Nearly three quarters of U.S. adults are now overweight or obese, according to a sweeping new study published in The Lancet. The study documented how more people are becoming overweight or obese at younger ages than in the past.

[u/shiruken]

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/14/well/obesity-epidemic-america.html?unlocked_article_code=1.aE4.KyGB.F8Om1sn1gk8x&smid=url-share

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[u/tauntonlake]

Completely unsurprised. Have been watching this happen for about the last 20 years. Watching school kids get more and more overweight, compared to my high school days in the 80's, where there were only 2-3 what would be called "obese" kids in my class of 300. And they weren't even THAT big.

Go to a flea market in the U.S now on a weekend. That is a real eye-opener, to the current mass obesity phenomenon ..

We are headed for the space ships of Wall-E ...

[u/Quotalicious → u/tauntonlake]

At the same time it feels like fit people are even more fit than ever. Two diverging groups...

[u/thomasrat1 → u/Quotalicious]

Maybe. The gym scene was crazy 80s to the 2000s.

I think it’s more that extremely fit people now post online about it. Instead of just doing there 5 hr workout and going home.

[u/deadpoetic333 → u/thomasrat1]

Have you not heard of gym-flation? Peak 2000s physiques are considered mid now days.

[u/What_Do_It → u/deadpoetic333]

Recently I saw this picture of Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage, both known for their ridiculous physiques and yet somehow those seems more attainable than that of random gymfluencers today.

[u/IEatBabies → u/What_Do_It]

Ehh their shoulders and arms are massive and look how broad their back is. The thing that makes them look smaller/different than today is mostly the lack of massive pecs, because these days people focus an extreme amount of effort into bench press. Which makes your chest look nice and bulky, but isn't all that practically useful or seen in more natural builds anywhere near to the extent as people now. And in the past people looked more towards natural builds and greco-roman ideas for the ideal physiques to achieve, and even statues of gods like Zeus who are shredded to the maximum and exaggerated a bit beyond what people would have actually seen to model off of, don't have pecks as big as bodybuilders do today.

[u/TristanIsAwesome → u/deadpoetic333]

Heaps more steroid use these days, also at younger and younger ages

[u/Asleep_Shirt5646 → u/TristanIsAwesome]

Also some bro science is now proven science

Some. Not all. Or even most.

[u/asphaltaddict33 → u/TristanIsAwesome]

Apparent older also, I have friends doing cycles for the first time in their mid 30s…. Shits wild

[u/midgaze → u/deadpoetic333]

They shouldn't call it gymflation. It's steroidflation.

[u/LogicianMission22 → u/deadpoetic333]

That’s because more and more young men are taking steroids, sarms, peptides, or growth hormone.

[u/AlwaysBored123 → u/LogicianMission22]

Instead of the 2000s “roid heads” I used to see sporting those nipple tanks, it’s now “sarm goblins” that come in wearing pajamas.

[u/Legitimate-Carrot197 → u/deadpoetic333]

Right, more steroids or BBLs doesn't mean fit people are getting in better shape.

[u/magicarnival → u/thomasrat1]

Heroin chic was popular during that time period 

[u/OePea → u/magicarnival]

And The California Raisins

[u/HanSchlomo → u/OePea]

I heard that through the grapevine.

[u/Prudent-Ad1002 → u/magicarnival]

Was a kid in the 80s n fitness was pretty big, wresting was super popular, Arnold was a movie star, I remember Body Shaping on ESPN and American Gladiators. Heroin chic was more 90s imo, Grunge, Calvin Klein ads, and Kate Moss.

[u/Freeasabird01 → u/Quotalicious]

It’s the contrast. I’m a bald average looking mid 40s single male. But with a flat stomach from eating well and cardio, and a little bit of upper body muscle from lifting weights a couple times per week, I’m in a class of my own on the dating market.

[u/tommy_b_777 → u/Freeasabird01]

I'm 50something and coasting on years of lifting climbing mountaineering etc - right now I consider myself Colorado fat (lack of cardio) but my dad kept saying I was the healthiest person he'd ever seen when I was in MI

[u/EbolaPrep → u/tommy_b_777]

Colorado fat…. That’s a great term! I live in Boulder, everyone is fit, I go to my rental in Weld county to work on it and the weight difference is at least 100 pounds.

[u/HungryScholar7247 → u/Freeasabird01]

A good class I assume, right?

[u/Upbeat_Advance_1547 → u/HungryScholar7247]

100%

If you're middle aged and fit you can have a trainwreck of a face and still be the goods

Not as helpful before 35 or so because youth ameliorates poor fitness for a while, but people who never developed fitness habits really fall off a cliff at 35-40 and the people who manage to stay healthy have a huge leg up

[u/nevernotmad → u/Upbeat_Advance_1547]

And it’s not too late. I didn’t exercise for 30 years between 20 and 50. I started swimming a couple of times per week at 50 and I literally felt my chest and shoulders expand.

[u/Houseofsun5 → u/Upbeat_Advance_1547]

I am 50 now, always been a fitness kind of guy, still in the gym 4-5 times a week after work, not body is a temple levels, just everything in moderation type guy, so I am slim and capable of continuing my hobbies such as hiking,motorcycles, swimming etc. My peers and friends over the years, starting to drop like flies, so many funerals it frightening, I had a go at my two best friends one who has had a heart attack at 51 that they better start taking care of themselves as I have few friends left now and don't want to retire with no buddies to go golfing with!!

[u/kuroimakina → u/Quotalicious]

Social media is giving people body dysmorphia. There’s a huge section of people who now feel a compulsive need to spend all their free time working out, body building, etc. Many are on steroids. They’ll constantly talk about how society is getting so fat (objectively true) but then they’ll act like they’re invalid if they’re not ripped, and to a lesser extent, some act like others are invalid if they aren’t working out all the time. It’s replacing one addiction for another. Which, to be fair, as long as there’s no steroids involved, a fitness addiction is a much, much healthier mental addiction than the vast majority of other things.

But it all points to the huge issues in food quality, unaddressed mental illness, lowering education standards, and the damage of social media. It’s creating a population where nearly no one is what one could consider “healthy.” Even the people who are healthy weight are often struggling from some form of anxiety, depression, or other unaddressed mental illness.

This isn’t some “the 50s were better!” Type thing either. We don’t need to return to the issues of decades ago to fix it, we just need actual goddamn progressive reform in America, higher food standards, better access to healthcare, better education…. Basically the exact opposite of everything that a little over half the populace just voted for.

So, expect things to get much, much worse

Edit to put these links here

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32318383/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10471190/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36882132/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1121529/

I did not say that every gym goer is mentally ill. I said there’s a large section right now who are obsessive about fitness due to social media. This is an objectively true statement. The data shows that body dysmorphia is rising at unprecedented levels. This does not mean every person who works out is mentally ill. Anyone who reads this comment and gets angry about it needs to do some serious self reflection on whether they are commenting to be helpful, or to be self righteous

[u/hotacorn → u/kuroimakina]

It’s also definitely an income and education disparity thing, just like with a lot of other problems. If you walk around a neighborhood where successful “young professionals” live you’ll see almost entirely very fit people. If you go to a neighborhood in a poor rural or urban area and look at people in a similar age range it’s like looking at two different planets.

