overweight

BillJones

terra_ferma wrote: »

I think it's impossible to answer your question without knowing what has caused her to gain so much weight that it's making difficult to do her job (I assume it's a mobility problem?).

That part is easy to answer, it is caused by more calories being eaten than are being expended. The extra energy, that is not used for pumping blood, heating the body, moving around etc. gets stored as fat, laid down to be used later.

The question of why she can't lay off the pies is another issue, of course. Pies being nice and tasty is often at the root of this sort of thing.

terra_ferma

BillJones wrote: »

That part is easy to answer, it is caused by more calories being eaten than are being expended. The extra energy, that is not used for pumping blood, heating the body, moving around etc. gets stored as fat, laid down to be used later.

The question of why she can't lay off the pies is another issue, of course. Pies being nice and tasty is often at the root of this sort of thing.

You answer shows a great deal of ignorance, there are plenty of reasons why someone can put on weight without eating too much.

BillJones

terra_ferma wrote: »

You answer shows a great deal of ignorance, there are plenty of reasons why someone can put on weight without eating too much.

No, there genuinely aren't. When people who claim this are covertly watched, they always turn out to be taking in more than they believed themselves to be.

Creating the molecules in fat cells takes energy, and this has to come from food. Yes, people can (rarely) have a condition that means that their resting metabolic rate is reduced from the norm, but this merely means that they can survive on fewer calories. If they take in the appropriate amount, they will not get fat.

The secondary issue, of how a person can manage to forego the immediate pleasure of eating, in exchange for the far off (in time) gain of being slimmer is of course the difficult part. Many people can no more manage to cut back on the pies than they could hold their breath for four minutes, but there is no point confusing the issue with this bizarre belief that some people can simply create the energy to lay down fat out of thin air.

Where, I wonder, do you get your anti-scientific idea that it's not the calories that matter? I know that the web is full of poorly thought-out pseudoscience on this subject, but despite a strange belief to the contrary, the first law of thermodynamics applies to a human body just the same way that it applies to a car engine, and you are not going to be able to lay down fat if you burn off as many calories as you consume.

tomtontom

terra_ferma wrote: »

You answer shows a great deal of ignorance, there are plenty of reasons why someone can put on weight without eating too much.

As a former fatty I would disagree. I have lots of health problems that I could (and did) use to explain or excuse my size. But when it came down to losing weight, the fact was I was eating more calories than my body needed. Cut down on the lard, get some exercise (starting off gently) and hey presto, my BMI has reduced from over 36 to 25. There really is no excuse for being that large, and I should know, I'd used every excuse in the book.

superbigal36

well said tomtontom (previously known as tom2tontom)

BillJones

tomtontom wrote: »

As a former fatty I would disagree. I have lots of health problems that I could (and did) use to explain or excuse my size. But when it came down to losing weight, the fact was I was eating more calories than my body needed. Cut down on the lard, get some exercise (starting off gently) and hey presto, my BMI has reduced from over 36 to 25. There really is no excuse for being that large, and I should know, I'd used every excuse in the book.

It's an interesting (and frustrating) question, that of how we manage to get ourselves to eat less. The desire for food is right now, and it can be strong enough to make people feel panicky. It can certainly be enough to distract people chronically from their job, so the pressure and temptation can be nearly constant.

Unlike other "addictions" as well you need to eat food pretty often, so you can't avoid it.

I lost a huge amount of weight last year, after at long last managing to stop making "exceptions" to my sporadic healthy diet. I ran a calorie deficit of 700kCal per day, and as if by magic, lost around 1lb per week. Just to be bloody minded, I did it on a high-carb diet, with ots of white pasta, rice and bread. It turned out, exactly s the science says, that it's calories that matter, not the colour of your toast.

prowla

If the employee is so overweight that they are unable to do their job, then it is surely an issue for the employer.

tomtontom

prowla wrote: »

If the employee is so overweight that they are unable to do their job, then it is surely an issue for the employer.

Yes, a disciplinary one.

DomRavioli

BillJones wrote: »

That part is easy to answer, it is caused by more calories being eaten than are being expended. The extra energy, that is not used for pumping blood, heating the body, moving around etc. gets stored as fat, laid down to be used later.

The question of why she can't lay off the pies is another issue, of course. Pies being nice and tasty is often at the root of this sort of thing.

BillJones - My mum is a size 22. She can bench press me, runs most days, and is that size because of a thyroid problem - she cannot lose or gain weight due to this, and her medication, which cannot be changed, means she has gained weight. She still only weighs 14 stone, which is technically only obese on the BMI scale for her height. Put it this way, if you called her fat in the street, she has a mean left hook and you would likely feel it.

Being "fat" doesn't mean unhealthy - my mum has no other health issues apart from the thyroid disorder, and is very healthy for a nearly 60 year old, far healthier than the stick thin people of her own age who cannot walk for more than 10 minutes without sitting down.

Perhaps the OP needs to tell his wife to keep her nose out, or if it bothers them that much to speak to her manager. You never know what is going on behind the scenes, or what health problems (hidden and visible) people have.

tomtontom

DomRavioli wrote: »

BillJones - My mum is a size 22. She can bench press me, runs most days, and is that size because of a thyroid problem - she cannot lose or gain weight due to this, and her medication, which cannot be changed, means she has gained weight. She still only weighs 14 stone, which is technically only obese on the BMI scale for her height. Put it this way, if you called her fat in the street, she has a mean left hook and you would likely feel it.

Being "fat" doesn't mean unhealthy - my mum has no other health issues apart from the thyroid disorder, and is very healthy for a nearly 60 year old, far healthier than the stick thin people of her own age who cannot walk for more than 10 minutes without sitting down.

Perhaps the OP needs to tell his wife to keep her nose out, or if it bothers them that much to speak to her manager. You never know what is going on behind the scenes, or what health problems (hidden and visible) people have.

Thyroid problems make it difficult to lose weight, not impossible. The same with medication, it can increase your appetite, affect your metabolism, but still does not stop you losing weight if you really want to.

And yes, they are two of the excuses I used!