Obesity is just poor decision-making!

I think it is just about portion control but that is easier said than don, isn't it?

growstuff

Blondiescot

What's wrong with porridge? Oats have been proven to help manage cholesterol levels, help to balance blood sugar levels,
support gut health, are a good source of antioxidants and studies have shown that a bowl of porridge in the morning can also help aid weight management.

The poster asked about losing weight. Porridge has a high number of calories, which is great if you want cheap energy, but not so great if you want to lose weight.

I do think you are overegging this growstuff and I agree with the comment that everyone needs to find what makes them put on weight if it is a problem for them.

I don't think you can recommend a diabetic diet to those who don't have diabetes. They may have some other digestive issues and need the proper help to track down the problem. I certainly wouldn't recommend mine. You need a dietician to help as no two people will necessarily have issues with the same foods other than those highest in fermentable sugars.

And therein lies the rub for the generally overweight. Just how seriously do we take this? We can see from this thread that some people blame the overweight. Would you blame someone with arthritis? What happens if we find that is down to particular foods? Do we blame them even though they didn't know? How will that help? How often are people sent away to deal with it on their own? It's no wonder people fail. We can see here all the contradictory advice they will be given.

Anyway, I heard an apple fall off the tree as I opened the door this morning. I went and picked it up and have been sniffing it all day. Don't stop eating beautiful fruit if you are okay with it. Moderation is the thing not denial unless it's really necessary.

Possibly Monica. But I look exactly like my paternal grandmother. She was a slave to her corsets, despite eating good, basic food and as far as I can remember, no sweets. I've got her solid figure.

My other granny (maternal) and my mother were slim most of their lives. Got more rotund after menopause and in my granny's case, lost weight as she aged. Sadly my mum didn't get to that stage, dying suddenly.

Musicgirl I disagree. Admittedly I have never been grossly obese, but I put on 2 stone along with the menopause.

I lost that 2 stone 8 years ago on the 5.2 diet. Not only that but I have done it without being on a diet for life and without it being very, very boring constantly thinking about everything I put in my mouth. Once I had lost the weight I adjusted my eating style and patternand portion size to keep my weight stable and now rarely even think about what i am eating. My tastes have changed, I do not like sweet things. so can watch other people tucking into cakes and biscuits without having any desire to eat any myself. I am not exceptional, lots of people teach themselves to do this.

Similarly, I also understand the problem of those with a genetic makeup that leads to weight gain. Such a gene runs in DH's family. He has always struggled to keep his weight down, even when he eats no more than I do.

Our DD was born with a big round tummy and it was even bigger by the time she was one. I and my Health Visitor consulted regularly,. The HV said she did not know what to advise because i was already doing all the right things, the hospital put her on a diet that meant her eating far more than she was accustomed to and she put on 7lbs in 6 weeks, which I told them would happen - then they blamed me for not following the rules.

One doctor suggested that perhaps my daughter went round all the neighbours getting them to feed her, rather like a stray dog. Thankfully this suggestion left me speechless, otherwise I might have been so scathingly rude to him, the school might have banned me. Yet she had the smallest appetite in the family and was the most active. Looking back in DH's family, we can trace family members with DDs build and problems through 4 generations of hard working farming and tradesmen.

Personally I think much of current day obesity is not the result of over eating but the result of the regular consumption of UPFs (Ultra-processed foods) that contain vast quantities of chemicals, emulsifiers, stabilisers, and maize sugar products, that denature the food we eat so that it has a long shelf life, can produce hundreds of thousands of absolutely identical products and which no other generation of humans before ours have ever eaten and are damaging our digestive systems.

So what's your answer then, growstuff? How would you stop all us fatties from stuffing ourselves with unhealthy food? Muzzles? Wiring our teeth together?

What about the 90% who don't have a medical condition?

Musicgirl As a T2 diabetic, I know perfectly well how boring it is to think constantly about everything I put in my mouth, but that's what I have to do. If people seriously want to keep weight off, that's what they have to do too.

So do people in deprived areas all have different body types? It seems you're claiming it's inevitable that people will be overweight/obese, which is not true. There's a proven correlation between depravation, disability, mental health, education and weight. What you're doing is saying there's no point doing anything about the inequality because people have conditions which cause them to be overweight, which plays straight into the hands of those who don't want the real causes investigated.

The fact is that the vast majority of overweight people eat more than their bodies need for energy, whatever medical condition they have or prescribed drugs they take.