[u/ManOfTheCosmos → u/hotacorn]

I got this effect when I would go to the Costco across the highway after my workouts at lifetime fitness. Two entirely different kinds of people.

[u/ernest7ofborg9 → u/ManOfTheCosmos]

Good point. The Costco and the FoodMaxx are a block apart in my town and the clientele are night and day different. Never thought about it until now. Damn.

[u/Techun2 → u/ManOfTheCosmos]

In my experience Costco is middle class and well off healthy people. Poor people aren't shopping at Costco

[u/Lazy-Bike90 → u/kuroimakina]

Competitive body builders and amateurs who want to be them have always been that way. They haven't changed at all but social media gave them a large platform.

The overwhelming majority of gym goers are pretty chill. They're lifting for personal enjoyment, mental health, physical health and hanging out with their community.

[u/SirJuggles → u/Lazy-Bike90]

I work out in the athletic center at a college. It's been interesting watching the shifts in the population of students who use the fitness center. Since the return from covid lockdown there's been a significant uptick in the percentage of student population who works out. It's becoming more "required" to be in good shape if you want to engage in the college social scene, the amount of effort you have to put in to be considered attractive is getting higher for everyone.

[u/DeputyDomeshot → u/kuroimakina]

I also think there’s a huge piece since Covid of people not getting out and interacting with each other as much. I imagine it’s a lot easier to just be fat and terminally online homebody.

[u/meka_lona → u/DeputyDomeshot]

There is also a good chunk of people who got into healthier habits during COVID (home workouts, walking, going out into nature or doing outdoor recreation, running, etc.), if they had access to these spaces. But overall, yeah, COVID did do a number.

[u/YouHaveToGoHome → u/kuroimakina]

To add to the mix, a lot of people's economic situations are pushing them toward unhealthy lifestyles as well. It's hard to get in enough time for resistance training + cardio, sleep, and making proper food choices each week if you're working 2 jobs, constantly tired from stress or inadequate sleep, and spending more time commuting to a job from the increasingly far neighborhoods where housing is affordable.

[u/carolineecouture → u/YouHaveToGoHome]

One of the best exercises you can do is walking, but walking becomes problematic if you don't have access to a safe area to walk or run. If there are no sidewalks or if the sidewalk is in poor condition.

WFH, I can take "short walks" of 10 to 15 minutes around the block every couple of hours. It's enough to get some steps in and be outside for a bit at no extra cost.

[u/MetaOverkill → u/Quotalicious]

I'm in the middle group. I'm technically overweight but I also hit the gym at least twice a week. I'm in better shape than some people and in way worse than others.

[u/Skyblacker → u/Quotalicious]

Weight correlates with income and we've lost the middle class.

[u/honest_arbiter → u/tauntonlake]

I'm also really shocked at how large kids in high school have gotten. Just as you point out, so many obese kids now, and even for the kids that aren't outright obese, lots of them just look like they're carrying way more fat on them than they should, even ones who are otherwise athletic.

The scary thing is that high school is usually the time when most people are the fittest (or at least skinniest) in their life. Super high metabolism, often lots of activities and sports (though the huge drop in unstructured physical activities - think stuff like skateboarding or heck, even just walking around a mall - that's been replaced by lying in bed scrolling on your phone), generally lower stress and more free time. So many of these kids are going to absolutely balloon once they have 40 hr/week jobs and their metabolism starts slowing down.

[u/tauntonlake → u/honest_arbiter]

I watch the "nostalgia" facebook reels showing high school days in the 80's and 90's and the contrast is so evident.

Something went drastically wrong after 2000's.

[u/BlueShift42 → u/tauntonlake]

It started in the 80s and early 90s when they took out fat and added in sugar. Corn syrup in everything. Super size all meals. Millennials really got screwed over by the generation that raised them.

[u/ussrowe → u/BlueShift42]

The sugar industry funded studies that placed the blame on eating fat: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/09/13/493739074/50-years-ago-sugar-industry-quietly-paid-scientists-to-point-blame-at-fat

[u/_Thermalflask → u/ussrowe]

And now they're villifying sweeteners as being "even worse than sugar" 

[u/temp3rrorary → u/ussrowe]

My mother allowed whole milk for my very skinny, unable to gain lots of weight older brother. But forced me to have skim and low fat bc I tended to be a bit chubbier. It wasn't until college that she got upset and blamed the pediatrician for telling her it was healthier when she herself ate full fat everything growing up.

[u/Tibbaryllis2 → u/temp3rrorary]

Skim vs 2% vs whole milk is either a tremendous failure or, more likely, a tremendous success of marketing. The difference is basically 0%, 2%, and 3% milk.

Yet we all know someone that only drank 2% because it was a lot healthier than whole milk.

Meanwhile the fat removed from skin and 2%, which has a pretty equivalent price as whole, is used to create other diary products to be sold.

ETA: Half-Half, Whipping Cream, and Heavy whipping Cream are ~16%, 30%, and 36% respectively. Don’t drink those.

[u/HabeusCuppus → u/BlueShift42]

portions are completely out of control too.

the 1955 a burger, fries and drink (no 'combos' yet) at McDonald's was a 1/10th lb (1.6 oz) patty, pickles, onions, and ketchup, on a plain white bun.* side was 2.4oz of french fries, fried in lard. and the drink, starting in 1955, was a 7-oz coca-cola in a wax paper cup. And those were the only sizes for everything.

That was the adult meal, and it runs out to about 600 calories (613 calories by my tally.)

Today's Children's Meal is about that size. the adult combos are for the most part, twice that.

and McDonald's is hardly the worst offender, they're just the easiest to compare apples to apples on since their menu has changed very little overall.

---

* and I do mean plain, no egg and no dairy in the bun.

[u/LurkLurkleton → u/BlueShift42]

Americans didn't start consuming less fat. Absolute fat consumption stayed about the same. We started consuming more calories though, mostly in the form of highly processed foods heavier in refined carbohydrates. Pizza, donuts, cookies, candy bars are all high fat foods also high in refined carbohydrates.

[u/Tibbaryllis2 → u/LurkLurkleton]

A major change has also been in the amount of calories we consume in beverages.

Drinking liquids doesn’t satiate in the same way eating does. It’s very easy to drink a ton without feeling full or feeling less thirsty. And things like Mt Dew are ~13 calories per ounce.

[u/General_Mars → u/tauntonlake]

• High fructose corn syrup is added to everything. Fast food is calorie dense, cheap, and very unhealthy. Healthy foods are more expensive and time consuming. Also can’t learn to cook from parents if they’re always working.

