KQED, one of our local PBS stations is running a show called FAT: What Nobody Is Telling You. I had a chance to watch it, and the round table session of doctors that followed the show, last night. I found it insightful and well balanced. That's not easy to achieve with such a sensitive subject. I highly recommend catching it if it's on in your area.
One of the things I found particularly interesting was a comment by a panelist after the show. She said that one of the people in the show was working out three hours a day to lose weight and to maintain a lower weight. And that this amounted to a second job. Another panelist agreed and said that we should look at exercise exactly like a second job. Plan around it, take it seriously, block out time, and so on. Just as we would with an actual job.
That approach is something that I didn't learn the first time around. I lost a lot of weight, kept it off for a while, then fell off the train when I figured I could sacrifice my workouts for more time at my primary job. Really quickly less time at the gym became no time at the gym, and all of the weight, and a little more, came back. This time I look at it with a longer eyed view, and having this second job concept in mind will really help with that. I now realize that I have a disease, called obesity, which just happens to be in remission at the moment. But will only stay that way with constant vigilence, for the rest of my life.
For another take on obesity you can also check out Penn & Teller. They take on the Body Mass Index (BMI), which I totally agree with debunking. I've never felt better in my life and I am still obese by BMI standards. I've always had a problem with the BMI. I don't think fat calipers make sense either. The best way I have seen to gauge fitness is to have the person perform some aerobic exercise that brings up their heart rate, then have then stop and see how long it takes for them to recover. That gauges the health of your heart and lungs, which is really what matters.
Posted by jherr at April 13, 2007 09:58 AMIt isn't clear to me that you have a disease; but if you did, by your own admission it isn't in remission. If a diabetic were in remission, which has occurred in test rats, the patient no longer has to follow the strict dietary guidelines that fighting the disease requires once the disease has been eradicated. Remission equals eradication for all practical purposes. The word you probably want to use is "chronic". If you do have a disease called obesity, then you have a chronic case of it because you are always and constantly having to fight it.
Posted by: mjpjr227 at April 13, 2007 02:55 PMOk, then, not in remission, a chronic condition that I am managing daily. ;-)
Posted by: jherr at April 14, 2007 08:34 AMThanks for signing in, . Now you can comment. (sign out)
(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)