Why Women Lose Weight—or Don’t

These are not surprising new findings, and whomever wrote that or whatnot is trying to insult the publics' intelligence. As women, we have been having body images because of mass media, advertisement, fashion industry, you name it. This has been going on for decades!! women take a lot of pressure and pain from body image portrayed on us, and those standards. Being healthy is important, but too thin is not healthy.

These are not surprising new findings, and whomever wrote that or whatnot is trying to insult the publics' intelligence. As women, we have been having body images because of mass media, advertisement, fashion industry, you name it. This has been going on for decades!! women take a lot of pressure and pain from body image portrayed on us, and those standards. Being healthy is important, but too thin is not healthy.

bubby1988: Thank you for your post. I found it well thought out and kind, not to mention accurate in my opinion.
The thoughts expressed here are a big part of the problem. When people love themselves it is so much easier to make changes should they decide to do so. Hurling insults is not helpful at all.
I am sorry that so many people are so hateful towards others simply because of their size. I am sure many overweight will be hurt by those who have posted anger and injury here. Very sad.

From my experience (having lost and gained weight practically on a yearly basis) the best "weight loss plan for me has been to join OA (overeaters annyomous). The key for me is to set realistic short term goals that I know in can complete. I try not to make it about a number on the scale.In OA. just as in AA I learn to live a day at a time. If I focus on trying to exercise every day and eat according to my "food plan" ( three meals a day no snacking in between) then the weight WILL come off. Keeping my goals realistic and acheivable I prevent myself from failing and saying "what the heck" I've already blown it i might as well pig out. This was my first Thanksgiving abstinent from overeating EVER and I'm 52 y/o. I have lost 20 lbs. in two months and I hope to lose 20 more by spring so I can return to the running and rock climbing I began at 48" Keep coming back ...it works.

For years I have been unhappy with my weight and it is only since I have had the amazing experience of being pregnant i have realised I just need to be healthy for me. I don't care if this is "Wtihin the right limits" what matters is how i feel about myself and whether or not I can keep up with my three children. That in itself is a weight off my mind cause I no longer care what others think of me or how they feel as long as me and my kids are happy thats all that matters. To be honest while they are wasting time passing comment on me they are leaving someone else who may be affected alone so let them have their say if it makes them feel better!!!

Being attractive for the sake of a man is entirely overated. As a matter of a fact, it sickens me to think that some of you could be so arrogant and self centered to attack others who don't make your grade of what is ideal appearance. Why should I care what you think about how I look? I spent the first 30 years of my life dodging tail wagging tongue panting "men" whereever I went. It was hell. I couldn't even have a relationship with a male without him proclaiming his interest for me, or commenting on my eyes or my hair and how great it looked. It was horrible to walk down the street and have guys gawk , yip and yodel out of their car window....worse yet....follow me. I hated it. "Men" that pursue women for their own selfish gain are not men and not worth having. I'd choose being heavier and ridding myself of some of you anyday. People should be concerned about their weight, not based on what some self centered fool wants, but what is healthy and functional. Will I be there for my grandchildrens birthday? Can I play soccer with my son? These are the things that matter to me...not how I rank in comparison to your wife. God did not put me here for you. He put me here for himself, to love and serve him accordingly. Shame on you if you think otherwise.

Are they kidding with this question about body image and if fat is really fat etc.? That is neither funny nor smart or cute. That is just a stupid and ignorant statement to make. As an epidemiologist i can say that obesity is a global pandemic. Obesity has major health implications: from cornonary heart disease to hypertension, high cholesterol etc. - all of which ultimately lead to heart failure and shorter life expectancy. The burden that is placed on the organs and functioning of the body of an obese person is tremendous and wide-ranging.

Making fat look like the new "in" or "thin" and demonizing fat loss as a sure-route-to-annorexia, the false message given to the public is that being obese is not such a bad thing. And we are not talking a few vanity pounds here or there; we are talking being seriously overweight, beyond a reasonable threshold conducive to health. This has nothing to do with the political agenda of giving women distorted body images. Although it is acknowledged that the other extreme end, namely annorexia and bullimia, can also have serious health consequences, it is nevertheless a reality that being underweight is not nearly as wide ranging and prevalent of a public health issue as being obese. If anything, obese people have very unhealthy attitudes towards their bodies. The majority of health problems are brought upon by obesity. It is a serious issue that should not be under-rated in our quest for finding the culrpit for our younger generation's messed up attitudes. There is no counter-culture at work to victimize women into toothpicks...these women were there before too, it is just that television has made spreading the information more efficient and widely avaialable. Let's not go around advertising that there is somehow something very cutsie and brave about being fat!

