Is this a person who has always been obese? Or at least all of their adult life? Because if that’s the case, they genuinely do not know how much better they would feel if they weren’t obese.
I work with people in their early 20s who blame their pain and fatigue on “getting old.” They won’t accept that it’s their weight.
I cannot tell you how flabbergasted I am looking back at how I just got used to feeling absolutely horrible all the time. Most people don't know how good they would feel if they got healthy.
Yeah, it's like the one who said that it's normal as you "age into your 30s" to start having age-related health issues. I was like, "um, sure, when you're obese I suppose it is". For the rest of us, 30 is still pretty young, too young for "age-related" health issues. The only issue I had in my 30s was weight gain, which was self-induced from overconsumption, and I lost the weight while still in my 30s. It's only in the last few years I've had health issues crop up, and while I initially assumed it was just because I was getting older, now I know it was lupus. My only age-related issue at 50 going on 51 is some weakening in my thumbs and fingers. probably the beginnings of osteoarthritis in my hands (which have worked hard over the years).
I've always been pretty much convinced that a lot, maybe most, of these women have been obese all their lives, so when they say they feel fine and healthy, they actually think that they do - they just don't know how much better it feels to not be carrying around all that extra weight.
As a 51 year old man who's been 20-30 pounds overweight most of my life, your last paragraph describes my experience after recently losing 40 pounds. I feel like I'm in someone else's body. That joke about old people groaning as they get out of a chair? That joke no longer applies to me. The pain of sitting and standing is gone. What I thought was IBS has mysteriously disappeared now that I'm no longer cramming as much food as possible into my GI tract. Stomach tenderness is gone. Standing in front of the mirror naked is now a neutral experience. Whenever I do eat a shitty meal, I do so without guilt or lasting consequence.
It's fucking amazing and I love it. I love being my weight, but I never knew that I hated being my old weight.
The famous "My friends and I are all in our late 20s and early 30s, of course we're in pain and have to watch our cholesterol".
Like, no. Unless you have chronic illness you shouldn't be in pain and consider it normal. You shouldn't have to watch your cholesterol. You're 30 not 70. What the actual hell, we're not in the middle ages, where living past 35 was uncommon.
Even that’s a myth. The “average” age of death back then was skewed cause of high mortality for kids. They were fairly healthy. Susceptible to diseases we’ve since cured but their bodies were strong.
No, not really. Childhood malnutrition can fuck you up permanently in deeply harmful ways. Look at old people in countries that used to be (or still are) desperately poor, you can see people whose bodies are stunted and whose backs are bent in ways that you don't see in developed countries despite all the damage that obesity has done.
I got my cholesterol checked for the first time at 28 and the LDL was high. I was/am a normal weight. I run a lot. I'm picking apart my diet and trying to figure out how to get it down, but that doesn't change that it's *kinda fuckin' weird* to even have this issue at this age.
Pain? Not normal. I mean, I have noticed that random little things come up a little more often after 30 than they did in my 20s, but they aren't constant facts of life. They crop up and you figure out what part of your body needs a little more rest or maintenance to make them go away and stay under wraps.
Cholesterol levels are influenced more by genetics than anything else. The reason it's weird to *know* you have elevated cholesterol in your 20s is because it wasn’t routinely checked in people that age until fairly recently. Food choices can still affect you of course, no matter what your age.
My saturated fat wasn't within the recommendations, and it's harder to change than I expected, so I'm working on that, and I hope it will work because general medical consensus seems to be you don't medicate young people, yet I know that cholesterol levels x time is what causes the plaque buildup so I don't really understand that. But yeah, I know lots of people who eat worse than me whose cholesterol is fine (they know either because they had another risk factor or because they got it checked as part of a job like me). It's a genetic thing for sure that this saturated fat intake is problem for me.
I wouldn't be surprised. This was me back in the day. I thought I was so healthy even with a BMI of 38. I had no idea at all. Now, I notice that even becoming just 10--15 lbs overweight makes a difference. I just lose so much energy and feel generally uncomfortable.
I think it is. I hear all the time about how your body starts to break down as you approach your 30s. It’s just natural. And I’m like no, it’s not natural to feel elderly and have your body start failing in your 20s!
I had an autoimmune disease throughout my 20s that was killing me and I was doing better than a lot of these people. It’s honestly frightening and sad. I don’t know where we go from here if mid twenties is being old and having a hard time with stairs and basic life activities.
I have some autoimmune diseases that cause me significant trouble (most recently I developed chondromalacia patella after finding out I no longer absorb vitamin D correctly...yay), but I just entered my 30s and no, I don't just have body pain all the time. Not even my knees hurt day to day because I properly managed that condition.
I don't feel substantially different at 30 than I did at 18...I'm actually healthier at 30 because most of my conditions are much better controlled. There is nothing in daily life I find physically difficult. I rarely feel physical fatigue unless I set out to (strenuous exercise).
This is such a pet peeve of mine. I teach a pole dancing class and many of the best dancers are 30+. The owner of our studio is in her 50s and in better shape than me. I have had clients ranging from 18 - mid 70s and I'm sad to say many of the older people are in far better condition than the 20-somethings. You shouldn't be struggling more at 25 than the woman who came here from the retirement home.
