Why do we get fat

Chapter 2 The Original Sin of Obesity (1)
In 1934, the young German pediatrician Hilde Bruch moved to the United States and settled in New York.She later wrote in her book that she decided to settle down because of the sheer number of obese children she saw. “There are a lot of fat kids, not only in clinics, but also on the street, in the subway, and in schools.” Indeed, the problem of obese children is so compelling that other European immigrants ask Bruch: What the hell happened to the kids?Why are they getting fatter?Many said they had never seen so many fat kids before.

We hear these questions a lot these days.When we are constantly reminded by health experts and news reports that human beings are currently in the "trend" of obesity prevalence, we may also ask ourselves: why is he so fat?why am i so fat
It was the mid-20s, 30 years before the first KFC and McDonald's opened; 20 years before glucose drinks and large fast food meals became commonplace.In this way, 50 was the worst period of the Great Depression, full of crises of food shortages and unemployment on an unprecedented scale.At that time, in the United States, one out of every four workers was unemployed; more than six out of every ten Americans lived in poverty; one out of every four children was malnourished.Still, Dr. Bruch was struck by the obesity of New York's children. What happened?

In the second year after settling in New York, Bruch opened a private practice at Columbia University's School of Surgeons treating obese children. In 1939, she published the first in a series of reports on obesity, which featured detailed studies of the many obese children she treated.Through communication with the obese themselves and their families, she found that no matter how much she and her parents were unwilling to admit at first, these obese children did overeat.Still, telling them to eat less doesn't work.Any guidance, sympathy, advice, and persuasion to children and parents will not work.

The truth is, these people have spent their entire lives trying to improve their diet, control their weight, or at least try to eat less, and they're still fat.Bruch writes that "despite all their efforts to lose weight, they have practically given up on achieving it in their lifetime." Maintaining a slim figure requires "persistent semi-starvation," which they cannot do.They would rather let themselves become fat and live in adversity.

One of Bruch's patients was a skinny little girl in her teens, and this slender image "slowly disappeared under layers of fat accumulation." The young girl spent her life struggling with her weight fight.She knew what she had to do, she had to eat less, and this struggle to lose weight defined the meaning of her life. "I've always understood that life is about body shape," she told Bruch. "When I put on weight, I always feel morose. It's so boring to live...I really hate myself. I can't stand being so fat .I don't want to look at myself.I hate the mirror,the mirror always shows how fat I am.I never feel happy eating because I get fat.But I can't find a way to solve it,so I get fatter and fatter .”

Just like this thin girl, many overweight people will spend most of their lives trying to eat less, and then eat less.Sometimes they succeed, sometimes they fail, and the struggle goes on and on.For some, the weight-loss wars begin in childhood—like the girl Bruch treated.For others, the battle begins in college: During freshman year, freshman's first year away from home and living on campus, they begin to accumulate fat around their waists and hips.Still others, in their 40s and [-]s, start to realize that trying to lose weight isn't as easy as it used to be.

If we are heavier than the standard weight recommended by medical authorities, then no matter what reason we go to the doctor, the doctor will strongly recommend that we lose weight.We're told that if we get heart disease, stroke, diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer's, asthma, any chronic disease that sounds like it makes us feel sick, it's likely to be related to obesity.We are asked to exercise, to eat well, to eat and drink less – it seems that we would not think to do these things unless we are asked to. "Compared to other diseases," Bruch said of obesity, "doctors just play a special trick in treating obesity, which is to tell fat people not to eat, even though they know they can't do it. "

Physicians in Bruch's day were not sloppy, and neither are modern physicians.They simply assume that since the causes of obesity are so clear and obvious, the solutions to obesity are equally intuitive.Doctors tell us that we gain weight because we eat too much and move too little, so what we do is do the opposite.As a famous saying in a best-selling book said: "If you want to lose weight, there is no better way than 'don't eat too much'." Everyone thinks that this way we can lose weight, at least we will not become fatter.

In 1957, Bruch described this view as: "Obesity is caused simply by eating more than the body needs." Today, this has long since become a popular view around the world.

We call this calorie intake and calorie expenditure, which is whether nutrient intake and expenditure are balanced.According to the World Health Organization: "The root cause of obesity is the imbalance between calorie intake and calorie expenditure." When we consume more energy than we expend, we will gain weight (positive energy balance); , and become thinner (negative energy balance).Food is a kind of energy, and we measure this energy with the unit of calorie[1]. When we take in more calories than we expend, we will gain weight; the less calories we take in, the leaner we will become.The influence of these official interpretations is extremely pervasive.Also, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control believes: "Weight control is to balance the calories taken in with the calories 'burned' by the body." The British Medical Research Council believes: "Although we cannot attribute obesity to a single cause, but The imbalance between energy intake (through food) and energy expenditure (mainly through physical activity) must be an important cause of obesity." According to the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research: "Obesity is always due to the relationship between energy intake and energy expenditure. It is caused by the imbalance between them." The German Federal Ministry of Health believes: "The energy intake greatly exceeds the energy consumption, which leads to obesity."

This belief about obesity is so pervasive and persuasive these days that it's hard not to believe it.Even if we have plenty of evidence to the contrary, no matter how consciously we try to maintain a "eat less, move more" life, we may not succeed in losing weight.This is likely because we are more likely to suspect that our willpower to lose weight is too weak than to doubt the idea that obesity is determined by the calories consumed and burned.

There are many examples of this kind of thinking, such as a respected exercise physiologist who co-authored the "Principles of Physical Work and Health" series published by the American College of Cardiology and the American College of Sports Medicine in August 2007.The colleague told me that when he started long-distance running in the 8s, he was short, bald, and fat; now that he is almost 20 years old, he is still short, bald, and fatter.After exercising for so many years, his weight has increased by about 70 kilograms, and he has run a total of 70 kilometers - about three times the circumference of the earth at the equator.He thinks exercise has a limited effect on weight maintenance; but he also believes that if he doesn't exercise, he may gain weight.

I asked him if he really thought about it: If he ran a little more miles, say four times the equator of the earth instead of three, he would be thinner.He replied: "I don't think there will be more effects. I don't have time for that. But if I could go out and exercise two or three hours a day for the past few decades, maybe I wouldn't be so fat now." The key Yes, he's stuck with the "if you exercise, you'll lose weight" rule.

In recent years, any counter-evidence to the argument that "the balance of calorie intake and expenditure is related to weight loss" has been clearly resisted by the academic circle.Imagine this: In a murder trial, several credible witnesses testified successively, proving that the suspect had an impeccable alibi at the time of the murder; but since the judge found the suspect guilty at the beginning of the trial, so They found the accused guilty.

Obesity is on the rise and people are getting fatter now.

(End of this chapter)