(no subject)

[dreamer_easy]

We're constantly bombarded with stuff about food, fat, and dieting; I'm wary about adding to the babble here. Because I've got Type 2 Diabetes, though, it's an issue I can't completely avoid. I spit on body fascism, the dodgy diet industry, and the casual, commonplace bigotry against fat people. I rip down ads for snake oil diets when I see them in the street, and I daily remind my soft, sexy curves how much I love them. What I want is unbiased info about health: what is the relationship between my podge and my diabetes? What can I realistically do about it? I don't feel comfortable trusting either the general panic about how we're all going to swell up like balloons and explode; nor am I completely comfortable with fat activists' dismissal of links between podge and health. What I want is SCIENCE dammit SCIENCE. Will post some here when I find it - always behind a cut, because the radio TV newspaper politicians and quacks are filling you with enough crap as it is.

Comments

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

Not only do I also have Type 2 Diabetes, I cunningly married a doctor. So access to relatively reliable information about health is usually not too hard.

I find myself in a similar position, too. The ideology is all very well, but when it comes to my health, I want science. I know people need respect and love regardless of size, but I want to be healthier.

I've just chanced medication (from Diamicron to Metformin) because the old medication was causing me to gain weight. Unfortunately, the change doesn't appear to be going that smoothly. But gaining weight has provoked regular exercise.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

One of the main objections of fat acceptance activists is to the automatic assumption that fat people need only diet and they'll become thin. I'm still researching this, but I think there may not be a solid scientific basis for what seems at first glance like a common-sense assumption! I don't want to torture myself with attempts to lose weight which are doomed from the start, or unrealistic assumptions about how much and how fast, or exaggerated fear of my own fat.

[zazuomgwtf.livejournal.com]

I have a plethora of syndromes connected to my syndrome x including; hig blood pressure, fatty liver, low blood sugar, high triglicerides. Above and beyond the fact that medical practitioners have told me the only real way to control this stuff is through proper diet and weight loss, I know it from my own experience. When I am fit and thinner I feel much MUCH better physically.

[gillpolack.livejournal.com]

Sometimes diet and exercise help, but are not the answer. I walk c 2 hours a day and am mostly very careful about my diet. Careful to the point of tedium. It doesn't help. I suspect that my metabolism is so stuffed through PCOS combining with acute allergies I can't seem to get thinner, and the doctor is convinced that I must be lying about my food and my exercise and won't try me on metformin, much less anything more exciting and risky.
Kate - if you can find good information I promise to read every word, enthusiastically. I have had a surfeit of doctors who assume the waistline is the disease, not a symptom.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Sounds perfectly ghastly.

(Have you tried a low GI diet? Probably, but I thought I should wave it about.)

[gillpolack.livejournal.com]

I am on one. Well, mostly. Low GI diets are really hard to maintain for years on end. Low GI maintains the weight but only lost me size initially. It *ought* not be more ghastly than any other maintenance program for a chronic illness, but it becomes that because of the focus on weight and waist measurement as opposed to the illness.

[zazuomgwtf.livejournal.com]

Part of my syndrome x is PCOS so I am really hearing you about this! Luckily I have had medical professionals who did believe that my weight problem was not caused by overeating. I can imagine how terribly frustrating it is for people who are trying to care for you to assume that your weight problem "is your fault".
Recently I was put on a diet especially for people who produce too much insulin, and it is really working. If you are interested my IM's are on my userinfo and I would be happy to tell you all about it.

[gillpolack.livejournal.com]

Exteremely interested. If I can sort the diet out then maybe the exercise will do something. I don't have IM, but my email is gpolackattriviumpublishingdotcom and I live in Canberra. Thank you!!

[http://users.livejournal.com/doctor_k_/]

And Dave's sister-in-law has worked as a diabetes nurse educator....

Our good friend baby_elvis has Type 2 diabetes as well, and by virtue of modifying her eating alone (no exercise) has managed to both lose 24kg, keep her sugars down without medication, and get her Hba1c down to well into the non-diabetic range.
Weight loss is commonly a part of managing the spectrum of conditions that include T2DM, polycystic ovary disease, and Syndrome X. It goes a long way to reduce or halt the progress of insulin resistance, and can improve fertility for subfertile women with PCOS.

Obesity is not a major risk factor for a whole host of things like heart disease, but it does seem to be a risk factor for some cancers eg breast cancer.
Activity levels and fitness IMHO are far more important for life expectancy, independence in your later years etc than size. Active obese people are less likely to have falls, to wind up in nursing homes than inactive thin people.
Keeping cholesterol and blood lipids within a certain range have been shown to be associated with lowering risk for heart and blood vessel disease, so that's a good motive to modify your fat intake.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Ta for this. I had suspected that exercise and eating right was the issue, rather than the physical presence of podge, but my doctor explained that artificially fattened guinea pigs developed diabetes. I want to track down that research.

A difficulty for me personally is that my diet is already very good - it's been low fat, low GI for years. I can always tighten it up a little, as I did recently when my insulin resistance increased and my blood glucose readings started to climb - but there's not a whole lot I can improve in that department, and in any case it now has little effect. What I need is a lot more exercise, and not just for the sake of weight loss or blood glucose.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

The moral of the story is: fat != automatic disease death and despair.

Fat isn't the only weight problem...

[purplepooka.livejournal.com]

Not related to diabetes, but just to put the whole health/image thing into perspective, I've been trying to gain weight for nearly a year now and not having much success. People glare and mutter when I say this, as if I'm actually lucky and shouldn't make a fuss, but it really is a problem. I don't consider my ribs and collarbone to be my best features, I get tired easily, the slightest virus knocks me for six, and despite a healthy appetite for the right foods I appear to be more or less consistently losing weight. It's difficult to find diets that are about gaining weight...

Re: Fat isn't the only weight problem...

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

as if I'm actually lucky and shouldn't make a fuss

Ignorance, alas, on their part - not quite as bad as people who wish they had anorexia, but a symptom of the fat hysteria gripping our culture. I read where being underweight is actually more dangerous for one's health. (Can a doctor help with weight-gain diets?)

Re: weight gain diets

[http://users.livejournal.com/doctor_k_/]

I think a dietitian would be more useful.

Re: Fat isn't the only weight problem...

[purplepooka.livejournal.com]

not quite as bad as people who wish they had anorexia

I actually know somebody who has said this in all seriousness... in front of somebody else I know who has had anorexia...

I haven't actually taken the time to consult the GP about weight gain diets, always seem to be too busy, which is probably part of the problem. Trouble is, fat diets are as hard to stick to as thin diets. If you're not hungry, or don't feel like a certain food, forcing it down is only going to make you sick. My trouble is that my tastes tend towards low carb and I burn a lot of energy in my work - walking around classrooms and between classrooms and between college centres on opposite sides of town... I'm an accidental Atkins ;-). I must try to stuff crisps down my throat while on the go.

[murasaki-1966.livejournal.com]

I got told by several doctors to lose weight. I ended up in hospital with a VERY large ovarian cyst. Because I am short and round, almost every GP assumed my slightly high blood pressure was do to my wieght. Once I lose the cyst, my blood pressure went back to normal.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Euw!!!

[murasaki-1966.livejournal.com]

Also, please remember, on the current method of working out healthy weight (eg the Body Mass Index) George Clooney is obese. We don't have a proper way to work out what is healthy. Obesity is the new health scare, before it was smoking, or heart disease or something. One of the skinniest girls I knew had a choledtrol level of over 10. You can be round and fit.

And I don't do enough exercise either*




*but I can blame that on my back