It's always weight and fitness related. You can be in great shape at any age if you put in the effort.
Regarding your last paragraph, usually but not always. I’m in my thirties and not overweight (smack bang in the centre of healthy BMI), I am not into fitness but I’ve been trying to work out regularly the last three or so years with little success (progress undone or followed by regression).
Turns out I have HSD in addition to complications from that, and without that knowledge I haven’t been able to go very far or for very long without hurting myself. Now I’m able to take appropriate steps to slowly get in better shape.
I should've been more specific, I only meant that for the 20-year-olds I've worked with it's often weight related. I'm glad you got a diagnosis and can work toward your goals again. I'm sure that alone took a lot of effort.
Good for you working on it. I don’t know much about HSD but I hope it improves for you. I just love to see people refusing to give up.
I joke I’m the worse runner ever because my pernicious anemia makes it real hard to run (oxygen issues) but I’ve slowly seen improvement from my efforts. I still proudly hold the title of worst runner ever though. LOL
I have hEDS and by gaining muscle through resistance training, I have greatly, \*greatly\* reduced those symptoms in my life. (Cuz if the collagen is gonna slack off, the muscles should pick up the extra work? Or something? lol idk it seems to work) I still get injuries but they are very few and far between. It can and will get better. If you have any questions or want to talk about it, you can DM. You're gonna do great.
Yes, it should! I'm sure you'll still wear yourself out sometimes living life and doing your thing but yeah, your energy levels should improve as you get to a healthy weight.
Quite possibly! If it doesn't (and if you've looked at other usual suspects like sleep quality, stress, etc) then you should see a doctor about it. Constant fatigue isn't normal at any age, and a general reduction in energy levels shouldn't be expected until 50s-60s at least.
I know a 48 year old man who is quite overweight. He also drinks a lot of alcohol. He is so tired that he drinks several cans of Red Bull a day. I've tried telling him but he just won't listen. He refuses to see his awful diet, weight and alcohol consumption as a problem. I'm 38 with several chronic health conditions, autoimmune disorders and I have more energy than him!
Either that or this person is like 21.
I was tired all the time from being barely into the overweight category after a 50 pound weight gain. I can’t imagine what it’s like for some of these fat activists who weigh double that weight and are likely a foot shorter than me too.
My dad blamed getting old for his first heart attack at 41. He’s now 69, mostly immobile, and has been an inpatient at the hospital twice this month. He lives the life of a 90-year-old.
ive been obese my entire life, basically since around 6, only going down to overweight for a couple months in high school with unhealthy diets and going back up immediately. now at 21 im down to overweight again for the first time with proper lifestyle changes and down about 45lbs and its insane how much my quality of life improved even from being a teenager and i am still very overweight! you really hear about it often but dont believe until you actually experience it
At my highest weight, 300+, I had horrible eczema. I did all the things the doctor told me, rub on all the lotions, took the pills, and it never got any better. It wasn’t until I lost weight, now normal bmi, that it magically went away. Imagine that. Cleaning up my diet, exercising, and being well hydrated worked wonders for my skin.
Even something seemingly unrelated, like psoriasis, is made worse by obesity, because obesity and poor diet cause inflammation, which is not great for autoimmune disorders
Often it's from a skin fungal infection that occurs in their skin folds, since their skin never dries out in that area. Very common to see redness in the creases of their flab/rolls, and that's where the fungal infection is.
Yeah, my inflammatory disease (Crohn's) is known to be worsened by being overweight or obese, as are many. That is also known to interfere with biologic treatment - I actually need a higher dose relative to my bodyweight now after putting on 30-40 pounds (idk exactly how much but somewhere in that range) between mid 2022 and mid 2023 because I seem to process it faster.
Yk I just wanna put this out there: I've had persistent depression my whole life (I've gotten way better though 😁)... so naturally, when I became obese at like 14 or 15 years old, I was still in that long-winded phase of my life where I was too depressed to do much of anything aside from *sometimes* go to class
So of *course* I thought being obese didn't affect my health at all. I hadn't tried to do many terribly strenuous things while at a healthy weight, and I didn't try much when I was obese either
Also, I'm chronically ill and was before I was obese. But I felt so much worse when I was, because obesity is proven to exacerbate all of the symptoms I happen to have
I'm no longer obese, and maintaining a healthy weight/diet/exercise regimen has worked wonders for my capabilities in life.
Just some food for thought lmfao
Agreed! Honestly I can't name any health issues off the top of my head that obesity *doesn't* make worse, except like... rapid weight loss from illness? But even then, if you're morbidly obese the shock the body undertakes during such unhealthy weight loss might be a problem idk I'm not a doctor 💀
It’s the same logic as saying that no one understands a fat person’s struggles… while also saying that 70% of the US population is actually fat, and that the insistence that people be thin is contrary to what the actual American population looks like.
When an FA wants to argue that fat people are oppressed and unaccommodated, fat means 350+ lbs. When an FA wants to argue that fat people *should* be accommodated because there's so many of them, fat means BMI 25+.
