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Media Outburst

Mr Happy said:
If we don't have a nation aspiring to be fat then why is the weight of the average person 2 stone heavier now than 30 - 40 years ago?

People are fatter and lazier and porkier. Fact! Diabetes is one consequence...
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I didnt say that as a Nation we are not more overweight, what I said was that no one wants (aspires) to be fat that is entirely different. The point I am trying to get across is that most overeating and therefore obesity is a direct result of us as a Nation living today with shed loads more stress than any previous generation. Stress causes overeating that is a FACT you may not believe it but its true and there is lots of studies/evidence to back it up.

Stress and obesity search Google finds 180,000 results (0.26 seconds) https://www.google.co.uk/#hl=en&sclient ... 40&bih=704

Feel free to carry on your argument after you have read the FACTS.

As for the Nation being lazy, that is another myth which was proved when a study was done to show how our young now sit in front of a TV or a games console and dont get any exercise, "kids today dont get any exersice" is the myth being perpetuated by this idiot professor amongst others. Unfortunately the study proved without doubt that out youngsters move around just as much as youngsters have every moved around they simple do it in different ways. I dont have a link to this study but it was a couple of years ago I think and was disgust here on this forum when the results were published so if you doubt my word feel free to search for it, I cant be bothered to defend what I know to be the truth.

So anyone that calls our Nation a land of fat porkers is quite simply rude and ignorant of the facts.
 
I am very overweight - yes. Am I lazy? You judge: I get up every morning at 5am to get ready for work. Work from 07.30 until 18.00 and then get home by 20.00. Have a meal and then go to bed ready for it all again tomorrow. When should I exercise? When I am asleep? I truly believe I am overweight because I am constantly stressed and this feeds my addiction for food. This is my life. Until our society becomes less stressful and I can afford to retire (maybe at 70 ) I cannot see my life improving greatly. We should stop the insults and try and find solutions - it seems that everyone knows every cause but remedies are few.
 
To say that modern life is stressful and thus giving everyone diabetes is defeatist and also promotes the lesser proven cause (stress) over the well proven cause (porkiness).

However, both of these are within our gift to change.

Life can be stressful but we can take control.
I used to hate commuting 1hour each way to work so I stopped doing it - result!
Working all hours and then at weekends leaving me no time for family was really hard, So I took every opportunity to reduce my working hours leaving more time for 'me' and thus able to do things to control my diabetes. Less money but that's not the end of the world. You really can live on less.
I have always attempted to avoid money worries by reducing my outgoings. I don't constantly buy 'stuff' I don't smoke. I run a cheap car (but use a bike or my feet where I can). I don't live in a house I can barely afford. Thus I reduce my stress.
I didn't like my job - I went to college and got new qualifications and a new job I did enjoy.

Don't blame stress like its something being done to you. Diabetes has been done to you and for most sufferers there is something you can do about it.
 
stuffedolive said:
To say that modern life is stressful and thus giving everyone diabetes is defeatist and also promotes the lesser proven cause (stress) over the well proven cause (porkiness).
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So you obviously did not read any of the studies that were listed in the Google links that I posted for the benefit of Mr Happy.

Please read about the causes of overeating before you comment with phrases like lesser proven and proven. The facts are all there you simply have to read them.

This link may help
http://www.specsavers.co.uk/ :wink:

I can understand uninformed people who are misled by the gutter press blaming obesity on "lazy porkers" but not a professor, he really should know better.
 
mandydowns said:
I am very overweight - yes. Am I lazy? You judge: I get up every morning at 5am to get ready for work. Work from 07.30 until 18.00 and then get home by 20.00. Have a meal and then go to bed ready for it all again tomorrow. When should I exercise? When I am asleep? I truly believe I am overweight because I am constantly stressed and this feeds my addiction for food. This is my life. Until our society becomes less stressful and I can afford to retire (maybe at 70 ) I cannot see my life improving greatly. We should stop the insults and try and find solutions - it seems that everyone knows every cause but remedies are few.
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Interesting valid points here :)
I know a female who used to be very very slender and began a huge new career
as a top level executive ranking in sales and marketing .
She piled 4 and half stones on with the "STRESS" of the job and the role :shock:

Loads of perks,great monthly wage, first class flights worldwide, top of range vehicle [chauffered ]
1st class travel and hotels, holidays abroad all inclusively paid for and she could even work from home
if too tired to get into the office .

Within 16 months of her in her new job - I remember seeing a picture of her and failed to even recognise her :o

STRESS can be a definete factor and yes, she constantly refuels herself with food as she works .
If she dosent do this - "I cant work to the level I need to" - and will lose my job !!! [Her own words]

Anna .
 
