Obesity Is NOT Just About Laziness. New Research Explains Why #shorts

Obesity is NOT just about laziness.

The very personal video about my sister received a lot of lovely comments, after getting over a million views in it's first 24 hours on social media (outside of YouTube).

Do you know what one of the overwhelming themes was?

“I feel like this too, and nobody ever seems to talk about it”.

Obesity has a stigma that people are just choosing to eat a lot of food. But that kind of assumes that people with higher body fat percentages have the same level of appetite as people like me, and they just choose to eat more… for funzies?

So, let’s use this as an opportunity to discuss a brand-new research paper.

Not only do some people have higher baseline appetite levels, but your hunger can actually increase in response to losing weight.

So, if you are a naturally hungry individual, eating fewer calories is harder, right?

And if your hunger levels then KEEP GOING UP as you diet, this can make dieting feel a lot like swimming upstream.

In this new paper, they found that for every kilogram of weight you lose via diet, your appetite increases by approximately 80-100 calories per day.

When comparing this to weight loss medication like Semaglutide or Tirzepatide, or gastric bypass surgery, these interventions reduced the compensatory response by around half. People on these interventions often keep losing weight towards and beyond year 2, which is rare in the dieting world.

Now, these are AVERAGES. Some people find it easier, of course. But that also means that for some people, it is not just swimming upstream, but more like swimming up a waterfall.

Now of course, some people will get their feathers ruffled and say “YOU ARE JUST MAKING EXCUSES FOR FAT PEOPLE” yada yada.

But, this is literally obesity research. If the super duper smart obesity researchers are studying the reasons why losing weight is very very difficult for some people…

maybe the general population should pause and wonder if they are looking at a complex topic through a very simplistic lens.

P.S. At the end of each post, I remind you that my best-selling book, ‘Everything Fat Loss’ is currently on sale as an audiobook, plus digital/print versions from Barnes and Noble, Apple, Kobo, Google, and Amazon with an extra 27% off in Canada and an extra 14% off in the US. Please feel free to grab it before the price goes up.

Reference:
- Physiology of the weight-loss plateau in response to diet restriction, GLP-1 receptor agonism, and bariatric surgery

[Mr_Tokon]

Taking a 1 month diet break while maintaining my current body weight has been great for reducing my hunger

[bloodmoonxx]

in my experience the more you get used to eating, the bigger your appetite gets. I used to be able to put away thousands of calories in a day and now I only eat 1300 a day. I still get hungry but if I leave it a while or keep busy I'll forget about it.

[tammyy]

Thank you, truly! It is nice to be understood.

[lyfebehyndbars]

For me, first 50 pounds was easy. Last 20 is much much much harder.

[limitisillusion]

People eat processed food designed to make you eat more and then wonder why they're hungry all the time. I can eat 10, 000 calories of pizza and ice cream in one sitting. That's probably on track with most morbidly obese people. If i eat 1000 calories of lean protein and whole foods, I'm full. Instead of looking at how hunger changes in reponse to weight loss, try looking at how hunger changes in response to whole foods vs processed foods. Food quantity without quality will always leave you hungry.

[Richard_richsmuth]

i am fat, and ive always been fat because of my diet. I dont eat for a few days, expecting to not eat for months, but then get hungry and eat the whole house.

[MrSplcrazy]

True. But also lots are just lazy and can't even be bothered to calorie count of exercise.

[amandanightstar]

I am fat and don't have an appetite thus I eat to little to have the energy to workout, people are different. There is no losing the waterweight when it is like that though.

[MatthewDeGrave]

I use to eat like 1600 calories a day and stopped losing weight, I reduced my intake to like 1200 calories. It sucks but I cannot hit my goals and its frustrating.

[Dragonmoon]

I have a question, does are bodies get use to the physical activity/exercise and reduce the calories burned (energy spent)?

Hence why we have to increase reps and/or weight?

Yes, I understand weight loss generally focuses on caloric in take, but I hit a plateau around 8 months in October last year), and despite increasing weight and consistent eating habits, still have regained some weight.

Not freaked or worried, just confused.🤔

[jaylencalinaw]

i like the way you talk. you put. periods. a. lot. hehehe

[azulsimmons]

That appetite increase after losing weight is insane.

[otarala]

this problem is similar to peoples beliefs for any number of mental health issues. Even with height and basketball it can still happen but there's usually at least some acknowledgement that the playing field isnt equal.

[Enoch-Root]

A lot of obesity though is down to poor diet and lifestyle. The increase in the number of obese people has simply increased too quickly for it to be some rare metabolic issue or something genetic.

Feeling hungrier than others certainly won't help, and is likely to be another cause.

But the elephant in the room is poor diet and lifestyle. I think more often than not, all the focus put on other issues just provides a list of excuses.

I've seen enough obese people lose large amounts of weight to know that anyone can achieve it through good diet and becoming a lot more active.