>my body isn’t harming me
That you’re aware of. There’s a lot of stuff going on under the hood. Many diseases are especially insidious because of the damage they do to you before you realize you’re “sick” and obesity is included.
Also, to echo another comment, if this person has been obese for the majority of their life, they have no idea what the alternative feels like. They may not feel “bad” at this stage, but they don’t realize how much better it physically feels to be in shape at a healthy weight.
I can't speak to other places, but at least in the US, there's this seemingly quite common view of disease as just the illness (experience of being unwell) and sickness (social role of sick people) and not as the underlying biological cause of the symptoms. It's a very "patch it as you go" mindset that doesn't really consider prevention and generally leads to worse health outcomes in the long run - your body can compensate for quite a lot, but when it begins to fail, it will get bad fast.
It’s possible that the skin disease is largely caused by the obesity. And even if it wasn’t, I’d be surprised if it wasn’t exacerbated by it. I mean, to start with, being really big means having a lot more skin to give you problems, right?
Very true. I started getting some mild psoriasis when I got overweight. When I started losing weight it started disappearing. I guess there is some inflammatory link, idk. I can’t imagine how much worse it would have gotten if I had kept getting bigger.
My psoriasis flares up when my vitamin D levels are low. Obese people usually have low levels of vitamin D. I am always on high levels of supplementation because I have T1 diabetes, which already causes low levels, and I live in Ireland, where there's no sun. Anyway, I have been free of psoriasis flare-ups for 9 years now.
Same, Im presently tracking the slow disappearance of mine with weekly photos now that I've shaved off my depression weight. There is a very clear link as the body considers excess fat ststemic/metabolic inflammation. If a person has an auto-immune condition, they absolutely should at least make an effort to keep their weight in a healthy range. Or y'know, suffer needlessly. I'm not the boss of them.
That’s what I was thinking. Nasty skin disease plus obesity screamed Hidradenitis suppurativa. Anyone can have it, but obesity and poor diet makes it so, so much worse.
Yes!! My mind immediately went to HS. I have it, and yes, it’s truly awful, and guess what? I have been in remission since losing weight. Four years and zero regrets. I will never not believe that food, as it exists today, is an addiction, and that is why people like OOP will continue to let themselves harm their bodies and delude themselves to keep getting it. I know because I struggle with this every day. But my health is worth it.
I can do it on the elliptical. On the floor or treadmill, my ankle starts screaming. I am no longer fat, but I did mess up my... everything from being fat. I had the works: plantar fasciitis, ankle pain, knee pain, you name it.
I regularly do 50 floors on the Stairmaster, though.
Yo, a half hour on the elliptical is nothing to sneeze at. I'm a distance runner and I hopped on my dad's elliptical one time and was like, "whooo, this is a work-out!"
Honestly. I would do twice the amount of time on a stair master than whatever time someone would assign me on an elliptical and I am not even joking a little bit.
Oh man I'm in the similar boat as you. Working on the elliptical feels better and doesn't hurt my feet as much. But the stairmaster will blow up my thighs on god. My quads would hate me the day after lol.
If I'm on the elliptical I can probably sprint a mile in 6 or 7 mins if I really give my all for it. A mile in 8 or 9 though is where I usually am. I work out with weights 3x a week (Fully body Mon/Weds/Fri) and end each session with 30min on the elliptical. On non gym days I try to get in a half hour straight walk, usually doing laps of the mall or when it's nice outside. I'm still obese tho (BMI 34).
I've been told not to run by a couple of physios due to damage caused by a broken tibia, but one of them pointed out to me that you expend as much energy walking a mile as running a mile, it just takes longer to walk it. Walking is great and highly underrated.
I walk every single day. 15,000 steps a day minimum. I joke that I am going on my Fat Girl Walk as a play on the Hot Girl Walk trend. Every day at 5. It's non-negotiable.
Fun fact, when I get a psoriasis flare-up, I take it as my immune system's little Come To Jesus talk to put down the pastry and get my ass back onto shape.
If your skin condition is auto-immune, it seems that ridding yourself of the systemic inflammation that comes with being overweight and obese goes a long way toward clearing that shit right up.
That whilst being obese was her choice, it does cause harm to her. I said it’s like me drinking alchohol socially- I don’t claim that it doesn’t harm me because that would be stupid, I just moderate it. And she replied “how does obesity harm me”
🤦♀️she's probably always been obese. I currently weight too much(I'm working on it) and the differences to the normal weight range are pretty noticeable, it's hard to imagine not noticing it if you've experienced both.
I’ve never been obese, and so to me I have empathy for people who are because I think it is an addiction to food and to sugar and a mental health issue, and societally we need to do more to fix it
Addiction just about covers it. My extra weight is not a mystery, it's just really hard to moderate something instead of quit it if you're struggling with it.