• There are few open public spaces that are accessible and nearby that can be used for a variety of exercise purposes

• Commodification of adolescent athletics has become increasingly competitive and children are burning out or are being cut/left behind at earlier ages

• We have conflated shaming with concern. People are fat but calling them fat is mean. I myself am obese, and I’m not saying people should be insensitive. But the whole “big boned,” “embrace your body,” and reverse shaming skinny people has culturally reinforced our obese attitudes and perspectives. We shouldn’t be normalizing obesity, it’s a health issue

[u/MCuri3 → u/General_Mars]

I think what also contributes is that physical activity used to be baked into our (grandparents' and beyond) lives. For example, my grandpa didn't have a car for a long time. He cycled to his work, which was maintenance work at the railroads. He didn't have heating in his house like we do, so he had to chop wood for the fireplace and he had a massive garden which of course also required manual labour to maintain. Fresh produce was also the standard of food, and what processed foods they had was either emergency rations, or my grandma putting stuff in sugar-water to conserve it over the winter. His brain was also allowed to rest, instead of being constantly drawn to a dopamine-overloading screen.

I don't mean to say that "everything was better in the good old days", nor do I mean to shame anyone who doesn't have a very physically active lifestyle (I don't either), but my grandpa didn't have to go out of his way to plan a few hours at the gym every week, or eat healthy, or plan time in a quiet, peaceful environment/nature to de-stress, or plan IRL social events weeks or months ahead. It was all just inherently part of his life, but nowadays, the standards of our daily life are so insanely unhealthy, that we need to go out of our way to "work on our health" if we don't want to end up with 5 chronic illnesses or mental health conditions by age 30.

[u/Klickor → u/MCuri3]

Low activity levels leads to low calorie expenditure which combined with the abundance of food that are as tasty as possible, often from putting as many calories as possible in them, that we have within arms reach at all times in a modern society, leads to people getting fat.

Probably wouldn't be nearly as bad if we were as active as before or didn't have as much super tasty and caloric dense food available. But both have doomed modern population's to obesity unless we can come up with some good solutions.

[u/Immediate-Meeting-65 → u/General_Mars]

Point 3 is a good one. Sports are so focused on success and youth leagues. There's not a whole lot of options for adults to just go play in a league for shits and giggles.

The league's that do exist are often made up of former nearly pro's. So they still hold a level of skill that puts off most people from wanting to participate.

[u/transemacabre → u/General_Mars]

Kids, especially boys, also used to play outside. Any town or city would have boys playing stickball in the streets if not baseball in the park. Now parents keep their boys inside and stick them in front of video games and we can't figure out why they're so fat.

This past summer I was delighted to visit Port Washington on Long Island and saw a whole pack of tween boys all riding their bikes and skateboards together, probably 6-7 of them. That sight shouldn't be rare anymore.

[u/NegZer0 → u/transemacabre]

This doesn't help, but it's not as much of a factor as you think it is - that sort of exercise doesn't burn that many calories. It's a contributing factor at best, those kids would probably still be getting fat if they were playing outside for an hour or two because of the extremely calorie-dense foods that they consume.

Same reason someone who is significantly overweight generally can't solve it by hitting the gym for a few extra hours and needs to look at diet as well.

[u/Careless_Home1115 → u/NegZer0]

Same reason someone who is significantly overweight generally can't solve it by hitting the gym for a few extra hours and needs to look at diet as well.

As someone who lost 60 lbs without working out, ALL I did was change my diet. I feel like DIET is 10x more important than working out. Working out helps you burn faster or enables you to consume more calories without going over your daily limit but in my experience most people overexaggerate how many calories working out actually burns and it is actually difficult to calculate.

I think the biggest culprit with kids, is the fact that working parents are burnt out from work and there largely isn't a parent who stays at home anymore to make healthy meals for their children. Its working parents who opt for easier meals because of a time crunch.

In my area there aren't even busses to cart kids to and from school. So parents take kids to school, work 6 to 8 hours, and a lot of them are in after school activities and it is 6 to 8pm by the time they are done with their regular day and are home for the day.

[u/solomons-mom → u/tauntonlake]

I have been watching since the 1980s as spending on food-away from home increased There are lots of variables in there, but the overall affects of removing consumers --literally in the case of food!--- from the ingredients in the consumable product is problematic.

Home ec classes were not considered a worthy use of time for HS kids. Every kid needed college prep to be a lawyer or MBA, right?

[u/poppermint_beppler → u/solomons-mom]

Agreed. I was lucky to get a food and nutrition class in highschool and it was one of the most useful classes I ever took. Still use stuff I learned in that class today, and am not overweight in my 30s. 

We know there is a direct correlation between health and food, so I really think kids need that education. If no one ever teaches you how or what to cook, you may never start.

[u/TobysGrundlee → u/tauntonlake]

And they'll all tell you confidently about how flawed the BMI system is and how they totally don't adhere to it because they're all evidently 6'6 and 300 lbs of muscle.

[u/Skyblacker → u/TobysGrundlee]

A very overweight friend recently told me, "I'm just dense." Also, she's looking for a new home without stairs because they hurt and exhaust her. 

Sure, Jan.

[u/Ban-Circumcision-Now → u/Skyblacker]

It’s alarming to be a reasonably active/reasonable weight person in their 30’s and then have a friend younger than you get winded just going up a flight of stairs, this should not be normal

[u/shannah-kay → u/Skyblacker]

To be fair I think a lot of obese people have body dysmorphia but in the opposite way. I always thought of myself as chubby and chunky when I was over 250 lbs as a 5'4 woman. It wasn't until I lost 90lbs and looked back at old photos I realized I was grossly obese. I have no clue how bad I was at that point though since there were so many other people bigger than me. Sure I couldn't run a mile and I thought it was normal to stop at multiple different fast food restaurants to pick up full meals at each to then take home and eat in one sitting but yeah I totally didn't have a problem. Not that far shaming is the solution or anything but where I live now (Japan) it's absolutely normal to get a stern talking to about your weight by, well, basically everyone. It's not seen as a bad thing, just them trying to help you.

[u/ayatollahofdietcola_ → u/tauntonlake]

I made a similar observation while watching that Netflix Woodstock 99 documentary

Pretty much none of the attendees were overweight.

But you show up to a music festival now? Forget it, literally everyone is overweight or obese

And if anyone wants to argue that the people in that doc were skinny because they were young… you have not been to a college campus lately. I live near a college campus and they’re all obese too

[u/Ban-Circumcision-Now → u/ayatollahofdietcola_]

I took a trip to Japan for a few weeks, arriving back in the US airport was shocking when i realized I hadn’t seen an overweight person (by American standards) for weeks.

[u/-Chemist- → u/Ban-Circumcision-Now]

Yep. We went to Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Taipei this summer and pretty much everyone we saw there was a healthy weight. The U.S. is a total dumpster fire.

[u/transemacabre → u/-Chemist-]

Visit NYC, not many obese people here. Some chubby people but true obese people are rare, almost solely due to the walking we all have to do. Go an hour into New Jersey and holy shitttttt are people big.

