Anti-fat bigotry, Anti-Obesity Programs, Fat Panic, health, Stress

January 8, 2014

Some Workplace Wellness Programs Work

I found it surprising too! A study of over 67,000 people who could join PepsiCo’s “Healthy Living” wellness program found that 7 years of participation in a “disease management” program resulted in a net savings — the cost of the program was less than the money saved by reduced healthcare costs. These sorts of programs are “aimed… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, WellnessIndustry

August 17, 2013

Opting Out Of The Illusion Of Immortality

Deb Burgard has a terrific post on the latest “being fat makes you die, damnit” study. Masters’ central argument seems to be that even though the repeated findings for decades of rigorous research (reviewed by Flegal, 2013) has found that BMI and mortality are only weakly correlated, and that higher BMI may actually correlate with longevity… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, fat acceptance, Fat Panic, OtherBlogs

death, fat

July 13, 2013

You’re SORRY? Oh fuck you.

Dr. Peter Attia thinks about his former patient often, the woman who came to him in the emergency room at Johns Hopkins Hospital one night seven years ago. She was obese and suffering from a severe complication of Type 2 diabetes, a foot ulcer, which required an urgent amputation. At the time, Dr. Attia admits,… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, Diabetes, health, Healthcare

June 19, 2013

Why I Think Declaring Obesity A Disease is Harmful

It’s inaccurate: A fit fat person is usually healthier than a sedentary thin person. Obese people (BMI of 30 to 34.9) have no greater risk of early death than those of “normal” body size (BMI 18.5 to 24.9). Most people who fit the clinical definition of obese are in the smaller categories. “Normal-weight” people who think… Continue reading

Anti-fat bigotry, Anti-Obesity Programs, Dieting/WLS, fat acceptance, health, Healthcare, News

June 18, 2013

In The News

The AMA has endorsed the idea that “obesity” is a disease, not a “condition”. (Personally I consider it a characteristic.) Forbes states that this is “a move member physicians hope will spur better reimbursement for treating overweight Americans and create better health outcomes.” Exactly how it’s supposed to “create better health outcomes” when commonly prescribed treatments do… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, fat acceptance, FatnessInGeneral, News, Sleep

June 13, 2013

The Fitbit

I’ve been seeing pedometers discussed a bit lately. In some ways, they get a bad rap; we’ve seen them [mis-]used in “wellness” programs and that accuracy varies. Although they can be amusing, as noted by one NY Times commenter: Fitbit has a clip on model that I attach to the waistband of tights or to the center of… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, Exercise, Walking

April 9, 2013

Around the web

A useful discussion of how to say the right thing to someone in hospital (or other bad situation.) Christianity Today wonders if antidepressants keep people from God. Fred Clark at Slacktivist responds: No pious jackasses sit around pondering “Should Christians Take Insulin?” No insufferably holier-than-thou idiots pretend it would be deeply spiritual if they said, “Rattlesnake… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, Dieting/WLS, Mental health

March 12, 2013

Things to Read

A clear explanation of why New York’s fat hatred is much more harmful than the soda ban from Melissa McEwan: People do not die of “obesity.” Some fat people die from complications of what are commonly known as “obesity-related diseases,” like heart disease and diabetes, but those diseases have only been shown to be correlated with fat, not caused by fat.… Continue reading

Anti-fat bigotry, Anti-Obesity Programs, fat acceptance, News, Statistics

January 31, 2013

Weight Loss Myths

Shakesville posted about this Gina Kolata NY Times piece already, but I wanted to highlight this: David B. Allison, who directs the Nutrition Obesity Research Center at the University of Alabama at Birmingham […] sought to establish what is known to be unequivocally true about obesity and weight loss. His first thought was that, of course,… Continue reading

Anti-Obesity Programs, Childhood Obesity, DayInTheLife, Dieting/WLS, News

Living ~400lbs