Vampirequeen, you're so right.

Rather than using people, I'll use my cats.

1 male, 1 female. Same size and age (not siblings). Both eat the same amount. He is very lean, slender and sylph like. She's a podge. They're both house cats.

She WOULD eat more than him, given the opportunity, but she doesn't get it. They just have different body types.

@growstuff, it is more complicated than it seems. One of the problems is the more you try to lose weight, the more difficult it becomes as the minute you stop dieting you regain the weight you have lost and more. This becomes a repeated pattern, which means that you can end up stones heavier than when you first decided you needed to lose weight. We all know that we should be on a diet for life but it can be very, very boring constantly thinking about everything you put in your mouth. Also, if you saw my post, you would see that around 10% of us have a recognised medical condition that makes it almost impossible for many of us to have a “normal” BMI. In fact, the scales are very much balanced against many people. Having said all that, I think the body positivity movement is dangerous if it means that you don’t even try to lose weight, although projecting a message that you can wear nice clothes and look your best at any size is only to the good. I think a sugar tax is a good idea, too.

I apologise if you didn't want to know about weight loss vampirequeen.

I am sure that there are some people who have medical conditions which result in being overweight or obesity. However, two thirds of the UK population are overweight or obese (over 70% in the 45-74 age group). I find it difficult to believe that so many people have medical conditions which lead to people being overweight. For most people, the reason is that they eat more in the long term than their bodies need.

I didn't actually ask about weight loss. I was pointing out that it's possible to be obese yet eat a healthy diet and not overdo the calories.

It was for the benefit of the 'you are what you eat' posters.

When my DDs were at school I was called into school because DD1 was overweight and DD2 was underweight. Both ate the same food and did the same amount of exercise. Today both are slim but for different reasons. DD1 had surgery to reduce the size of her stomach which makes her restrict her food intake even further than she already was. DD2 eats anything and everything. She has full sugar/full fat everything. Three huge meals every day plus numerous snacks. She is constantly hungry. There is nothing medically wrong with her. It's just the way she is. Her worst size moment was when she was 9 months pregnant and had to get what she described as 'huge' jeans. They were size 12.

There is far more to obesity than what goes into your mouth.

Glorianny

growstuff

I have never seen any serious study which shows that porridge alleviates T2 diabetes. In the diabetes forums I belong to, most contributors say it increases their blood glucose levels - it certainly increases mine and affects it for the whole day, sometimes longer.

Apparently it has varying effects on blood glucose levels. It can reduce the need for insulin injections and is preferable than most packaged breakfast cereals. www.healthline.com/health/diabetes/oatmeal#pros
But for some people it doesn't work.

I agree it's preferable to most breakfast cereals, but I don't eat those anyway.

My point was really that if the poster is serious about losing weight, she needs to cut something down. 1,700 calories is too many for a weight reduction diet. Personally, I'd cut out the grainy and starchy carbs because I know they spike my blood sugar.

If people want to work out how many calories they should be eating, they should work out their basal metabolic rate eg www.calculator.net/bmr-calculator.html. Then adjust it for exercise.

To lose a pound a week, a person needs to have a calorie deficit of about 500 a day. The opposite is also true, so if a person eats 500 a day too many calories, he/she will put on a pound a week. It's easy to eat 100 calories a day too many, which means putting on about 10 pounds in a year.

On average, a woman over 60 needs to eat no more than 1200-1300 calories a day to lose weight. A Beefeater chicken roast dinner has 1,709 calories.

growstuff

I have never seen any serious study which shows that porridge alleviates T2 diabetes. In the diabetes forums I belong to, most contributors say it increases their blood glucose levels - it certainly increases mine and affects it for the whole day, sometimes longer.

Apparently it has varying effects on blood glucose levels. It can reduce the need for insulin injections and is preferable than most packaged breakfast cereals. www.healthline.com/health/diabetes/oatmeal#pros
But for some people it doesn't work.

I have never seen any serious study which shows that porridge alleviates T2 diabetes. In the diabetes forums I belong to, most contributors say it increases their blood glucose levels - it certainly increases mine and affects it for the whole day, sometimes longer.

It gives me terrible wind . I do tend to eat a lot of it if I’m on an economy drive. I knew someone who had a friend that decided, when he was a student, to live on porridge. He said it resulted in his teeth dropping out (should have taken a multi vitamin tablet perhaps?). No idea if it was true, though. I like Ready Brek but it isn’t as healthy as proper porridge.

