Lifestyle Choices

Most people who are plump are jolly and good natured. They are pleasant and easy going and not at all hard to get along with—until perhaps they take it into their heads to begin to reduce! Most of them are full of alibis and reasons for their extra weight. Except in rare cases there is only one reason why any of them are plump and well padded. They just love to eat!

“What’s the use?” they wail. “Everything I eat turns to fat. I just can’t lose weight.” This is probably true, partly because of the way they are going about it.

Going on a reducing diet is no new experience for most of these people. Usually they have tried all kinds of diets, liberal and otherwise. For a time they succeed, but in the end they often find themselves back at the same old level, far above the average for their height and age. Sometimes they are the butt of unfortunate jokes among their friends. In desperation they determine once and for all to lose weight. They are invariably in a hurry to do this. Some abandon food altogether for a time, only to return to their former eating habits with a vengeance and perhaps add a few more pounds. This is not a sensible way to lose weight.

Before beginning to reduce, one should have a good reason. Ask yourself why you want to lose weight. Is it because you will then be able to fit into less expensive clothes? This is good, but there are better reasons than this. What about your health? People who are overweight are far more likely to suffer from degenerative diseases, such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart disease. Arthritis and cancer are also more common among those who are overweight.

All that extra weight you are carrying around is only putting that much extra strain on your heart, kidneys, bones, and joints. Those unwanted pounds are wearing you out too soon. The nearer you come to your ideal weight, the more chance you will have to escape these serious diseases. Should you have to undergo surgery, you will make a smoother recovery if your weight is nearer normal. These are reasons worth considering.

How much should you weigh? Are you sure that you are overweight? People with large bones and well-developed muscles weigh much heavier than those of a lighter build. But this extra weight is not due to fat, but rather to bone and muscle. They are not overweight. No matter how much dieting they may try, they cannot change the picture very much. Dreaming of a slim silhouette will not help in their case. They must accept things more or less as they are.

But this is no excuse for a person who is both large-framed and also fat. Such people can have a more attractive appearance. That excess padding can come off. However, before attempting any weight-reducing program, it is best to talk this over with your doctor. You should always be in good physical condition before undertaking any strenuous program.

Suppose you are only moderately plump. Should you go on a strict reducing diet? Probably not. Your present weight may be ideal for you. Such a weight may be conducive to better health and a more active life. How can you tell whether you are overweight? Take a look at the Metropolitan Life Insurance charts in the appendix. These figures have been prepared from a careful study of many thousands of people from all walks of life. They are a handy guide for what might be considered the average weight compared with age. These charts allow for differences of body build, ranging all the way from slender to heavy. In judging your ideal weight, you must take into account your own particular type of build rather than trying to copy someone else.

 

Why Are You Overweight?

Now suppose you are fifty pounds overweight. What are you going to do about it? First of all, you must ask yourself just why you weigh so much. Common sense tells you that anyone who overeats will put on extra weight. “But,” you say, “I don’t eat more than my sister, and her weight is normal.”

This may be perfectly true. There are many individual differences. No two people are alike. Some can use up those extra calories, others cannot. If you are putting on extra weight, it is because you are taking on more calories than your body actually needs. This does not seem fair, for you just love to eat, along with all the rest of those thin people you know. But things are different in your case. Your body is not using up those extra calories. You will have to do something about this.

Eating is largely a habit. We take our meals at certain times when we may not be really hungry. This is our pattern of life. In itself there is nothing wrong about this provided we are able to utilize the food from each meal. If we are gaining weight, we are taking on more than we can handle.

Nature hates waste. She will not throw anything away. Instead, she neatly stores those extra calories away in the form of fat. That is why it is so much harder to get rid of all this extra poundage. It is easy enough to put on a few pounds, but what a job it is to take them off again!

 

How Many Calories Do You Need?

How many calories can we burn up in a day? A hard-working man, such as a carpenter, may use up more than 5,000 calories a day. An executive working at a desk may be doing a great deal of brain work, but his caloric requirements may not be more than 2,200 per day. A woman who is working hard around the house all day may require 2,500 calories. An office secretary may need only 1,800 per day.

Then there is the question of how active we are. At twenty-five years of age we usually burn up all our calories without any difficulty. At thirty- five the situation may have changed a great deal. As we grow older, we tend to become less active. We sit down more often, perhaps to relieve our tensions. Labor-saving devices spare us from further exertion.

There may be no harm in this provided that we lower our intake of calories. But even minor differences in our work load can begin to increase our weight. Investigators found that a young woman, five feet three inches tall and weighing 120 pounds, used up eighty-eight calories per hour while working with a standard typewriter. When they switched her over to an electric typewriter, she used only seventy-three calories. Now let us assume that she continued to eat the same quantity of food and carried on the same amount of exercise. This is what might happen: Under that lighter work load she would soon begin to show certain changes in her appearance. In ten weeks she would gain one pound in weight. In ten years she would gain forty pounds!

Let us emphasize this fact once again. People put on extra weight because their diet contains more calories than they actually need. This is the only reason except in certain cases of illness that will be mentioned later. How can we change the picture? We can do it in two ways. Either we must reduce the food intake, or we must increase the output of work. In most cases it is as simple as that.

Before attempting to reduce, you should have a thorough medical examination by a well-trained doctor. The blood and urine should be carefully examined to rule out any serious disease. Some people begin to put on weight for no apparent reason at all except that they are more hungry than usual. This might be the beginning of early diabetes. They are losing glucose or blood sugar through the urine. This increases the appetite and causes them to put on more weight. Later they may begin to lose weight again.

Other diseases may also increase one’s weight. This may happen when the thyroid gland fails to work properly. Other glandular illnesses may cause an increase in weight. A failing heart will cause swelling in the legs and elsewhere in the body. So will certain types of kidney disease. That is why one should have a thorough medical examination before going on any weight-reducing program.

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