Stress has always been with us.
Stress caused by poor housing conditions, poor workplace environments, disease, inequalities, injustices etc. Diabetes rates are on the way up, waistlines are increasing. I have yet to see a study which shows that this ephemeral 'stress' has also increased at the same rate.
Sid you need to disentangle your willingness to grasp onto a single fact (stress impacts eating - I don't deny it) from the reality of causation and correlation. Stress is a cause of eating disorders (it can make you undereat too you know!) but you need to show that it is responsible for the rise in calorie consumption, and you cant.
Lots of other things cause us to overeat, such as availability of cheap high calorie foods, the stuff that goes into food that messes with our body chemistry - these are the things you would be better stressing about, not stress itself.
 
Stress? Stress of what.

I grew up as the middle child of a full on working class family, dad was a labourer and mum worked part time in a shop. Purchased a house, 3 square meals a day, holiday once a year usually uk seaside resort.

I went to Uni, when it was free and have worked since. Yes my mortgage is ridiculous, yes I hate paying 20% of my wages so that scum can claim benefits due to laziness. Whilst I moan about my long hours etc my children have new cloyhes and shoes at the drop of a hat (no darning of socks for us), play on an iPad, have 5 kids channels on the tv.

The marketeers have created a eutopia that people strive to meet rather than being good people and spending quality time with their families. Coupled with this they have promoted 3 minute meals to trough down.

Its not stress, it's a massive shift of a moral compass!

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anna29 said:
She piled 4 and half stones on with the "STRESS" of the job and the role :shock:
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No she didn't.
You said it yourself, she ate constantly that's why she piled on 4 1/2 stones..
I know others in such situations who get through the 'stress' by smoking or drinking. They don't pile the pounds on but they are equally making poor lifestyle choices.
I know of others that exercise their way through such situations and have been criticised for being 'addicted to the gym'!

This blaming stress malarkey is just denial. Denial is known to be a huge problem that gets in the way of diabetics taking the correct course of action. I am shocked that it is being pandered to on this website.

Take control of your diabetes, no one else can do it for you .
 
stuffedolive said:
anna29 said:
She piled 4 and half stones on with the "STRESS" of the job and the role :shock:
Click to expand...


No she didn't.
You said it yourself, she ate constantly that's why she piled on 4 1/2 stones..
I know others in such situations who get through the 'stress' by smoking or drinking. They don't pile the pounds on but they are equally making poor lifestyle choices.
I know of others that exercise their way through such situations and have been criticised for being 'addicted to the gym'!

This blaming stress malarkey is just denial. Denial is known to be a huge problem that gets in the way of diabetics taking the correct course of action. I am shocked that it is being pandered to on this website.

Take control of your diabetes, no one else can do it for you .
Click to expand...

Can I just let you know the female I mentioned ISNT even a diabetic - just a female that suffered from stress .
Whether it be eating,smoking,drinking,excercises excessively,chewing your nails,pulling your hair out/hair loss etc.
I actually 'grind my teeth' and my dentist gets heartburn with her stress, we were talking about this 2 weeks ago !
Stress can and does 'impact' in many forms .

This is a debate and discussion so it is simply being discussed here and certainly isnt being pandered to .
Have taken out the offensive comment as it is a side swipe offensive comment aimed at just Type2's unfairly .

Some people dont get stressed at all - other's simply do .
We are 'all' different with how we handle things in life :)

Anna.
 
Oh dear, this is getting out of hand. I wonder if someone would like to tell Steve Redgrave that when he developed Type2, he was a "lazy porker?"

Stress is a very personal thing and our personalities and coping skills decide how we deal with it. Some may see losing their car keys as a major stressful event. We all have a certain amount of stress within our daily lives and it is how we deal with it that decides if it is a burden and detrimental to our health. I would think in todays' society that materialism plays a big part in people's stress levels if they succumb to it. If you cannot afford shoes for your child, that is stressful. If you cannot afford the latest expensive trainers for your child then that is how you have decided to live your life and may make you stressed. How we all view stress is an individual and subjective experience.

The stress that might trigger diabetes is much more of a kind that we are powerless to do anything about and includes, death of a loved one, kids with terminal illnesses,divorce, PTSD, redundancy, house being repossessed, poor health, etc........... Here is a study about PTSD and it's connection with Type2.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 063839.htm
 
catherinecherub said:
The stress that might trigger diabetes is much more of a kind that we are powerless to do anything about and includes, death of a loved one, kids with terminal illnesses,divorce, PTSD, redundancy, house being repossessed, poor health, etc.......
Click to expand...

Oh and this is only a recent thing is it? No one has ever died before, or been divorced before, or lost their house before?

I think you need to just consider how these very issues have affected people in the past. Pre war high infant mortality, low life expectancy, poor housing, lack of tenure, millions of deaths in WWI and WWII. I think if stress was a major factor in diabetes then we would have seen huge rates of diabetes through the Victorian age right through to the post war creation of the welfare state. But we didn't, diabetes rates increased as our lives got easier and we got more affluent. This situation is seen time and again as each developing country takes on a western diet - not western stress. This is seen in the Inuit, in latin America, asia, austrailian aborigines..... These people do not have to move to the west to succumb to diabetes they just need to eat like we do. Stress is laregely a red herring.
 