Glorianny

growstuff

Blondiescot

You clearly missed the last part of my previous comment. Studies have shown that porridge can aid weight management. At less than 200 calories for an average bowl, I'd hardly call that high in calories, and oats are very filling, so that would keep you going until lunchtime.

Which studies?

FWIW I know that porridge sends my blood glucose sky high (because I test it), so I won't touch it.

I expect the argument is that porridge makes you feel full, but that only works if it really does reduce the consumption of other foods and very little else is eaten.

The fact is that porridge contains a lot of carbs and calories and if the aim is to lose weight, it needs to be cut down.

A reasonably sized portion of oats is in fact an aid to losing weight because it creates a feeling of "fullness" for longer. It as has been said also reduces the levels of bad cholesterol and studies have shown it helps alleviate Type 2 diabetes.
The calorific problems usually come from the things people choose to use on their oats-like honey, sugar, syrup, cream etc.
Porridge is certainly better than any pre-packaged breakfast cereal.

I have never found porridge filling for any length of time. It has certainly never kept me going all morning. Mind you, nor has anything else.

When I was eating porridge for breakfast, with some currants and a squirt of syrup, I lost weight. Maybe I should have poured cream on it as well. ?

I'd like to see a sugar rating on food, in the form of a teaspoon showing how many spoons of sugar are in an average serving of the item. I think it would help if people realised how many spoons of sugar they are consuming a day.

I was told that oats help lower cholesterol,too. Mind you, so does Lipitor. A combination works wonders!

growstuff

Blondiescot

You clearly missed the last part of my previous comment. Studies have shown that porridge can aid weight management. At less than 200 calories for an average bowl, I'd hardly call that high in calories, and oats are very filling, so that would keep you going until lunchtime.

Which studies?

FWIW I know that porridge sends my blood glucose sky high (because I test it), so I won't touch it.

I expect the argument is that porridge makes you feel full, but that only works if it really does reduce the consumption of other foods and very little else is eaten.

The fact is that porridge contains a lot of carbs and calories and if the aim is to lose weight, it needs to be cut down.

A reasonably sized portion of oats is in fact an aid to losing weight because it creates a feeling of "fullness" for longer. It as has been said also reduces the levels of bad cholesterol and studies have shown it helps alleviate Type 2 diabetes.
The calorific problems usually come from the things people choose to use on their oats-like honey, sugar, syrup, cream etc.
Porridge is certainly better than any pre-packaged breakfast cereal.

You should never apologise for stating a fact JenniferEccles.
I totally agree with all you have posted.

MaizieD

Why should orange juice have a health warning, Maybee?

We can't obliterate all sugars from our lives.

Well, I did question it when I heard it on the blog about cancer prevention but I then heard it on the ZOE app blog. I think it’s all about the sugar rush you get from it. A diabetic friend told me the other day that he sometimes has orange juice if he’s flagging a bit. The doctor who did the first blog said he’d said that having freshly squeezed orange juice was different to having a sugary drink and his colleagues told him he was wrong so he now puts it high up on his list of food not to take. And the ZOE app blog said it was to do with sugar spikes causing inflammation and they’re very much looking into gut health and inflammation. Not being scientific I can’t explain it properly I’m afraid.

growstuff

Casdon

That’s not a fact though growstuff. An average portion of porridge oats contains 145 calories, which given the other benefits it offers is low. The nutrient composition is well balanced. It’s a recommended product on many diets, including Slimming World, which is one of the most successful.

I guess it depends what you mean by "average". A quick search tells me that a 50g bowl (made with water), which is what the manufacturers consider average, contains about 180 calories.

It IS a fact that porridge is carbohydrate-dense.

per 40g serving ; ENERGY. 612kJ. 145kcal. 7% ; FAT. 2.8g. 4% ; SATURATES. 0.4g. 2% ; SUGARS. <0.5g. <1%% ; SALT. <0.01g. <1%%.
40g is an average serving. The point is, for people who aren’t diabetic, porridge is one of the most healthy breakfasts. We don’t all need to reduce carbohydrates to the level that diabetics do, and it’s wrong to suggest that porridge is bad because it’s carbohydrate dense, it’s unrefined, which is most important. For most people, the advice given by DaisyAnne is correct.

growstuff

The 50g bowl contains 30g of carbs, which is more than I eat in a day.

Good for you! Depends I suppose on whether you eat to live or live to eat. For most of us, food is a pleasure, not a chore.