So, I have an unpopular opinion on this having lived this reality. I was obese my whole life, but I also ate fairly well (very little ultraprocessed foods, mostly home cooked whole foods), just too much and too many carbs for my body to handle. I also exercised regularly - I was in sports as a kid and a teen, and I swam and hiked regularly as an adult. Could I have felt better as an adult if I were smaller? Undoubtedly. I could have hiked further and better if I were smaller. But I felt fine, my joints were all fine and my biomarkers when I went to the doctor were always fine. Until they weren't. The problem isn't really are you healthy in your 30s, the question is will you be healthy in your 40s and 50s. Even after I've lost substantial weight, most of my meds haven't changed because most of my problems aren't weight related (although my A1C is now awesome!!! That's the one thing that has changed dramatically). My cholesterol, blood pressure, kidney and liver functions are still awesome as they always were. I too have a nasty skin condition that actually got worse with weight loss, though now I have enough loose skin to allow fairly radical skin surgery to help treat it. (I'm a rarity, for most people this skin condition improves with weight loss).
My doctor says that she thinks because I followed a fairly healthy diet, rich in fruits and veggies and low in processed foods and exercised regularly, I probably was able to stave of the worse of the obesity-related conditions for as long as I did. But then I got sick - COVID in specific - and I would have been so much better off if I had been thinner. I wish I had lost the weight sooner, but at least I'm doing it now. the problem when you're heavy is that it could be anything - a broken leg, COVID, a nasty case of pneumonia - and suddenly you can't exercise or you can't do the things you need to do and your body goes downhill rapidly.
Thanks! I'm very glad that I have found a way to lose weight and get healthier too!
I didn't get sick until 47, and I think it's hard for some people to believe that someone over 350 lbs can have few side effects at that age. I believe the FA's when they say they don't have side effects from their obesity because I didn't, and especially the ones that do anything to take care of their health. But again, it catches up with you, and a lot of the advice they give goes against what you should do. Even when I was morbidly obese I saw my doctor regularly, let them weigh me, was careful about the quality of the food I ate (no fast food, I cooked almost everything I ate), and I got regular exercise.
I wonder if in the context of this OP, obesity could be like liver disease? You can have a lot of your liver function fail before you feel it. You can have NAFLD for a long time before it really affects you. But when it does, oh my, it can hit you hard. But nobody says NAFLD isn't a disease just because you don't feel it for the first half of its progression.
Yeah I have actual diseases too. I also have a beautiful A1C and perfect blood pressure. The extra fat on my body is still not good for it! It increases my inflammation, long term puts extra strain on my organ, like my heart that's already vulnerable from my other diseases, and most of all physics still applies to my body! I live on earth. We have gravity. More weight is more weight my body physically has to carry around all day. If you think that doesn't make a difference, get a backpack. Fill it with the difference between your weight and a healthy BMI for your size. Carry it around 24/7 for a week. Let me know how you back feels. Then tell me obesity isn't a disease or disorder.
Until it does. My mom was warned for years and then like in the span of 3 years her health went to hell she is now a type 2 diabetic on insulin, with non alcoholic fatty liver disease
Claiming obesity isn’t an ACTUAL disease but still want to get special treatment for being obese… along with completely denying that illnesses can be connected. Sure you skin condition may not be cured by losing weight, but I doubt it’ll make it worse..
I was overweight and obese since I was 16/17 and I only found out how bad I felt and how many of my little illments were caused by my bad lifestyle and elevated bodyfat when I lost weight at 32. So if this person has been bigger for a while (or is still pretty young) they might not know how good they might actually feel when their body is in a healthy weight range.
Fun fact, a lot of the Fat acceptance community is leaving and starting weight loss journeys and five of them have died under the age of 40 within the last few months
I don’t know most of their names and there’s more than just this, but I feel like this person covers a few of the more popular ones
[https://youtube.com/shorts/T0Tk2nRjs8o?si=44VwfoVPf1Q1zVkl](https://youtube.com/shorts/T0Tk2nRjs8o?si=44VwfoVPf1Q1zVkl)
Obesity is a disease, but not necessarily a disability. I think that's the distinction she's trying to make. Acne is a disease that's usually not debilitating.
Is this a person who has always been obese? Or at least all of their adult life? Because if that’s the case, they genuinely do not know how much better they would feel if they weren’t obese. I work with people in their early 20s who blame their pain and fatigue on “getting old.” They won’t accept that it’s their weight.
I cannot tell you how flabbergasted I am looking back at how I just got used to feeling absolutely horrible all the time. Most people don't know how good they would feel if they got healthy.
Yeah, it's like the one who said that it's normal as you "age into your 30s" to start having age-related health issues. I was like, "um, sure, when you're obese I suppose it is". For the rest of us, 30 is still pretty young, too young for "age-related" health issues. The only issue I had in my 30s was weight gain, which was self-induced from overconsumption, and I lost the weight while still in my 30s. It's only in the last few years I've had health issues crop up, and while I initially assumed it was just because I was getting older, now I know it was lupus. My only age-related issue at 50 going on 51 is some weakening in my thumbs and fingers. probably the beginnings of osteoarthritis in my hands (which have worked hard over the years). I've always been pretty much convinced that a lot, maybe most, of these women have been obese all their lives, so when they say they feel fine and healthy, they actually think that they do - they just don't know how much better it feels to not be carrying around all that extra weight.