Please, this is written so people who are too lazy to be "healthy" have an excuse. Having extra weight adds stress to pretty much every part of your body. Just because you can convince yourself, and others that you are ok with the way you look doesn't mean it's any healthier for you. For a woman 5'2" who is 200 lbs, she is putting her life at risk, what is so hard to understand about that?????? And yes, it is alos unhealthy for a woman (men too), to be underweight. 5'2" and 80lbs is bad for you too. Just don't make excuses that, "I've tried and no matter what I do I can't lose weight.", Bull!!! You just aren't trying enough. If you sweat, and exercize enough, yuo will lose weight along with healthy eating. Running, swimming etc... it BURNS FAT AND CALORIES. Nobody runs and doesn't burn fat and calories, it's just how often and long you do it. Then, don't go home and eat cheesburgers and ice cream either. i would respect someone 100 times more if they were just honest and said "I'm overweight and I don't care how it looks OR how unhealthy it is. I like eating crap!"

Burn the bridge. Nuke the foundation. Back yourself up against a wall. Have an opinion one way or the other, get off the fence and rip it up. Cut yourself off so there is no going back. Once you're committed the truth will come out. You ask about security? What you need is uncertainty. What you need is confusion; something that forces you to reinvent yourself, a whip to drive you harder.

"I never try anything - I just do it. Want to try me?
White Zombie, "Thunder Kiss"

In Dune, Frank Herbert called it "the attitude of the knife,??? cut off what's incomplete and say ???now it has finished, for it has ended there.??? So finish it, and walk away, forward. Only acts undertaken with commitment have meaning. Only your best effort matters. Life is a Meritocracy, with death as the auditor. Inconsistency, incompetence and lies are all cut short by that final word. Death will change you if you can't change yourself.

I was one of those underweight girls throughout my teens and twenties, but nearing the end of my thirties, I've put on some pounds. It bothered me until everyone I knew started telling me how much better I looked, how much healthier I looked. It's true about comparing yourself to those around more than models when you get bigger and i always think to myself "if she can wear that and feel good, what I'm wearing isn't so bad." But I have to say, as the rolls take over and it's getting uncomfortable and harder to breath and get around, I have to wonder how big people can be happy with their weight. It's not comfortable and you feel like crap. There really is a happy medium when it comes to weight, but unless you've been to both ends, it's hard to find.

I think you guys should also put in there that BMI's are not always correct infact many times they are wrong. I am a 5'11 male it states for me to be normal weight I must weigh between 133-178 pounds. At 18 while in boot camp my weight dropped from 185 to 165. The doctors declared me underweight and sickly they order double ration for me to gain weight. I was way below reccomended body fat levels and started to lose muscle mass also. I weigh 255 now an I actually am at 24 BMI instead of 35.6 as it indicated.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/71267

This link takes you to a previous newsweek article. I was once anorexic and bulemic. I am now normal to slightly overweight. I am much healthier and happier now than I was back then. I love my body and so does my husband. I wish more women loved themselves instead of comparing themselves to other women, especially when they compare themselves to the false images shown in advertising and the like.

Why can't a person's deed and how they treat others matter more than what they look like? I wish I could love myself, fat or fit! But, I do not, not at this moment. It can change, and I hope to the Gods that it does, though I know I need to work really hard, much more so than I am at this time possibly... I just believe that we should stop measuring the waist line and start measuring the amount of heart and compassion one has towards life in general, human and non.

As an obese person myself, I am appalled by the negativity I am reading. It's easy to criticize someone when you don't know what they are going through. I have to deal with negative body image every day watching tv, listening to the radio, talking to my kids, etc. and it hurts. Think about the schoolyard bully and how the kid being picked on feels, or how about when your boss yells at you for something that you were sure you did right, or how about you went to a store and picked out the perfect dress (or suit) and your best friend said you looked stupid. Combine all those bad feelings together, then you may come close to the depressed, hurt, feelings I feel on a daily basis. I don't owe society anything. I will continue to eat healthy and try my best to lose weight. But the negativity here and in society in general doesn't help anything. Think about that before you post.

I think there are more obese women then men. It is truly nasty to look at and i don't feel bad for them. They have done this too themselfs or there parents tought them to be this way. That's why they got to take control of there weight and not just for themselfs FOR THE CHILDERN. Also they would never be able to meet another man this way and the same for men.

Society would not be overweight if they could afford to eat, fresh fruit and vegatables. As far as exercise most get enough at work unless in a noffice position, perhaps. Twelve hours of heavy labor and then family responsibilities fills a day. The salt and cheap sugar itmes compared to fresh fruit and vegatables are the problem.Many medical findings now see that as far as heart attacks etc just as many thin people die or get ill from it as heavy and we all die of something .Comparing the diet of "baby boomers" I have found by working in adult home a nuymber of years most lose weight from less stress, and they do not get the sugary and salt items as much but regular diest of all three good meals aday, and eat what they want( we would do not want to infringe on anyone's rights) They in the one I speak of, live to be in their 80's -90's on an average and loose weight, I found very, very few wer over weight, but had good meals served each day.Eating this way, was the only thing they had control over, and so found they even would demand things as: " Real Butter", in the one I worked in, and foods they lioved on all their lives.. We can learn much from them. They love parties and really will not come out if no food offered. So they get smnacks less often then many in society, perhaps?