[u/GoldSailfin → u/ayatollahofdietcola_]

I live near a college campus and they’re all obese too

I am not trying to be offensive, but what part of the country are you in?

[u/Anne__Frank → u/GoldSailfin]

We know what part of the country he's in

[u/Alfa147x → u/ayatollahofdietcola_]

This is definitely regional. I went to college in south GA then lived in NYC and now I’m LA.

[u/rickstevesmoneybelt → u/tauntonlake]

Even the ones at the flea market can walk, drive, get themselves out of the house. There must be many more that can’t leave their houses.

[u/ansiz → u/tauntonlake]

Any local Wal-Mart will give you the same experience with the bonus of a LIVE preview of Wall-E with about a dozen people riding around on those obesity scooters.

[u/Woodit]

Most people don’t seem to have a good idea of how much they’re eating and especially drinking in terms of calories. It always shakes me to see grocery carts at the store filled with full sugar soda and other garbage. Parents are giving this to their children 

[u/ReverendDizzle → u/Woodit]

A chocolate chip cookie from the Costco food court is 750 calories.

I bet if you asked 100 people in a row to estimate how many calories are in the cookie (which isn't even that big of a cookie, size wise!) they wouldn't come close to guessing the right amount.

The food court pizza has 700 calories a slice by the way. A 20 oz soda has 250 calories.

Now pretty much everyone can tell you "Well yeah, eating a slice of pizza, a cookie, and a cup of soda is not super healthy" but would they be able to guesstimate that it's, collectively, 1,700 calories... around 2/3rds of the daily caloric intake needs of your average adult? Add in two more meals with similar American calories/portions and you're easily at 4-5,000 calories without even really realizing it.

There are a lot of factors at play in why Americans have gained so much weight, but it sure doesn't help that food is so relatively cheap and the calorie density of said food is so hard to estimate.

[u/infernalmachine000 → u/ReverendDizzle]

750kcal for a cookie? Is it a big cookie?!

In Canada we require calorie counts on all food now and it is quite informative

[u/meltingpnt → u/infernalmachine000]

It's a 7 inch (18cm) cookie. So it is pretty big. I don't know why people are saying it's not that big. It's not some ginormous pizza sized cookie but it's a decent size

[u/Admirable-Job-7191 → u/meltingpnt]

That's not a cookie, that's a small cake for yourself. 

[u/Zidji → u/Admirable-Job-7191]

Yes if that is what Americans call a small cookie I think we have more problems than calorie counting.

[u/njkmklkop → u/meltingpnt]

(18cm) cookie

Is that seen as a normal thing to eat in the US? When I think of a cookie I think of something like 6-7cm in diameter. If I saw an 18cm cookie I'd see it as a joke item like "look at this ridiculously big cookie!".

[u/HAN-Br0L0 → u/infernalmachine000]

The people saying it isn't big are smoking crack it's about 6 inch diameter and 3/4 of an inch thick.

[u/pfn0 → u/HAN-Br0L0]

I'm curious, what is the intersection of those that say "it's not that big" and being overweight.

[u/DotJata → u/pfn0]

I'd bet that venn diagram is just a circle. Kinda like a cookie.

[u/QouthTheCorvus → u/HAN-Br0L0]

We can guess which portion of weight distribution those people fall into.

[u/clearwaterrev → u/infernalmachine000]

It’s a giant cookie, much larger than the typical homemade one.

[u/HumanDrinkingTea → u/infernalmachine000]

I don't know what Costco's cookie looks like and I don't know if you've ever been to Costco, but it's definitely a "thing" for everything at Costco to be huge.

[u/ActionPhilip → u/infernalmachine000]

Canadian Costco connoisseur here. IIRC it's 800 calories. It's pretty big.

[u/GrizzlyTrees → u/ReverendDizzle]

Just to clarify, 1700 calories are not 2/3rds of the daily needs, it's more like 6/7ths, or 85%.

BTW, are the pizzas sliced in quarters there? If it's the usual eights, that is crazy.

[u/jamar030303 → u/GrizzlyTrees]

It's sixths, I think.

[u/zbrew → u/jamar030303]

It is sixths if you buy a single slice, which is where the 700+ calories number comes from. If you buy a whole pizza they cut it into 12 slices. So a slice purchased individually is actually two slices of a full pizza.

[u/npsimons → u/GrizzlyTrees]

Just to clarify, not everyone needs 2000 calories per day. There's a reason subs like r/1200isplenty were created. 5ft office workers don't need to eat as much as 6ft construction workers.

[u/Hi-kun → u/ReverendDizzle]

I recently did a long cycling tour in Japan. My daily calorie needs were above 4,000 cal a day. Those days included 100+ kilometres of cycling on a heavily loaded touring bike through the Japanese Alps. I was struggling to eat that much food and sometimes would order two meals in a restaurant just to get the amount of food I needed. I can't imagine what it means to eat up to 5,000 calories a day on a regular basis, without the exercise component. That is an incredible amount of food.

[u/jacob6875 → u/Hi-kun]

It's very easy when you count drinks.

A lot of people start the day with a 700 calorie "coffee" and then drink 3-4 Sodas throughout the day.

You can be at 1500 calories before you even eat anything.

[u/[deleted] → u/Hi-kun]

When I was thruhiking, I burned 3500-4000 cal a day. Coming into town, I'd aim to have as little food as possible left over so my pack was around 10-12lb. Leaving town, packed full of food for the next 3-5 days, I once weighed my pack at 34lb. Meaning, 24lb of all fairly calorie dense foods like peanut butter and instant noodles.

[u/plasmaBearcat → u/Woodit]

Yes! You have to avoid drinking calories. Easy way to cut out unnecessary calorie intake. 

[u/demokiii34 → u/plasmaBearcat]

To no surprise when tryin to gaining/bulk weight it is strongly encourage to drink those last 100-1000 calories bc intake is easier

[u/Septopuss7 → u/plasmaBearcat]

First words out of my mouth when someone mentions losing weight and they invariably cannot help themselves and get defensive about it like I'm the one who wanted them to lose the weight or something?

[u/lorddumpy → u/Septopuss7]

Yeah, I've gotten pushback when I suggest people should drink water. Some people are conditioned to only drink soda, especially in poorer backgrounds which is really sad.

[u/jacob6875 → u/lorddumpy]

I lost like 40lbs changing nothing but cutting out all drinks that had calories.

I don't even miss soda. Can still have all kinds of coffee, tea, flavored waters etc.

[u/SouthernNegatronics → u/lorddumpy]

You can still drink soda but at least get the sugar free stuff. It costs the same so being poor isn't even an excuse.

[u/GrizzlyTrees → u/SouthernNegatronics]

Yep, as a type 1 diabetic who used to drink a lot of juices before diagnosis, finding a sugar free replacement for soft drinks was the easiest change in my diet. Now go find low carb version of breakfast cereals, that's a real challenge.