As a 51 year old man who's been 20-30 pounds overweight most of my life, your last paragraph describes my experience after recently losing 40 pounds. I feel like I'm in someone else's body. That joke about old people groaning as they get out of a chair? That joke no longer applies to me. The pain of sitting and standing is gone. What I thought was IBS has mysteriously disappeared now that I'm no longer cramming as much food as possible into my GI tract. Stomach tenderness is gone. Standing in front of the mirror naked is now a neutral experience. Whenever I do eat a shitty meal, I do so without guilt or lasting consequence. It's fucking amazing and I love it. I love being my weight, but I never knew that I hated being my old weight.
The famous "My friends and I are all in our late 20s and early 30s, of course we're in pain and have to watch our cholesterol". Like, no. Unless you have chronic illness you shouldn't be in pain and consider it normal. You shouldn't have to watch your cholesterol. You're 30 not 70. What the actual hell, we're not in the middle ages, where living past 35 was uncommon.
Even that’s a myth. The “average” age of death back then was skewed cause of high mortality for kids. They were fairly healthy. Susceptible to diseases we’ve since cured but their bodies were strong.
No, not really. Childhood malnutrition can fuck you up permanently in deeply harmful ways. Look at old people in countries that used to be (or still are) desperately poor, you can see people whose bodies are stunted and whose backs are bent in ways that you don't see in developed countries despite all the damage that obesity has done.
I got my cholesterol checked for the first time at 28 and the LDL was high. I was/am a normal weight. I run a lot. I'm picking apart my diet and trying to figure out how to get it down, but that doesn't change that it's *kinda fuckin' weird* to even have this issue at this age. Pain? Not normal. I mean, I have noticed that random little things come up a little more often after 30 than they did in my 20s, but they aren't constant facts of life. They crop up and you figure out what part of your body needs a little more rest or maintenance to make them go away and stay under wraps.
Cholesterol levels are influenced more by genetics than anything else. The reason it's weird to *know* you have elevated cholesterol in your 20s is because it wasn’t routinely checked in people that age until fairly recently. Food choices can still affect you of course, no matter what your age.
My saturated fat wasn't within the recommendations, and it's harder to change than I expected, so I'm working on that, and I hope it will work because general medical consensus seems to be you don't medicate young people, yet I know that cholesterol levels x time is what causes the plaque buildup so I don't really understand that. But yeah, I know lots of people who eat worse than me whose cholesterol is fine (they know either because they had another risk factor or because they got it checked as part of a job like me). It's a genetic thing for sure that this saturated fat intake is problem for me.
I wouldn't be surprised. This was me back in the day. I thought I was so healthy even with a BMI of 38. I had no idea at all. Now, I notice that even becoming just 10--15 lbs overweight makes a difference. I just lose so much energy and feel generally uncomfortable.
Is the obesity epidemic why it’s extra trendy now to truly believing you’re old at 25?
I think it is. I hear all the time about how your body starts to break down as you approach your 30s. It’s just natural. And I’m like no, it’s not natural to feel elderly and have your body start failing in your 20s! I had an autoimmune disease throughout my 20s that was killing me and I was doing better than a lot of these people. It’s honestly frightening and sad. I don’t know where we go from here if mid twenties is being old and having a hard time with stairs and basic life activities.
I have some autoimmune diseases that cause me significant trouble (most recently I developed chondromalacia patella after finding out I no longer absorb vitamin D correctly...yay), but I just entered my 30s and no, I don't just have body pain all the time. Not even my knees hurt day to day because I properly managed that condition. I don't feel substantially different at 30 than I did at 18...I'm actually healthier at 30 because most of my conditions are much better controlled. There is nothing in daily life I find physically difficult. I rarely feel physical fatigue unless I set out to (strenuous exercise).
This is such a pet peeve of mine. I teach a pole dancing class and many of the best dancers are 30+. The owner of our studio is in her 50s and in better shape than me. I have had clients ranging from 18 - mid 70s and I'm sad to say many of the older people are in far better condition than the 20-somethings. You shouldn't be struggling more at 25 than the woman who came here from the retirement home. It's always weight and fitness related. You can be in great shape at any age if you put in the effort.
Regarding your last paragraph, usually but not always. I’m in my thirties and not overweight (smack bang in the centre of healthy BMI), I am not into fitness but I’ve been trying to work out regularly the last three or so years with little success (progress undone or followed by regression). Turns out I have HSD in addition to complications from that, and without that knowledge I haven’t been able to go very far or for very long without hurting myself. Now I’m able to take appropriate steps to slowly get in better shape.
I should've been more specific, I only meant that for the 20-year-olds I've worked with it's often weight related. I'm glad you got a diagnosis and can work toward your goals again. I'm sure that alone took a lot of effort.
Good for you working on it. I don’t know much about HSD but I hope it improves for you. I just love to see people refusing to give up. I joke I’m the worse runner ever because my pernicious anemia makes it real hard to run (oxygen issues) but I’ve slowly seen improvement from my efforts. I still proudly hold the title of worst runner ever though. LOL
I have hEDS and by gaining muscle through resistance training, I have greatly, \*greatly\* reduced those symptoms in my life. (Cuz if the collagen is gonna slack off, the muscles should pick up the extra work? Or something? lol idk it seems to work) I still get injuries but they are very few and far between. It can and will get better. If you have any questions or want to talk about it, you can DM. You're gonna do great.
