Health Hazards Of Obesity

The list of health hazards associated with being obese reads like a “what’s what” of diseases you really don’t want to get. Obesity really does increase almost every life-threatening condition that plagues modern society.

It is completely true that how you treat your body and how you look is entirely up to you. If you’re truly happy being morbidly obese, making your way from day to day at a high risk of disease and illness, having a very poor quality of existence, then that’s your choice. However, by knowing the health hazards associated with being obese, you may change your mind. If you've steadily been gaining weight, knowing the dangers of obesity might motivate you to start taking action, too.

Not only that, but realizing the risks could prompt you to inspire change in others. Knowing our loved ones could be putting themselves in danger is often the catalyst we need to get them to change their habits. While you yourself might be lean, strong and fit, not everyone around you will be. Perhaps you have a friend, a family member, or a colleague who is extremely overweight – they might be completely unaware of the damage they’re doing to their body. By sharing these risks, you could just save a life.

Heart Disease

Heart disease is the precursor to a heart attack.

Being obese greatly increases your risk of CHD (coronary heart disease.) A waxy substance known as plaque starts to build up in your arteries when you are obese, causing the vessels to become constricted and reduce blood flow to your heart. As your body can’t pump enough blood to the heart, you can develop heart failure or suffer from a heart attack. Both can be fatal.

High Blood Pressure

This is linked to the same build up of plaque as above. Your blood vessels will still try to pump the same volume of blood around your body, but where the vessel diameters are smaller, the pressure increases. Increased blood pressure is linked to heart disease and strokes, and dangerously high blood pressure needs to be medicated as soon as possible.

A stroke is similar to a heart attack in many respects, though instead of blood being blocked from reaching the heart, a stroke is a blockage to the brain.

Type 2 Diabetes

Diabetes is all to do with how your body uses sugar.

Under normal circumstances, when you eat a meal (particularly one containing carbohydrates or sugars) your body releases a hormone known as insulin from the pancreas. The sugars are broken down and carried through the bloodstream, where insulin helps convert it into energy your body can use.

When you’re a type 2 diabetic, your body first starts producing too much insulin (due to a high sugar intake) and then over time, “burns out” and can’t manufacture enough of this hormone. Diabetes is a major player in heart disease, strokes, kidney failure and blindness and has been heavily linked to being obese.

Cancer

Cancer is another disease with long standing links with obesity. Being overweight and living an unhealthy lifestyle increases your chances of all cancers, but specifically increases your risk of colon, breast, endometrial, and gallbladder cancers.

Blood Fats

If you’re obese you’re likely to have higher levels of bad blood fats. These include triglycerides and LDL (low density lipoprotein) cholesterol. You’ll also have lower levels of good, or HDL (high density lipoprotein) cholesterol.

Arthritis

It’s not just your organs, cardiovascular and circulatory systems that suffer – all that extra weight means obesity can play havoc with your joints and lead to arthritis, and specifically the type of arthritis associated with the premature wearing out of the joints.

If the above weren’t enough, being obese also raises your risk of metabolic syndrome (high blood sugars,) sleep apnea, breathing problems and sexual dysfunction.

How to Treat And Prevent Obesity

Prevention is the best form of cure, so if you’re currently in great shape, keep doing what you’re doing. Regular exercise, along with a calorie-controlled diet based around nutrient-dense foods is a surefire way to avoid obesity.

If you’re one of those lucky people with a fast metabolism though, who seems to have to do very little to stay skinny, be warned. One day this may just catch up with you and your bad habits could start to show ill effects. You should take a look at your lifestyle now, before it’s too late.

Even if you’re currently morbidly obese, there are so many things you can do to get yourself back on the right track, lose the weight and start making a healthier future for yourself.

Set Goals

Without goals, how do you know what you want to achieve?

You need something realistic to aim for. If you currently weigh 300 pounds, don’t look to get down to 150 within six months – this isn’t going to happen, and trying will only make you fail. You need small, measurable steps that you can sustain and build on.

Give yourself one longer term goal, such as dropping 30 pounds over the course of three months and one shorter one such as losing a consistent 2.5 pounds a week.

You need behavioral goals too – how are you going to make sure you do hit your weight loss target?

Read through the following and create some behavioral goals based on these key habits of healthy people:

Food Quality

Before worrying too much about calories, macronutrients or following a certain type of fad diet, clean up your eating habits.

Stick to the outer aisles in the supermarket and stock up on fresh and frozen fruits and vegetables, natural (ie. no sugar/fat added) dairy products, animal proteins such as meat, fish, poultry and eggs, as well as unprocessed sources of carbs and fats – root vegetables, brown rice, whole-grain cereals, nuts, seeds and good quality oils such as olive, peanut or coconut.

Ditch the junk food for good. It may hurt, but going cold turkey is the only way you’ll break your bad habits for good.

Meals

Eat three square meals per day.

Each meal should contain a protein source, be at least 50 percent fruits or vegetables and have just a small amount of added carbs or fat. In between, snack on meat, boiled eggs, unsalted nuts and seeds or berries, but only if you’re genuinely hungry.

Exercise

Ideally, you’d follow a progressive, periodized strength training routine with high intensity cardio thrown in, but for now, anything that gets you moving is good – the tricky stuff can come later.

Walk to the shops instead of driving, get off the bus or train one stop earlier before work, take up a sport, go swimming or bowling instead of watching a movie and be as active as you can. If you are extremely obese already, even just walking up and down the stairs or to your mailbox can help. Gradually increase how much you move, and you will be fitter in no time.

Adherence

Keep a meal diary and log all your food intake along with your exercise, daily thoughts, feelings and struggles. Review this once a week and set new goals based on how you’ve progressed. When youw rite everything down, you hold yourself accountable. You won't be able to lie to yourself. This is truly motivating.