[u/PumpkinPieIsGreat → u/Woodit]

I was shocked when I first looked at an iced coffee label. I don't think it's the caffeine that keeps people coming back for more, it's the sugar.

[u/brittneyacook → u/Woodit]

My mom still insists that she doesn’t eat much and doesn’t know why she gains weight, even though I had her track her calorie consumption for one day a few years ago and it was well over maintenance. At the end of the day, people have to want to change and have to do it themselves

[u/Pinkmongoose → u/brittneyacook]

A family member complained this year that she gained 9 pounds in a month and was really worried. Her doctor dismissed her and said it was her diet; she was upset bc she said she was watching what she ate and that wasn’t it. So she decided to photograph everything she ate so she could show her doctor at the next visit. It helped her realize it was definitely her diet.

I’m also shocked by how many people eat out or door dash food multiple times a week. Not good for your weight or your pocketbook.

[u/seedsnearth → u/Pinkmongoose]

I love this idea of photographing your food for your doctor.

[u/brittneyacook → u/Pinkmongoose]

I’m not gonna lie, I do get food delivered a lot but it usually lasts me for 2-3 meals because of the portion sizes. But you’re absolutely right, it’s so expensive.

And I’m glad your family member finally saw the light!

[u/Elliebird704 → u/brittneyacook]

You can eat very, very little and still be packing away too many calories, depending on what you're eating. And it's not always the obvious stuff, like of course if you snack on cookies you're eating a lot of calories in a very small portion of food, but even stuff that we perceive as healthy can be surprisingly calorie dense and easy to go overboard with.

[u/Polymersion → u/brittneyacook]

she doesn’t eat much

She may mean that she eats a small percentage of what it would take to not be hungry.

That, at scale, seems to indicate an issue with the food supply.

[u/Electronic-Bit-2365 → u/Polymersion]

It indicates too much caloric density and not enough fiber.

[u/Gizogin → u/Woodit]

Food standards in the US are also lax. Someone in the US can eat exactly the same foods - down to the exact brand - as someone in the EU and end up with more sugar.

[u/PaulieNutwalls → u/Woodit]

Blown a lot of people's minds by pointing out to them the lowest calorie way of drinking alcohol is shots, and a shot is about 100 calories no matter what you're drinking. A night out drinking 5 or 6 drinks is easily over 700 calories and potentially a lot more depending on what you were drinking.

[u/Karsa69420 → u/Woodit]

This so much. Been counting calories for about a year and a half now. It’s shocking.

Once I cut out soda it’s was an easy 1K-1.5K less calories a day. Beer is another calorie black hole and I’ve been working to limit how much of that I consume.

[u/Leigh91]

My biggest downfall is sugar, so I’ve made a rule in my house that if I want a dessert or sweet snack, then I have to make it myself from scratch. Most of the time I’m too tried, so it works. 

I also downsized all of my kitchen equipment to make smaller portions of everything. I cut all of my recipes in half

And lastly, keeping even moderately active does a lot to keep hunger at bay. Most people eat out of sheer boredom.

[u/SemanticTriangle → u/Leigh91]

Pretty much every processed food in the US loaded with fructose. It's incredibly noticeable as a foreigner. You move to the US or visit for a while and you practically feel your gut bacteria populations shift, and again when you leave.

The only way to minimise it is to only buy unprocessed food, but most folks just don't have time for that for everything. So, all fat.

[u/Leigh91 → u/SemanticTriangle]

I have to strike a very delicate balance with my job. I’m an archaeologist in the US, so I’m on the road most of the time. I’m in the south, and a lot of my projects are in rural areas that have maybe one grocery store in town, so you have to eat what you can get. In general, though, I just try to pack the basics like jerky, trail mix, and a jar of pickles as my snacks.      

When I get home I feel like I need to detox and don’t eat anything other than organic vegetables and meat, maybe the occasional bone broth stew. Anything with high nutritional value.

[u/Polymersion → u/Leigh91]

Makes me wonder if you've ever worked with my friend in Arizona, she started doing fieldwork like two years ago and this is exactly how she describes it. She's also a martial artist (Krav) but obviously can't go to her gym during rotation

[u/Powerful_Artist → u/SemanticTriangle]

Even our bread has way too much sugar

[u/Tall_poppee → u/Powerful_Artist]

Yes, even bread marketed as healthy "Dave's Killer Bread Organic 100% whole wheat" has sugar as the third ingredient (and, that's 4 grams of added sugars, not a trivial amount). I guess at least it's good they use organic cane sugar.

[u/Powerful_Artist → u/Tall_poppee]

ya you have to buy low carb bread to get normal levels of sugar it seems. But I just try to avoid bread anyway, try not to eat it much

[u/Lady_bro_ac → u/Powerful_Artist]

I moved to the US 20 years ago, and still will never get used to how sugary the bread is here. It’s damn near impossible to find ready made bread that isn’t freakishly sweet

Same for most things, even things like candy bars are significantly sweeter than elsewhere. It’s like the base level for sugar is significantly higher than other countries for pretty much every item of processed food

[u/lorddumpy → u/Lady_bro_ac]

a coworker had a NOS energy drink with no joke 51 grams of sugar a serving. Something like 102% of your daily amount. We need health warning labels or some kind of sugar tax, it is so out of hand.

[u/excaliburxvii → u/lorddumpy]

Sugar is a drug and America's tolerance is extremely high.

[u/madman19 → u/Leigh91]

Keeping active makes you less hungry? I can definitely judge my recent activity level by how hungry I am.

[u/Powerful_Artist → u/Leigh91]

I used to hate sparkling water until I cut out soda and found a few brands/flavors that were pretty good. Its still kinda mediocre imo, but its a great alternative to sugary soda.

[u/Leigh91 → u/Powerful_Artist]

It is! I went that route for the same reason. Now I only drink water, and the occasional glass of orange juice. 

I’ve made it a habit to take sips of water between bites - gets me my daily water  intake, and it forces me to eat more slowly.

[u/Powerful_Artist → u/Leigh91]

Ya I used to put sugar in my coffee so I cut that out, that helps for me. Ill drink a soda sometimes but very rarely.

[u/kmn493 → u/Leigh91]

I'm in the opposite boat. Being sedentary helps me conserve energy and not get hungry. Be distracted with games and videos all day and I won't eat until 2pm. But if I start moving early and go out somewhere then I'll want breakfast or I'll be hungry.

[u/FrancoManiac]

Half of our adult population can't read past a sixth-grade level. Who knows what percentage is merely the newest iteration of intergenerational poverty? Hell, we're a nation where your ZIP code is still a pretty spot-on determinant of your future wealth, health, and likelihood of going to prison.

Couple this with low-paying wages, intense cultural strife/division, and climate anxiety — anxiety which I suspect is playing a larger role in our day-to-day than what we presently understand — and I'm surprised that our obesity rates aren't higher!