100% agree with the above. Stress is a somewhat modern phenomenon and partly caused by ridiculous expectation. I get grief from my kids teachers at school who want to know what my child aspirations are, not content with the 'train driver' or 'astronaut' that I answered 30 years ago.

My response - "happy"!

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I was diagnosed Type 2 in December 2012. I have no close family members who had diabetes (parents, grandparents). I weighed 8st 4 oz on diagnosis and due to change in diet now weigh 6st 12oz. Am I considered to be a fat porker? It seems to me that some people develop diabetes for no apparent reason at all.

Cinders
 
Cinderella said:
I was diagnosed Type 2 in December 2012. I have no close family members who had diabetes (parents, grandparents). I weighed 8st 4 oz on diagnosis and due to change in diet now weigh 6st 12oz. Am I considered to be a fat porker? It seems to me that some people develop diabetes for no apparent reason at all.

Cinders
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Cinders,
you and me both. I've never been what you might call overweight and done masses of exercise all my life. We are the exceptions. The vast majority of T2s are overweight - FACT.

I fully expect anna29 to delete part of this post. She deleted part of my last post - the bit asking why she deleted part of an earlier post. Lets guess which bit.
 
Some people eat unhealthily because they like the food. Others develop an unhealthy relationship with food which can lead to obesity at one end of the scale and anorexia at the other. People who struggle with weight loss must resent the hell out of a lot of these posts. Until you have experienced the kind of stress that leads to a downword spiral with food, alcohol, drugs etc. all the comments on the insignificance of stress as a contributor to unhealthy eating habits are presumptuous. Have you ever reached a stage where you feel there isn't one inch of space left in your head and everything is happening an inch from your face and not only can you not see the big picture you become unaware there is one? Have you ever felt that if even one more small thing happens for you to deal with you will simply collapse in on yourself? Have you ever felt that your feet are not on the ground and you are being swept along with nothing to grab hold of? As someone who has I find all the comments about stress not being new or not having an impact on people's choices offensive and judgemental. The posters are fortunate never to have become caught in the quagmire. I am happy for all that they have better coping abilities than mine. This does not entitle anyone to judge how stress affects others. There is a distinct whiff of 'holier than thou' to it all. I am a healthy body weight but after my father died I gained nearly 2 stone. This was not because I suddenly decided that more calories was a fantastic idea. I have also been underweight due to stress. As I get older stress robs me of my appetite. Diabetes is quite a condition to have when even the thought of food makes me nauseous. Stress is a factor. Not the only one certainly, but a factor none the less. It is disingenuous to say that it is no different now than for previous generations because the world is different. We are more isolated and have less of a notion of real community. My stress was never caused by unrealistic material or monetary expectations - it is for many but not for all. That may be what is skewing this thread. Everyone is different. So blanket statements about obesity or stress are true for some but not all. Is there any possibility of ceasing with the generalities here? And can we please stop passing them off as fact? You can prove anything with statistics and the thing about studies is that they are written by people, not machiness so bias can never be ruled out even where it is unintended.

Hats off to you Anna for keeping your head above the parapet:smile:

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I think I understand what you are saying Thundercat.
In answer to your questions 'have you ever....?'. Well yes, I and I imagine many people on here have, its called 'depression'. But it doesn't give you diabetes.

Remember this thread started life as a response to the message that the professor was giving to those who have become and, more importantly, yet to become T2 diabetic due to being obese.

There's no 'holier than thou' about my response. I am agreeing with the pfof that T2s can (MUST) take control. All you need is to know you need to take control get some support and above all you need to believe it.
 
I am not an idiot. Of course depression/stress (bosom buddies) can't give you diabetes! Not all obese people are fat because they don't want to give up bad eating habits. Stress and depression are contributing causes to obesity to deny this is to bury your head in the sand. How encouraging for those who struggle with food to have a professor whose opinion carries quite a lot of influence label people as lazy porkers. To say we are becoming a nation of lazy porkers glosses completely over the underlying issues that can in many many cases lead to obesity. Not everyone chooses to be fat. It made a good sound bite so he must be pleased. Obesity is not the only cause of type 2. Bleating on about the percentage of obese people developing type 2 is pointless as itbis a known cause for it but not the only cause and not alwaus a cause at all. But still the media emphasis on obesity and diabetes in such a negative way carries on. There are many complex psuchological reasons for obesity. It is a symptom of underlying issues. These issues cause obesity which in turn can cause diabetes so they cannot be ruled out of any serious discussion on how to tackle the growing type 2 figures. The professor could have added to the store of public knowledge but chose instesd to perpetuate the stereotype

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Actually, having thought about some of the points raised in other posts about how stress can't be responsible cos there was stress in the wars and how folk were large in the past and didn't develop diabetes...

The rise in T2 seems to have accelerated over the last 40 years or so - in line with the increase in the number of houses with colour televisions!

There you go, back to black and white and the problems solved!


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