What is the Overfat Epidemic?
The Overfat Epidemic
Weight loss is a primary concern of most people. Trillions of dollars have been spend on it without real success. Millions of dollars are spent each year to research the problem of being overweight.
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The result is a threatening of the industrialized world with an epidemic of overfat people. We can discuss how much body fat is too much, the definitions of obesity and other commonly discussed issues, but the fact is, too much body fat is unhealthy. Rather than dancing around the issues of percent body fat and the latest definitions of obesity, let’s just call the problem what it is: overfat.
By 2030, scientists say, 75 percent of Americans will be overfat, with the rest of the world not far behind. In the U.S., women 20-34 years old are the fastest growing group of overfat people. And in some populations individuals with darker skin the numbers of overfat people are generally much worse. For example, more than 80 percent of black women are overfat. At one time the overfat problem affected adults almost exclusively. But now , overfat children are everywhere.
The primary problem is simple; for most people it’s the overconsumption of sugar and refined carbohydrates. It’s not necessarily the overconsumption of calories of these foods, but even so-called low-calorie sugar foods can overproduce insulin with the result of storing more of this low-fat food as body fat. Companies creating these foods, and those selling them, are the next targets of government and lawyers much like the attack on cigarette companies of recent decades. Most of the issues about being overweight fail to address the problem.
It’s not about weight, it’s about being overfat. Excess body fat is unhealthy for two reasons. First, it’s unhealthy because of the reason it accumulated in the first place for most, it’s unhealthy eat ing habits, for example, as I just noted regarding sugar and refined carbohydrates. Second, stored body fat produces inflammatory chemicals that are a very serious threat to overall health. Chronic inflammation is the first step in the process of development of most chronic diseases, from Alzheimer’s and cancer to diabetes and heart disease.
What is the weight ?
Most people consider excess body weight and body fat as synonymous. But this is untrue: what most really want to do is lose body fat.
We live in a weight-conscious society, and stepping on the scale each morning is a powerful ritual, one difficult to break. Most of the weight the scale measures is water, and most of this water is in the muscles and other body areas, not fat. Body fat weighs much less.
However, body fat takes up much more space than water. Everyone knows this: as we gain or lose fat, our clothes fit differently. In fact, many of the patients I helped lose body fat often didn’t lose weight and some actually gained weight while getting healthy and losing inches off their waist. As body fat is reduced, improved muscle function adds more weight, a healthy sign. So if we want to address the real issue reducing body fat the best way to evaluate is by measuring body size.
There are many ways to measure body size, and even percent body fat. Many weight-loss programs sell various gadgets for determining this issue. But in keeping with simplifying the stress in your life, my suggestion is to avoid the task of trying to focus on these more detailed measurements and avoid the risk of creating a new obsession of measuring yourself. The most simple and practical way to calculate changes in body fat is by periodically measuring your waist with a tape measure. Do this at the level of the umbilicus, the belly button. No other approach will provide you with more information about what you need to do either reduce or maintain body fat levels.
For most people, it’s body fat that should be the focus. Reducing body fat should be done in a healthy way, and fortunately, for the majority of people, this is not difficult to accomplish. Essentially, this whole book is about burning body fat, so this chapter will refer the reader to other chapters for more detailed discussions of certain aspects of fat-burning. For most people, this begins with the Two-Week Test described earlier. In that chapter I suggest weighing yourself before and after the test only, just for reference.
Calorie Restriction:
Restricting calories as a means of losing body weight is the most common approach used in the weight-loss industry. And 95 percent of those who go on a calorie-restricted diet will fail. This includes many who lose weight initially. Most will gain it back plus more in the end. Moreover, many will not lose significant body fat but instead will lose muscle.
By performing a computerized dietary analysis on almost every patient I’ve seen in practice, it’s clear that most people who restrict calories also restricted nutrients. This results in a loss of health and human performance. Dehydration, nutrient loss, muscle and bone loss, lowered metabolism that shifts to more sugar- and less fat-burning and other health issues are most often the real result of weight loss from calorie restriction. In some, the result has been an eating disorder that can be even more difficult to treat.
I’ve emphasized the importance of fat-burning especially how reducing sugar and refined carbohydrates increases it, and how building the aerobic system increases it. By increasing fat-burning, you’ll lose inches on your waist, reduce body fat, have unlimited energy, and not just look and feel fit and healthy but actually live it.
The ABCs of Burning Body Fat:
For almost everyone who has too much body fat, following these three steps will result in the loss of significant body fat (there will always be a very few exceptions with unusual metabolic disorders or other rare problems).
A: Perform the Two-Week Test. Read about carbohydrates and sugars, perform the test and determine your tolerance to carbohydrate foods.
B: Balance your fats. Don’t avoid them, unless they’re bad. Eat sufficient amounts of good fats.
C: Build your aerobic system through easy exercise. For most people, walking is adequate by focusing on improving health and aerobic fitness, there is almost always an appropriate loss of body fat.
Thyroid Troubles
Thyroid dysfunction may be a problem in some people who have difficulty losing body fat. Low thyroid function leads to symptoms that include mental and physical fatigue, increased body fat, depression and skin problems (especially cracking around the heels and on the hands). Hair loss is also common, especially thinning of the lateral one-third of the eyebrow.
The first step is to evaluate thyroid function through blood tests; free T3 and T4, and TSH levels. If these are not normal, thyroid antibodies should be measured. But blood tests don’t always show the relatively minor functional thyroid problems.
Saliva tests may be more important for detecting subclinical thyroid dysfunction. You can also take your temperature those with low thyroid function usually have low temperatures. Below normal temperatures less than about 98.6˚ Fahrenheit or 37˚Celcius may indicate thyroid dysfunction. (Note that NSAIDS - nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs - including aspirin, ibuprofen and others, can also disturb metabolism and decrease body temperature.)
As you improve the quality of your diet and build the aerobic system, and fat-burning begins to increase, thyroid function will improve too. This will be reflected in more normal body temperature and improvements in any other abnormal blood or saliva tests.
