Hbo: The Weight Of The Nation

[CamarilloCA 41]

Has anyone been watching this show? It's been very interesting, eye-opening, and heart-breaking in some cases.

One thing that I thought was interesting that I thought I would share. I will try to get this right.

There was a study of twins that ate the same identical diet and did the same exercise and have the same genetic make up. One of the twins was thin all his life while the other twin had gained weight (50 pounds?) at some point and lost the weight again. Both were the same weight, however, at the time of the study.

Even though they ate the same meals with the same portions, the one that had never gained weight didn't gain weight while the one who had once gained weight did gain again.

The result of the study was this: the twin who had once gained weight and lost it again needed to take in fewer calories than his twin to maintain his weight. In other words, when they sat down to an identical meal, the twin that had gained and lost weight in the past had to eat less of the meal than his brother in order to stay the same weight.

I thought this was interesting. I don't know if their metabolism was the same or not. I don't think they said.

I do know that it would be impossible for me to maintain a healthy bodyweight if I didn't have my sleeve to keep my portions small. My eyes or my brain tells me the portions that I want to eat, but my sleeve knows better what I really need. I know that I will need to keep my portions less than what other people eat for the rest of my life, and I'm glad I have the sleeve to help me with that.

[Chimera 644]

My husband has been telling those facts to evryone at work since we saw it - it really is astounding, I too thank goodness that we have our new sleeves to help.

[Percepied430 3]

I thought this was really well done documentary and goes far to dispell the rumor that obesity is all about laziness and lack of self control. I think it could have done a much better job talking about the political and public policy implications of the issue as far as food policy and health care policy goes, but thats just me. It is a complicated issue that is for sure.

[CamarilloCA 41]

Thanks for your comments:-) Well, it is a series with new ones every week so maybe other things will be covered in the future. I do know that one episode was about the corn industry and subsidies and about how the farmers get money to grow corn and how they don't get subsidies to grow other vegetables so it is an incentive for them to just grow the one crop of corn. And the corn is made into corn Syrup and other substances that basically go into everything. It also mentioned the powerful lobbists and industries that would make changing this difficult, but they mentioned that no one thought things could change in the world of cigarettes and tobacco 50 years ago, and yet things did change there as research came out about the health costs of smoking.

There were a few segments on weight loss surgery but not much. I agree that it is good to educate people about how difficult it is lose weight and keep it off, and I think this program is showing that nicely.