Does anyone beside my mother and me believe that

it's not the amount of food we eat that makes us fat.

It's the growth hormones they are giving to animals and for growing vegetables to maximize the output.

I mean people use to eat three good meals a day. How many people are doing that now a day.

I wonder if this will ever be found out to be true that obesity is caused by all these additives and hormones.

Think about it, if it can make a cow grow, can't it make a human grow too?

I'm no scientist, just a common sense gal, I think??

But just as big is the fact that when we were having those 3 meals a day we were actually, you know, moving around a bit.

NOT the only factor but it needs to have a study done. Wish someone would look into just how much this contributes to obesity. Do people really believe it contributes nothing?

it's probably more complex than any one thing. Maybe the additives, HFCS, and growth hormones have a role to play or maybe not. I think the proliferation of "fast food", lack of portion control, and lack of exercise would all be equally suspect culprits.

I used to live in Ohio and loved to go to Amish places to eat. Good high carb food, and not low in calories at all.

Never really saw an overweight Amish person - but then they worked off all that they took in working in the fields, etc.

Everything from moon pies to fried chicken, but it all got burned off working like crazy day in and out.

and varying degrees of "hunger responses," the bottom line is ALWAYS how many calories you take in vs. how many calories you burn off.

NO ONE -anywhere ever can gain weight if they take in less than they burn off.

There are no "free lunches," though obviously, some sources of calories and nutrition are more likely to involve weight gain than others, and I'm betting that you'll get a number of suggestions along these lines- some of which will probably be very good ones.

there is a HUGE difference in what it takes some people to burn off those extra calories and what it takes others

Explaining why I've been working out two years and still weigh the same.

in keeping u on subscribers list?

I also think some gyms are like the diet industry, they keep you paying with no real results. I have also seen some people's "workouts" very little energy expended with a lot of breaks. If obese people even walked briskly they would notice a difference. Maybe you need a new gym if you have no results after two years.

:)

So muscle is more dense than fat. It does not weigh more. A pound is a pound.

Which is heavier: A pound of lead or a pound of feathers? Neither they weigh the same. The volume is different.

I've lost 20 pounds with exercise and some dieting (it took 2 years, but I'm in no hurry) I'm almost able to get into my high school clothes (umm...way way, WAY past high school) and I weigh more than I did then. I have more muscle so I'm more dense. Similar volume, heavier weight.



My Favorite Master Artist: Karen Parker GhostWoman Studios

I meant that people are TOO fixated on weight instead of body compostion. I also weigh nearly as much I did when I started exercising 25 years ago, but I've been a size 10, down from size 16 for 23 plus years.

I ought to keep track of measurements, too!

Seeing a result is motivating.

And it can't hurt, and one person pointed out, I didn't gain any weight.

But I have to have a diet too. My current project is not to eat late at night - I was working so late, and then working out, that I'd eat dinner really late and now I figure I'll have to go home and eat and then go to the gym.

and I'm a fairly heavy excerciser. Run nearly every day and frequently do a 45 minute heavy treadmill run-walk at the gym in addition to running..... but I have to watch my caloric intake carefully or I'll gain weight.

Also, notice people I've seen at the gym for years.... 10 to 15+ years... who are overweight. They work out like crazy and they're still fat. Has to be too much caloric intake.

Calories in v. calories out.

People with metabolic issues just don't burn (out) as many calories as people with healthy metabolisms.

The "bottom line" is NOT ALWAYS how many calories you take in vs how many calories you expend.

I have a metabolic disorder. It includes hypothyroidism, and insulin resistance that has now become diabetes.

I spent this summer with my doctor, trying to manage all the weight that crept on over the last 18 months. I also spent it outside. I was weeding (6 acres), planting trees (22 holes dug through volcanic rock), catching and worming/vaccinating/trimming sheep, hauling and stacking hay, mucking out coops and barns, fixing fences, and riding my horse. Oh, yeah, and repairing a roof. I was outside doing physical labor for a minimum of 4 hours a day. I worked up plenty of sweat every day.

