The Body Weight Trap
Are you feeling bad about your body weight? Do you tell yourself you’re a failure because you can’t get to a target weight?
Body weight was historically an area of difficulty for me. I had always felt ‘big’ as a child, being tall and covered in ‘puppy fat’ as a young girl. I was told I had big shoulders being a swimmer, which added to my feeling of being too large. I came to believe that my body was big and that it wasn’t a good thing. Growing up in the 90s I was surrounded by images of skeletal women on the front covers of magazines which further reinforced my dissatisfaction with how my body looked. In my early 20s when I left home and went to university, I started clubbing with my friends; I would dance all night and then sleep all day, with food being at the bottom of my priority pile. I became obsessed with weighing myself and fixated on reaching a certain weight, believing that this would somehow magically make me happy. But it was never enough.
It wasn’t until I started my journey to heal my relationship with food and my body, that I learned how bodyweight is no real reflection of health and during therapy for my eating disorder, I was also introduced to the idea that the size and weight of my body was no reflection of my worth or value. I had spent almost 20 years of my life worrying about my size and weight so this was a difficult thought pattern for me to let go of. But thank god for neuroplasticity, because I was able to reprogram my brain, and now feel the freedom I so desperately wanted from the mental prison that I was living in.
A Money Making Machine
The reason I am telling you this is because most of us are so focussed on body weight that we often forget about health. A healthy body can be many different shapes and sizes. Someone who is ‘slim’ can have type 2 diabetes, and someone who is living in a larger body can run a marathon. It angers me that so many industries are making money out of people's insecurities around their body shape and size. The diet industry makes billions out of products that convince people these silver bullet products work, when actually all they do is keep people stuck in a dieting cycle, which is detrimental to their health, not just physically, but mentally too. Feelings of failure, low self worth and depression can be the result of chronic dieting, plus it leads to metabolic changes and an increased likelihood of some diseases like osteoporosis, they don’t advertise that on the front cover of diet shakes do they?
We live in a world where the outside surface of our bodies matters more than the inside. We are constantly bombarded with images of bodies and faces, which we are brainwashed to think we should aspire to. The sad reality is that if it wasn’t this way, industries like cosmetics and supplements wouldn’t be worth the huge amounts of money they are today. They rely on people like you and me, buying into the ideal they are selling and providing the often expensive products that enable you to reach there (although they actually don’t). If the focus was shifted towards achieving optimal health, it would create a world of much happier and contented people, and do you know what ironic the result of that would be? You’d probably look better too. Your skin would be clearer, your body would be more mobile, you’d have more energy and less depression and anxiety.I can’t think of one downside to making a dietary change to improve your health, and heal yourself from metabolic diseases like high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes or fatty liver disease.
Is BMI Bollocks?
What is BMI and is it useful? BMI stands for body mass index which means the amount of weight your body has per area that it takes up. You can calculate your BMI online by knowing your height and weight in cm and kg respectively. Once you know your BMI, you can look at a chart which tells you if you're underweight, normal, overweight, obese or clinically obese. Here are some reasons why BMI alone isn’t a good indicator of health:
Your body weight alone does not give any indication of your health
Your body is made up of multiple tissues all of which have a different density
Body composition is not taken into consideration
Disease risk is linked to body fat distribution not weight
Men and women are not physiologically the same but measured on the same scale
Multiple factors are needed to determine health e.g. fasting glucose, body fat % etc
Different ethnic groups have different physiology
When is BMI useful?
Each person is individual in their eating behaviour, dietary choices, and body composition. Each client that I work with has a unique set of circumstances and conditions which lead to their current health status. As a nutritionist I use BMI as one of many indicators to give an overall view of someone's health. I look at blood work, to tell me how efficient someone's blood glucose control is, if they are clearing fat from their blood effectively and how their liver and kidneys are functioning. I consider dietary intakes, balance of nutrients, quantity of fresh produce being consumed as well as activity level. Mental state, level of satisfaction and contentment with life are also considered alongside age, sex, ethnicity, dieting history and relationship with food. What I’m getting at here is that BMI can be useful when considering a holistic view of an individual's health and lifestyle in order to give the best possible advice.
Turn Suffering Into A Superpower
No one should feel bad about their body; it’s a horrible place to be, and one which steals the ability to enjoy life, whilst being trapped in the mental prison of a self deprecating narrative that generates depression and low self worth. My journey to find a place of acceptance and balance with my own body has now turned into my superpower. It has given me valuable insight and experience to enable me to help others on their journey towards health by healing their relationship with food and eating. It took me a long time to see it that way, but now I do, I am grateful for all the challenges and difficulties that I have overcome as it enables me to help others to do the same.
If you’re considering making a change to your health I would encourage you to do it today. Stop waiting for the right time, do it now. Tackling the root cause of dietary related diseases is the only way you will get your health and vibrancy back. There is no magic silver bullet or pill you can take which will make you feel better. You are the only person who can drive this change and believe me the rewards of doing that are outstanding. Life is so precious and you deserve to live in a healthy and happy state.
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