However, here where I work there have been several people who have gotten stomach surgery and I'd say all of them have gained back the weight.
I think it's so odd that happens.
I wish the smart medical people could figure out why some people become obese and others don't. We're all humans with shared genes and history. It just weirds me out.
We can all be 99.9% identical... that remaining 0.1% is rather a lot larger than what most people consciously think about, myself not excepted. It's why many mental health drugs like antidepressants don't have the identical effect on everybody, regarding either the intended effect... or, worse, the side-effects (known, common, or otherwise).
Re: obesity, there are many factors that contribute to this condition: genetics, overeating, a sedentary lifestyle, metabolic disorder, etc. There was a nutritionist who came in and did several presentations on healthy dietary habits at my workplace. One of the things she emphasized was that, where the U.S. is concerned, the portion sizes have grown so much bigger in the past several decades. For example, a dinner plate used to be eight inches in diameter. Nowadays we use 12-inch plates and try to pack as much food as we can. So from what I gathered, overeating seems to be the major contributing factor.
Aye, genetic and propensity for weight gain are a biggie. Even if every other factor was identical regarding active vs sedentary, chronological age, etc...
Not sure if I brought this up in the thread, but have you looked into antidepressants and other drugs for mental health issues and their side effects? Are more people clinically diagnosed and prescribed drugs? (or maybe it's not, which then explains the increase of suicides over the last two decades...)
Has it gone down since 2011?
https://psychcentral.com/news/2011/10/25/antidepressant-use-up-400-percent-in-us/30677.html
The rate of
antidepressant use in the United States increased nearly 400 percent over the last two decades, according to a report released Oct. 19.
The report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics found that 11 percent of Americans over the age of 12 takes an antidepressant, with about 14 percent taking the medication for more than 10 years.
For teens, it has:
https://psychcentral.com/news/2017/.../128149.html?li_source=LI&li_medium=popular17
A new study finds a startling rise in
depression among all Americans, with youth demonstrating the most rapid increase over the last decade.
Researchers at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health and the CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy found that from 2005 to 2015, depression rose significantly among Americans age 12 and older. Young people between the ages of 12 and 17 experienced a 46 percent increase in reported depression over this time span...
...The results show that depression increased significantly among persons in the U.S. from 2005 to 2015, from 6.6 percent to 7.3 percent. Notably, the rise was most rapid among those ages 12 to 17, increasing from 8.7 percent in 2005 to 12.7 percent in 2015.
Not to mention, who needs to pop those pills when elevated cortisol levels lead to weight gain? That harks back to the officially undiagnosed who may have lots of stress-related problems, regardless if the underlying cause of that is emotional or physical.
What about the possibility of certain artificial sweeteners or pesticides? I knew a person who always drank diet cola. He went off it and lost 12 pounds in a month alone from that. Not sure what sweetener was involved but it's a moot point, people saw the difference.
Last I'd checked, buffets aside, portions of food in grocery stores and most restaurants keep getting smaller but the prices keep going up. Ditto for the other neat trick of using larger plates to give the
appearance of more product on plate at said restaurant. Or they're using more carb-heavy filler like rice, especially the not-whole-grain variety. And in some restaurants do indeed have larger portions at a nominally higher price to get people to come back. So there's definitely truth to the statement of larger portions in one form or another, as well as other factors... but a lot of people tend to
assume the blimpy people just eat too much.
Going back to "portion sizes are truly going up", here's a fun thought: Have restaurants stopped giving out doggy bags? I've tended to save portions uneaten, it's illogical to waste and why should I try to shove it all down my throat when everyone else is with theirs and they don't make snide remarks when I ask for a container if the wait staff hadn't already...?
How about people who drink a lot? Some acquaintances I know do and then saw nutritionists or other means to rapidly reduce the fat. While continuing to glug glug. But not everybody drinks, in moderation or more.
I'll agree, the parents caving to kids' demands to buy the junk food crap - especially when a lot of it used to not be sold in stores to begin with but sold at events like circuses as a special treat...
What about high fructose corn syrup vs real sugar? HFCS is ubiquitous and some studies have shown it's arguably more detrimental. Plenty of debates cover that topic far more in depth.
And, yeah, diagnosed or not, the number of depressed people with enough cortisol blimping 'em up... and not everybody chows on processed foods, even eating some in moderation has a negligible effect...
I need new meds that work.
)
Western medicine doesn't seem to have all the answers to our health concerns. I can't count how many times my questions have been met with confusion (huh?), uncertainty (never heard of it), skepticism (that's not possible), dismissal (it's probably nothing), or even disdain. I might as well start looking into acupuncture and herbology.