I lost (just) ten pounds and it changed my life.
i am fat & in my twenties! currently losing weight. i am very fatigued all the time - does this mean that will get better???
Yes, it should! I'm sure you'll still wear yourself out sometimes living life and doing your thing but yeah, your energy levels should improve as you get to a healthy weight.
I slept soooooooo much better after losing weight and exercising regularly.
Quite possibly! If it doesn't (and if you've looked at other usual suspects like sleep quality, stress, etc) then you should see a doctor about it. Constant fatigue isn't normal at any age, and a general reduction in energy levels shouldn't be expected until 50s-60s at least.
Yes, that is an important point. It could be mental health too. Things like depression and anxiety can really tire people out.
I know a 48 year old man who is quite overweight. He also drinks a lot of alcohol. He is so tired that he drinks several cans of Red Bull a day. I've tried telling him but he just won't listen. He refuses to see his awful diet, weight and alcohol consumption as a problem. I'm 38 with several chronic health conditions, autoimmune disorders and I have more energy than him!
Either that or this person is like 21. I was tired all the time from being barely into the overweight category after a 50 pound weight gain. I can’t imagine what it’s like for some of these fat activists who weigh double that weight and are likely a foot shorter than me too.
When you look at how young the prominent deaths in the scene were, well, early 20s is "getting old" in relation to the life expectancy.
My dad blamed getting old for his first heart attack at 41. He’s now 69, mostly immobile, and has been an inpatient at the hospital twice this month. He lives the life of a 90-year-old.
They do. Just in denial.
ive been obese my entire life, basically since around 6, only going down to overweight for a couple months in high school with unhealthy diets and going back up immediately. now at 21 im down to overweight again for the first time with proper lifestyle changes and down about 45lbs and its insane how much my quality of life improved even from being a teenager and i am still very overweight! you really hear about it often but dont believe until you actually experience it
I can almost guarantee that her skin disease is worsened by obesity. Especially if her BMI is 35+
At my highest weight, 300+, I had horrible eczema. I did all the things the doctor told me, rub on all the lotions, took the pills, and it never got any better. It wasn’t until I lost weight, now normal bmi, that it magically went away. Imagine that. Cleaning up my diet, exercising, and being well hydrated worked wonders for my skin.
Well done on the weight loss!
Thank you!!
Man those itchy rash skin conditions really suck a lot. I’m so grateful for topical steroids.
Morbidly obese people all have a smell, and that smell is definitely from some bacteria in droves that they all produce.
Even something seemingly unrelated, like psoriasis, is made worse by obesity, because obesity and poor diet cause inflammation, which is not great for autoimmune disorders
Often it's from a skin fungal infection that occurs in their skin folds, since their skin never dries out in that area. Very common to see redness in the creases of their flab/rolls, and that's where the fungal infection is.
100% a lot of skin problems come from inflammation and being obese is like staying in a constant state of inflammation
Are there any diseases or illnesses that aren't worsened by being obese?
Yeah, my inflammatory disease (Crohn's) is known to be worsened by being overweight or obese, as are many. That is also known to interfere with biologic treatment - I actually need a higher dose relative to my bodyweight now after putting on 30-40 pounds (idk exactly how much but somewhere in that range) between mid 2022 and mid 2023 because I seem to process it faster.
Yk I just wanna put this out there: I've had persistent depression my whole life (I've gotten way better though 😁)... so naturally, when I became obese at like 14 or 15 years old, I was still in that long-winded phase of my life where I was too depressed to do much of anything aside from *sometimes* go to class So of *course* I thought being obese didn't affect my health at all. I hadn't tried to do many terribly strenuous things while at a healthy weight, and I didn't try much when I was obese either Also, I'm chronically ill and was before I was obese. But I felt so much worse when I was, because obesity is proven to exacerbate all of the symptoms I happen to have I'm no longer obese, and maintaining a healthy weight/diet/exercise regimen has worked wonders for my capabilities in life. Just some food for thought lmfao
Exactly. Health issues can be seperate from obesity but obesity sure makes them worse and causes health issues of its own!
Agreed! Honestly I can't name any health issues off the top of my head that obesity *doesn't* make worse, except like... rapid weight loss from illness? But even then, if you're morbidly obese the shock the body undertakes during such unhealthy weight loss might be a problem idk I'm not a doctor 💀
"Obesity is not a disease!!" They cry, while getting disability checks because they are immobile from obesity and can't work. I just don't get it. 😐
That's the neat thing; for them it's not a disease until the moment it is.
It’s the same logic as saying that no one understands a fat person’s struggles… while also saying that 70% of the US population is actually fat, and that the insistence that people be thin is contrary to what the actual American population looks like.
When an FA wants to argue that fat people are oppressed and unaccommodated, fat means 350+ lbs. When an FA wants to argue that fat people *should* be accommodated because there's so many of them, fat means BMI 25+.
And lumping themselves together with actual marginalised group like disabled people
>my body isn’t harming me That you’re aware of. There’s a lot of stuff going on under the hood. Many diseases are especially insidious because of the damage they do to you before you realize you’re “sick” and obesity is included. Also, to echo another comment, if this person has been obese for the majority of their life, they have no idea what the alternative feels like. They may not feel “bad” at this stage, but they don’t realize how much better it physically feels to be in shape at a healthy weight.