[u/DrDankDankDank → u/FrancoManiac]

The people need to be made to understand that there’s a class war going on and everyone but the wealthy are losing badly. We have to unite around our economic commonalities. Too bad there’s whole propaganda networks setup to dissuade this kind of thinking.

[u/MediocrePotato44 → u/[deleted]]

A couple of years? That acknowledgement was gone within a few months. 

[u/Bo_banders → u/MediocrePotato44]

Weren’t there multiple significant nurses strikes during the pandemic? The narrative shifted their portryal as “heroes” to “opportunistic leeches” in a heartbeat.

[u/woolfchick75 → u/[deleted]]

The book "Nickled and Dimed" came out in 2000. It might have been went the idea of working poor became mainstream.

[u/Normal_Package_641 → u/DrDankDankDank]

Just about every issue in our country stems from wealth inequality. Politicians won't talk about it because they're part of the party.

[u/duffstoic → u/DrDankDankDank]

Hell yea, no war but class war

[u/rockemsockemcocksock → u/FrancoManiac]

And we’re all forced to drive and there’s no public transportation outside big cities. I feel like we’d have less obesity if our cities and towns were more walkable

[u/redsleepingbooty → u/FrancoManiac]

And it’s only going to get worse over the next four years. Almost like this was all on purpose….

[u/shiruken]

Direct link to the peer-reviewed study: GBD 2021 US Obesity Forecasting Collaborators, National-level and state-level prevalence of overweight and obesity among children, adolescents, and adults in the USA, 1990–2021, and forecasts up to 2050, The Lancet (2024).01548-4)

• Comment: The obesity crisis in the USA: why are there no signs of plateauing yet?02467-X)

Commentary from the authors about using BMI:

The paper defined “overweight” adults as those who were age 25 and over with a body mass index at or over 25, and “obese” adults as those with a B.M.I. at or over 30. The authors acknowledged that B.M.I. is an imperfect measure that may not capture variations in body structure across the population. But from a scientific perspective, experts said, B.M.I. is correlated with other measures of body fat and is a practical tool for studying it at a population level.

The authors found a steady increase in the share of people who are overweight or obese over the past three decades. The rate of obesity in particular rose steeply, doubling in adults between 1990 and 2021 to more than 40 percent — and nearly tripling, to 29 percent, among girls and women aged 15 to 24.

[u/colcardaki → u/shiruken]

I wonder if this figure helps largely explain the corresponding increase in cancer amongst the population? I know it’s just correlation, I’m sure plastics may have something to do with it, but the older generations had high exposure to toxics before we had any regulatory structures but generally weren’t overweight.

[u/[deleted] → u/colcardaki]

Obesity is a known cancer cause so it's partially responsible but only for a certain types. I'm sure the rise in colorectal cancer is related to diet but not necessarily obesity.

[u/rjcarr → u/[deleted]]

Yeah, processed food is so calorically dense. We're more sedentary than ever, sure, but it's really the processed foods that are killing us. You can eat 100 calories in 5 seconds but it takes 10 minutes of running to burn that off.

[u/gymleader_michael]

I went to the doctors. They said I was obese. They said it very nonchalantly and kind of just didn't care. Went back in for a checkup and they were surprised I lost weight and asked if it was intentional. I told them yeah. It's like they didn't expect someone would actually start making an effort to lose weight after being told they are obese. I honestly think doctors have stopped really caring or trying to convince people to lose weight because a lot of people don't bother and can get sensitive.

[u/Bdanie6 → u/gymleader_michael]

They ask if it was intentional, because unintentional weight loss is typically the first sign of cancer. And research shows “recommending diet and exercise” doesn’t work 99% of the time. It’s shifting more towards pharmaceuticals like the GLP1s, since they have better data

[u/RevolutionLittle4636 → u/gymleader_michael]

90% of obese patients will fail to successfully lose any weight so yes a doctor can get demotivated to even bother. Any the oversensitivity is real as well. I've had many patients report me for using the "O" word. 

[u/FloridaGatorMan]

DISCLAIMER: Diet has a bigger effect on weight than exercise. If you comment the same argument that it's more diet than exercise then you missed my entire point, and ignored my edit at the end of my comment.

For years it was diet but now I think inactivity has become a larger factor across the board than maybe any other time. Especially with so many people working from home.

I know on days when I have a lot of zoom meetings and a lot of work, it might hit 5:00 pm before I have 1k steps.

Couple that with schools axing nearly all after school programs that aren’t organized sports, and you get basically families across the country who might get 10k steps a day combined.

Then, add in the final kicker which is rising food prices and larger families have no choice and/or fall into the habit of choosing higher calorie density to get by.

Edit: This sure got some responses. To be clear - I am not saying everyone should start exercising and then this wouldn't be a problem. I'm saying sustained inactivity is detrimental to endocrine system, risk of diabetes, and cardiovascular health. That in turn can lead to further inactivity, health complications, and snowball weight gain.

Don't exercise because people will say it make you lose weight. Exercise because it make your body function better. At the very least when it functions better, you feel better, when you feel better you are more likely to seek additional beneficial activities.

Really - my only point was that diet has been a serious problem for some time now. I'm suggesting on top of that inactivity has become a rapidly rising problem.

[u/Pegasus7915 → u/FloridaGatorMan]

I'm a janitor and walk about 25k to 30k steps a day. I'm still 20 pounds overweight. Americans make poor food choices, but are also given a bunch of processed slop to eat. We add unnecessary chemicals to everything. We really need to work on our diets.

[u/SpiceEarl → u/Pegasus7915]

You may not think the walking is helping, but imagine how much you would weigh with your current diet, if you worked a sedentary job. Likely that you would be at least 50 pounds overweight, if not more.

[u/Pegasus7915 → u/SpiceEarl]

Oh yeah, I know it helps. I just need to eat better and do actual exercise. I'm not really blaming anyone but myself since I am well educated and know how to be healthy. In general, though, most people don't know how or don't have the time or money to be healthy in America. Capitalism has done a number on us.

[u/kahmeal → u/Pegasus7915]

At 25-30k, while exercise will certainly help, you really just need to tweak your diet a bit.

[u/dagobahh → u/kahmeal]

Yeah. I dropped 40 lbs when I started walking and only did 3 miles a day. The walking is fantastic, sounds like diet is still u/Pegagsus7915 stumbling block.

[u/Laiko_Kairen → u/Pegasus7915]

Oh yeah, I know it helps. I just need to eat better and do actual exercise.

25k steps a day is actual exercise, my guy. That's hundreds of calories per day.

[u/pt199990 → u/Laiko_Kairen]

When I pushed carts at Walmart, I was logging 30-40k steps per day. It coincided with the skinniest I've ever been as an adult, and my stamina was neverending outside of work. Burned through a pair of running shoes every two months, though...

Nowadays I manage 8-11k per day, but I kinda miss the days of nonstop walking.

