It's time to make some changes to our national conversation about obesity. We need to stop talking solely about people being overweight as if that is the only cause of poor health. We need to stop reducing the problem to a number on a doctor's chart on the wall, or the number on a scale. The problem is much much larger than that (no pun intended).
We need to begin to change our focus, and look at overall health, rather than focusing simply on weight. Yes, being overweight can lead to many health problems. So can being underweight. Malnutrition can occur at any point on the weight spectrum, and can lead to many of the overall health concerns that people experience when they are overweight.
A child that eats only chicken nuggets, will suffer from malnutrition, for the lack of appropriate calcium, and vitamins that come from dairy products and healthy vegetables. That child is also likely to be overweight.
A child that eats only lettuce will suffer from some of the same problems, but will also suffer from the lack of protein to build healthy muscle tissue and normal growth. They will likely not be overweight though, so it's not a problem, right?
And what about the adult that eats all the right things in all the right portions, but doesn't exercise, so is develops brittle bones, or simply has fat instead of lean muscle mass? But hey, they aren't overweight, so they aren't obese, which means we don't need to worry about them.
Yes, someone who is obese has additional concerns - stress fractures, difficulty breathing, added risk of cardiac issues - but if you really do some research, these aren't limited to the obese, they can be complications of anyone who lives an unhealthy lifestyle and suffers from poor or mal-nutrition.
Ultimately, we need to move away from the scale, and stop reducing the problem to a number. We need to stop telling our young people that their value and their worth comes from the size of their jeans, and teach them that their overall health is what is important. We need to teach them that the better they take care of themselves now, the longer they will have to make their mark on the world, to make their legacy, and to show the world just how special they are. And none of that has anything to do with what they see on the scale.
Just my little thought for the day.