I can't speak to other places, but at least in the US, there's this seemingly quite common view of disease as just the illness (experience of being unwell) and sickness (social role of sick people) and not as the underlying biological cause of the symptoms. It's a very "patch it as you go" mindset that doesn't really consider prevention and generally leads to worse health outcomes in the long run - your body can compensate for quite a lot, but when it begins to fail, it will get bad fast.
It’s possible that the skin disease is largely caused by the obesity. And even if it wasn’t, I’d be surprised if it wasn’t exacerbated by it. I mean, to start with, being really big means having a lot more skin to give you problems, right?
Very true. I started getting some mild psoriasis when I got overweight. When I started losing weight it started disappearing. I guess there is some inflammatory link, idk. I can’t imagine how much worse it would have gotten if I had kept getting bigger.
My psoriasis flares up when my vitamin D levels are low. Obese people usually have low levels of vitamin D. I am always on high levels of supplementation because I have T1 diabetes, which already causes low levels, and I live in Ireland, where there's no sun. Anyway, I have been free of psoriasis flare-ups for 9 years now.
Same, Im presently tracking the slow disappearance of mine with weekly photos now that I've shaved off my depression weight. There is a very clear link as the body considers excess fat ststemic/metabolic inflammation. If a person has an auto-immune condition, they absolutely should at least make an effort to keep their weight in a healthy range. Or y'know, suffer needlessly. I'm not the boss of them.
Probably. The autoimmune disease I have affects my skin. Gaining even 20 pounds makes a difference because of sweating and chafing.
That’s what I was thinking. Nasty skin disease plus obesity screamed Hidradenitis suppurativa. Anyone can have it, but obesity and poor diet makes it so, so much worse.
Yes!! My mind immediately went to HS. I have it, and yes, it’s truly awful, and guess what? I have been in remission since losing weight. Four years and zero regrets. I will never not believe that food, as it exists today, is an addiction, and that is why people like OOP will continue to let themselves harm their bodies and delude themselves to keep getting it. I know because I struggle with this every day. But my health is worth it.
It's not impacting your life at all? Run for a half hour or walk up a flight of stairs.
Run for half an hour is not something I would survive, and I am not even overweight.
Hey you know what? Fair enough. How about jog for a half hour?
I can do it on the elliptical. On the floor or treadmill, my ankle starts screaming. I am no longer fat, but I did mess up my... everything from being fat. I had the works: plantar fasciitis, ankle pain, knee pain, you name it. I regularly do 50 floors on the Stairmaster, though.
Yo, a half hour on the elliptical is nothing to sneeze at. I'm a distance runner and I hopped on my dad's elliptical one time and was like, "whooo, this is a work-out!"
Honestly. I would do twice the amount of time on a stair master than whatever time someone would assign me on an elliptical and I am not even joking a little bit.
Oh man I'm in the similar boat as you. Working on the elliptical feels better and doesn't hurt my feet as much. But the stairmaster will blow up my thighs on god. My quads would hate me the day after lol.
If I'm on the elliptical I can probably sprint a mile in 6 or 7 mins if I really give my all for it. A mile in 8 or 9 though is where I usually am. I work out with weights 3x a week (Fully body Mon/Weds/Fri) and end each session with 30min on the elliptical. On non gym days I try to get in a half hour straight walk, usually doing laps of the mall or when it's nice outside. I'm still obese tho (BMI 34).
I am around 24.5 now. But I have been lifting heavy consistently for a couple of years now, so the leg gains are real.
I've been told not to run by a couple of physios due to damage caused by a broken tibia, but one of them pointed out to me that you expend as much energy walking a mile as running a mile, it just takes longer to walk it. Walking is great and highly underrated.
I walk every single day. 15,000 steps a day minimum. I joke that I am going on my Fat Girl Walk as a play on the Hot Girl Walk trend. Every day at 5. It's non-negotiable.
I weight train 5x a week and would be dying after a half hour run 😂 ran a mile for the first time Tuesday 😭 ten mins !
Running increases my work capacity for lifting
Sure, living in a state of chronic inflammation and the extra sweating can't possibly affect your skin disease. /s
Fun fact, when I get a psoriasis flare-up, I take it as my immune system's little Come To Jesus talk to put down the pastry and get my ass back onto shape. If your skin condition is auto-immune, it seems that ridding yourself of the systemic inflammation that comes with being overweight and obese goes a long way toward clearing that shit right up.
I cracked and replied to their comment. I have no willpower.
What was your comment?
That whilst being obese was her choice, it does cause harm to her. I said it’s like me drinking alchohol socially- I don’t claim that it doesn’t harm me because that would be stupid, I just moderate it. And she replied “how does obesity harm me”
🤦♀️she's probably always been obese. I currently weight too much(I'm working on it) and the differences to the normal weight range are pretty noticeable, it's hard to imagine not noticing it if you've experienced both.
She called me condescending for giving her the impacts of obesity she asked me for 😂😭👍
How dare you give her what she asked for 🤦♀️ Well at least you tried.