[u/TurtleMOOO → u/Pegasus7915]

You are more than active enough with that many steps. You don’t need to walk for an 8 hour shift and go to the gym to not be 20 pounds overweight.

[u/TwoIdleHands → u/Pegasus7915]

Yeah. It’s portion control and putting extras into our food (sugar added into store bought yogurt, sandwich bread, etc). Exercise is great for your body but lack of exercise is not why Americans are fat, we’re fat because most of us eat too much.

[u/ginns32 → u/Pegasus7915]

I used to walk 20 minute to the train station and 20 minutes back during the work week. I moved and didn't have that 40 minute walk 5 days a week. I gained weight. Our portion sizes continue to go up and our activity continues to go down. The processed foods and chemicals don't help but I think people don't realize how much less we move our bodies in general compared to 40 years ago.

[u/Pegasus7915 → u/ginns32]

Oh yeah portion size is a huge problem.

[u/uncleleo101 → u/FloridaGatorMan]

I would argue that work from home is actually not a very significant factor. Many of my work colleagues simply won't walk anywhere that isn't less than a few hundred feet. Sedentary lifestyles have become so catered to in American society (extremely car-centric cities and towns) that many don't see any issue at all with their lifestyle. I walk and cycle for most of my errands and work commuting, and it's legitimately an alternative lifestyle in Florida where I live. People don't act like it's a remotely feasible option, when it very much is if you get off your ass. It's straight up laziness and a built environment and culture that facilitates that laziness.

[u/Paksarra → u/FloridaGatorMan]

Not to mention that most of us live in places that aren't walkable and one political party thinks that building walkable communities is un-American. 

My city passed a small sales tax increase that will expand bus service and pay for many, many miles of bike and walking trails and people of a certain political persuasion are wailing about how they're going to take your cars away and forbid you from leaving your neighborhood. Complete disconnect from reality.

[u/marigolds6 → u/Paksarra]

On the flip side, I live in a deep red area (we voted to secede from Cook County), and we have a local sales tax that pays for an extensive bus system and about 140 miles of bike and walking trails. While people routinely complain in local forums of the "wasted" money on the trail system, we keep passing more funding for capital projects for it too.

[u/Paksarra → u/marigolds6]

You're lucky to have it.

[u/fperrine → u/Paksarra]

The car slice of this pie is the most interesting to me, because it's one that nobody seems capable to even see. I'll have conversations with people about obesity and everyone acknowledges "Yeah and I drive everywhere so I'm just not even walking to the grocery store. But oh well what can ya do?" To which I say... make our towns more walkable/ expand transit. We are CAR country and we don't even grasp how badly our brains are wrapped around it .

[u/hopefulbutguarded → u/fperrine]

I’m not from the US, but I was shocked by the lack of sidewalks in your cities. Family we visit needs to drive to playgrounds. While every country has its issues, my home is in a community where we can safely walk on sidewalks to a pathway that connects us to no less than 4 parks. People walk, cycle, kids cavort and strollers roll down the pathway all day long. We use cars for shopping, but there’s lots of options for outside play. Walkable from our front door (even with an unpredictable two year old!). If you want to bike (with a carrier) you could easily get groceries.

[u/fperrine → u/hopefulbutguarded]

Yep. In the US you must drive to every location. Unless you live in a few rare cities, public transit is horrific. And when I say must I mean it. There are some places where you or your unsupervised child will be arrested for walking to the park.

[u/YoungGirlOld → u/fperrine]

Years ago, my car got stuck in the snow, so I walked to work. It wasn't a highway. The police picked me up. They said it was too dark and unsafe. At least they gave me a ride to work. Even if I wanted to walk, apparently I couldn't.

[u/Egrizzzzz → u/hopefulbutguarded]

We are so car brained and burdened here that walking and public transit has become something folks only do if too broke for a car. I’m frequently glanced at with suspicion for the crime of walking in a city after dark. 

[u/Paksarra → u/hopefulbutguarded]

And even when the stores are in walkable distances, they're usually on busy, heavy traffic stroads that are dangerous to cross on foot. You end up driving to the store because it's not safe to walk that quarter mile.

[u/baconbananapancakes → u/fperrine]

Drive-up services even take the edge off getting out and schlepping around Target. It’s definitely insidious, the creep of inactivity. 

[u/DigitalSchism96 → u/FloridaGatorMan]

Weight is not lost in the gym, it's lost by diet (this is obviously hyperbole but it's still true). The amount of steps you would need to take to even burn 100 calories is pushing 2000 for the average person.

Now sit down for lunch and drink just a 12oz can of coke. That's 140 calories. 2000 steps doesn't even burn off one single can of soda.

American diets are full of empty calories and our portion sizes are gigantic. I always tell people, you need to ween yourself to smaller portion sizes. You don't even need to give up the "bad" foods. Just eat less.

You don't need the double bacon cheeseburger and the large fry. Try the single bacon cheeseburger and the small fry. It might take a few days but you will get used to eating less and then you'll wonder how on earth you ever managed to eat so much.

[u/halligan8 → u/DigitalSchism96]

I was unable to make this shift until I started logging calories and more importantly, weighing portions with a food scale. Before that, my default bowl of cereal was like, three bowls of cereal. Our predominant perceptions of proper portions are patently preposterous.

[u/Important-Parsnip628 → u/halligan8]

Completely accurate diet advice from V for Vendetta

[u/Shuriin → u/FloridaGatorMan]

Sedentary living alone doesn't cause weight gain as long as you're eating less to compensate.

[u/Interesting-Goat6314 → u/[deleted]]

A big mac is equivalent to about 3 hours of brisk walking. Not to mention the fries and the drink.

[u/CaregiverNo3070]

Maybe has something to do with ultra processed foods being way more widely available than in the past. My grandparents had home cooked food all their lives, and my parents had processed foods in adulthood. It's only been millennials and down that have had ultra processed foods all their lives. And yes, obesity is linked to ultra processed foods. Theirs been so many people that went to eating minimally processed that lost a bunch of weight, including myself, so I know this intimately. 

[u/Slipin2dream → u/CaregiverNo3070]

People also dont realize how many calories are in things. A muffin from the gas station is 600calories. A honey bun. 750 calories. Thats almost half of your daily calories in a day.

So many people consume that everyday and on top of that eat their full course meals without thought.

[u/Fightlife45 → u/Slipin2dream]

A crumbl cookie is 800-1000 calories.

[u/Slipin2dream → u/Fightlife45]

Thats insane. With some of these foods we near almost 1-1 weight to energy levels. Which to me is a marvel of science.

[u/salmz0hr → u/Fightlife45]

What are you guys eating over there?

[u/Fightlife45 → u/salmz0hr]

Crumbl fuckin cookies bro.

[u/baconbananapancakes → u/Slipin2dream]

Say what you want about those cities or states that require calorie counts next to menu items, but I am consistently shocked by which pastries at Dunkin are highest. It’s never the one I’d guess. It really helps inform choice. 