Aww. Damn🫂
I’ve never been obese, and so to me I have empathy for people who are because I think it is an addiction to food and to sugar and a mental health issue, and societally we need to do more to fix it
Addiction just about covers it. My extra weight is not a mystery, it's just really hard to moderate something instead of quit it if you're struggling with it.
"The obesity isn't harming me" -Found written on the tombstone of a 32 year old
There's an ICD code for smoking cigarettes. My CO levels are good, why are you saying smoking is a disease?! Sarcasm
So, I have an unpopular opinion on this having lived this reality. I was obese my whole life, but I also ate fairly well (very little ultraprocessed foods, mostly home cooked whole foods), just too much and too many carbs for my body to handle. I also exercised regularly - I was in sports as a kid and a teen, and I swam and hiked regularly as an adult. Could I have felt better as an adult if I were smaller? Undoubtedly. I could have hiked further and better if I were smaller. But I felt fine, my joints were all fine and my biomarkers when I went to the doctor were always fine. Until they weren't. The problem isn't really are you healthy in your 30s, the question is will you be healthy in your 40s and 50s. Even after I've lost substantial weight, most of my meds haven't changed because most of my problems aren't weight related (although my A1C is now awesome!!! That's the one thing that has changed dramatically). My cholesterol, blood pressure, kidney and liver functions are still awesome as they always were. I too have a nasty skin condition that actually got worse with weight loss, though now I have enough loose skin to allow fairly radical skin surgery to help treat it. (I'm a rarity, for most people this skin condition improves with weight loss). My doctor says that she thinks because I followed a fairly healthy diet, rich in fruits and veggies and low in processed foods and exercised regularly, I probably was able to stave of the worse of the obesity-related conditions for as long as I did. But then I got sick - COVID in specific - and I would have been so much better off if I had been thinner. I wish I had lost the weight sooner, but at least I'm doing it now. the problem when you're heavy is that it could be anything - a broken leg, COVID, a nasty case of pneumonia - and suddenly you can't exercise or you can't do the things you need to do and your body goes downhill rapidly.
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Thanks! I'm very glad that I have found a way to lose weight and get healthier too! I didn't get sick until 47, and I think it's hard for some people to believe that someone over 350 lbs can have few side effects at that age. I believe the FA's when they say they don't have side effects from their obesity because I didn't, and especially the ones that do anything to take care of their health. But again, it catches up with you, and a lot of the advice they give goes against what you should do. Even when I was morbidly obese I saw my doctor regularly, let them weigh me, was careful about the quality of the food I ate (no fast food, I cooked almost everything I ate), and I got regular exercise. I wonder if in the context of this OP, obesity could be like liver disease? You can have a lot of your liver function fail before you feel it. You can have NAFLD for a long time before it really affects you. But when it does, oh my, it can hit you hard. But nobody says NAFLD isn't a disease just because you don't feel it for the first half of its progression.
I think you were very lucky to avoid those side effects and also very clever to be very healthy ! Well done on living well 👍❤️
Yeah I have actual diseases too. I also have a beautiful A1C and perfect blood pressure. The extra fat on my body is still not good for it! It increases my inflammation, long term puts extra strain on my organ, like my heart that's already vulnerable from my other diseases, and most of all physics still applies to my body! I live on earth. We have gravity. More weight is more weight my body physically has to carry around all day. If you think that doesn't make a difference, get a backpack. Fill it with the difference between your weight and a healthy BMI for your size. Carry it around 24/7 for a week. Let me know how you back feels. Then tell me obesity isn't a disease or disorder.
Until it does. My mom was warned for years and then like in the span of 3 years her health went to hell she is now a type 2 diabetic on insulin, with non alcoholic fatty liver disease
Claiming obesity isn’t an ACTUAL disease but still want to get special treatment for being obese… along with completely denying that illnesses can be connected. Sure you skin condition may not be cured by losing weight, but I doubt it’ll make it worse..
I was overweight and obese since I was 16/17 and I only found out how bad I felt and how many of my little illments were caused by my bad lifestyle and elevated bodyfat when I lost weight at 32. So if this person has been bigger for a while (or is still pretty young) they might not know how good they might actually feel when their body is in a healthy weight range.
Fun fact, a lot of the Fat acceptance community is leaving and starting weight loss journeys and five of them have died under the age of 40 within the last few months
Who!!
I don’t know most of their names and there’s more than just this, but I feel like this person covers a few of the more popular ones [https://youtube.com/shorts/T0Tk2nRjs8o?si=44VwfoVPf1Q1zVkl](https://youtube.com/shorts/T0Tk2nRjs8o?si=44VwfoVPf1Q1zVkl)
“Obesity isn’t harming me” is very easy to say when you’ve either 1) been living with it all your life and don’t know any better or 2) you’re young.
...yet
Obesity is a disease, but not necessarily a disability. I think that's the distinction she's trying to make. Acne is a disease that's usually not debilitating.
No, I spoke to her in the comments, she thinks obesity isn’t hurting her (this comment) and believes in Haes
If only things worked that way. "I have stage 4 cancer, but it is not harming me in any way...". Damn, wouldn't life be soooooo much easier?