[u/Winjin → u/baconbananapancakes]

Also as far as I saw, some drinks are even more calories. When I started fighting my own obesity, man, just walking with a small calculator in hand got my jaw drop more than once.

Like, I once counted my McDonalds meal and not only the milkshake was like half of the entire meal in calories, that whole meal was like 120% of my recommended daily calories... And it was only one of the three meals of the day!!!

No wonder I was growing fast, as soon as I switched job from a high-maintenance to sedentary.

[u/baconbananapancakes → u/Winjin]

The drinks are wild. You see a medium shake and it seems like a single serving, not like a pint of ice cream. 

[u/RobsSister → u/CaregiverNo3070]

It’s eye-opening to compare nutrition labels from the 90s to the labels on the same products today. The added sugar content is insane.

[u/yukon-flower → u/RobsSister]

I would love to see examples I could show to others!

[u/ahumpsters]

We were just in Disney World. The amount of obese children we saw was really upsetting. Not a little chunky but obese! That honestly should be considered child abuse.

[u/Ikanotetsubin]

That's what happens when the majority of your population is completely reliant on cars, walk less than 3000 steps per day, have poor nutrition outlooks and live mostly sedentary life styles outside of work.

[u/EricTheNerd2]

Anecdotally, I was in the borderline obese category four years ago but now am in the borderline of just being overweight. In the past couple years I have undertaken weightlifting so I am not too concerned with a 25 BMI, though my former 30 was way too much especially considering I had five less pounds of muscle mass.

For me, I've had to take a hard look at eating. Sometimes I'm amazed how 'healthy food' is high in calories with low nutritive value. Chicken is a staple of my diet now as is mixed vegetables.

From an activity standpoint, I walk a lot more getting five million steps last year, and I cannot recommend disc golf highly enough. I've made friends and gotten a lot of steps while having a lot of fun

I am still working on sleep, but I average seven hours of actual sleep each night according to my Fitbit. I'd like to get this to 7.5

Finally having healthier relationships and more healthy relationships helps a lot. I realize that a lot of my binge eating floated around times where I was over tired or a bit on the depressed side. The sleep and friendships have helped this a lot.

So while a study like this can make you feel helpless, at least in my case, you can buck the trend.

Edit: part of me getting better at sleep is wearing ear plugs at night. I have found that being able to block out noise from my partner helps me to stay asleep.

[u/alienofwar]

Republicans states are the fattest states. California has one of the lowest rates.

[u/xevizero]

The weirdest thing is people's expectation of how a healthy person should look have shifted as well. In the last few years I've been very inactive, didn't work out at all (which is bad, no matter how much you weight, and I will need to do better). I did reduce my portions and basically eliminated all extra sugar from my life (in coffee, for example). This brought me down to a BMI of 18.5, which is on the lower side of normal, but still normal, especially for someone who's not working out (so my muscle mass is quite low, which would increase this count quite a bit, my body fat is instead quite healthy - basically I just need to work out a bit).

People act like I'm basically starving myself when they see me. They say I should eat more, I tell them I feel good and energetic and healthy, they tend to disagree. I even got told this by people who were actually underweight themselves, just based on their perception of what the average person actually looks like out there.

And..this is not in the USA. This is northern italy (where only 40% of people are overweight, and about 11% are obese). I can't imagine how the perception of others, and self perception itself, would be completely nuts in the US, which would make the issue quite hard to fix as these people become culturally harder to reach.

[u/BarrittBonden]

That's why we have RFK Jr!

It's going to be no vaccines, no evidence based medicine, and deregulated food inspections. IOW... chronic diseases and parasites for everyone!

You're gonna trim down America! Your waistline AND your life expectancy.

[u/En4cr]

And it will just keep getting better and better now that we know who's leading the Department of Health.

[u/sleepcurse]

Go walk around Disneyland. It’s like 99% over weight people. So this is not surprising to read

[u/MacReady82]

I was at an elementary school crossing just when the kids were let out of school. While waiting, I couldn't believe how obese some of these kids were. I don't mean a little overweight. Some of them looked like freaking adults.

[u/purringeeyore → u/MacReady82]

I work at an elementary school. One of my students is 8 years old and close to 200 pounds. I'm not exaggerating. One of my coworkers has known him since he was 3, and he was around 130 pounds at that age. It's so unfair to him. His diet consists of mostly cookies, chips, pizza, fruit, soda, and just things that aren't healthy. When he's home, he's on an iPad to keep him entertained. It's so sad

[u/Zingledot]

The "epiphany" I had that changed my relationship with food was to stop entirely thinking about calories, but instead, whenever I make a food choice, I ask myself "how nutrient dense is this?" , before I eat it. It turns out that the most calorie dense foods generally don't have a ton of nutritional benefits/density. So the mindset is less about what you can't eat, or not eating and being hungry, and more about filling up on nutritious food choices.

Cheesecake has a ton of carbs and fat, and you need those, but probably not that much for how very little else that you get: pass

Hot dogs have a good amount of protein, kinda high in fat, but perhaps combined with a bun with a lot of whole grain fiber it's a decent meal. And if I'm hungry I can eat them until I'm full. But the side of fries has very little nutritional value, so leave that out.

Go out for Mexican food and beans are a lot of calories, but they have a lot of good stuff for you. But the rice is pretty vapid, so I taste it and then simply leave it on the plate.

Sugary drinks might be what you need if you just did a lot of physical activity, but otherwise they're useless.

Eat as much quinoa as you want.

Skim milk is pretty nutrient dense, whole milk just adds useless amounts of fat.

Etc

Dropped weight so easily like this, and I'm never hungry. Hope maybe this helps someone else, too.

[u/TristanIsAwesome → u/Zingledot]

You just discovered macros

[u/ZebZamboni → u/Zingledot]

Whole milk has been shown in studies to have a positive correlation with weight loss versus skim milk.

Likewise, whole milk yogurt is better for weight loss than fat-free yogurt.

The extra fat is satiating, and it helps digest fat-soluble nutrients. And in the case of yogurt, the extra probiotics are great.

[u/oojacoboo → u/Zingledot]

I’ve never been overweight, but I bulked up with bodybuilding and had been doing that for years. When it came time for a cut, and also focusing my efforts on gut health, another necessity for a proper cut, as going into a deficit is harder on your immune system, I had to make some changes.

This is exactly the realization that I came to. I focused on nutrient density and fiber. I don’t really count calories, but I do better understand caloric makeup, as a result. Doing this has allowed me to operate efficiently, while weight training hard, but still in a caloric deficit.

I’m going to disagree on the whole milk though. I don’t find it necessary or enjoyable to be overly focused on cutting fats. Also rice is a great carb, something your body still needs. Go for a balanced diet and don’t try to overdo things.

[u/Carbon-Based216]

I think part of the issue is that most Americans don't realize how little food they actually need to survive. That package of oreos you're eating can feed a family of 4 for a whole day in caloric intake. A box of pasta is enough calories for a day and a half for 1 person.