Meanwhile, I was eating minimally. Truly. My doctor had me on a liquid diet for 6 weeks, detoxing, and then, between the thyroid, blood sugar, and some food allergies, there were so few things I was "supposed" to eat that it's not hard to limit calorie intake.

I didn't lose an ounce. My doctor has doubled the thyroid, but warns me that thyroid can affect blood sugar. And, until I get my blood sugar down, I won't lose any weight.

Your body stores excess energy, typically as fat because fat is more energy efficient (9 calories/gram vs 4 calories/gram protein or carbohydrate). If you aren't using the energy it gets stored. If you're using more energy the body converts its stores into the needed energy.

Where is the energy coming from for you to do all those activities while intaking a minimum of calories and not lose weight? If you have a metabolic disorder, then I would guess that you require less energy for your BMR and to do those activities than the average person, but the bottom line is if your energy requirements, to maintain your current weight, are inline with your calorie intake you aren't going to lose weight.

I'm consuming fewer calories than I expend, and that the pounds won't come off until the blood sugar is properly regulated.

I can't say I understand it, I'm just repeating what my doctor tells me.

The only good news is that I am no longer GAINING, which I did on 3 small, healthy meals a day along with some physical activity every day. I don't do as much outside, and am not as physically active in the winter. It's dark when I leave for work, dark when I get home, and I still have barn chores and livestock to care for in the dark. We also have periods that can last for weeks at a time where the temperatures never reach 30 degrees. That's some activity, but it's obviously curtailed until the light returns and the world thaws. Physical activity is then relegated to what I can accomplish indoors.

Edited to add: In my case, it's not just calories, but the kind of calories. At this point in time, I'm supposed to eat 2 things:

Fresh green food
Lean protein

No fruit, no dairy, (I can do goat cheese), no flour, minimal, occasional wild rice or quinoa. I can have a couple of almonds between meals if my blood sugar fluctuates. I can have eggs, as long as I don't have more than one yolk. Breakfast is usually two eggs or 5 raw, unsalted almonds. Lunch is a salad of green things sprinkled with goat cheese, with homemade vinegar/olive oil dressing. Dinner is a half grilled-skinless chicken breast or a piece of salmon with more salad or a green vegetable. Sometimes I throw the chicken and vegetables in a pot as soup, and have a bowl of soup for dinner.

Energy to do all that stuff? I DON'T have it. I'm out of breath, and often dizzy and faint. I do it anyway. If I have to stop to catch my breath, I do. If I need to sit down for a few minutes, there's a bench in the barn, lol. The energy levels have improved since doubling the thyroid two weeks ago. No sign of any weight loss yet, though.

the hormones given to some cattle to make them grow require that they actually eat more too. Other food animals are not given hormones and you can purchase hormone free beef in many places.

No growth hormones are used to grow plants, that I know of.

Back when we ate 3 good meals a day we also tended to be more physically active - we went outside and worked or played, so we burned more calories.

I'm not saying that some of the garbage that is in our food, especially highly processed junk doesn't have any affect, and there are obviously metabolism differences in people that may indeed be caused by environmental factors, but in the big picture it is still about balance of energy in energy out.

i still eat meat, not a lot but i have chicken at least times a week, i also do an hour of cardio six days a week and i've lost 85 pounds over the past 2 years.

Since my domestic situation has been in a bit of flux lately, so I decided to lose a little extra that I have been carrying around (Just in case I needed to look really good, you know).

My choices were to eat smarter or cut down on drinking.

Naturally, I decided to eat smarter.

Twenty-three pounds in eight weeks.

I am at perfect weight and shape, now.

But I need new jeans.

so i'm starting to ramp up the cardio tomorrow, i probably won't be able to run the whole but half would be cool and then walk the other half and the best part is that my daughter will be doing it with me.

there are so many fat kids today. When I was a child, there was at the most one fat kid per class. The rest of us were fairly skinny and we ate fatty foods that our mothers made in casseroles as well as cookies and pies. Now I look at the school bus empty out and about half the kids are fat or roly poly. They are also seem much taller for their ages than we were sixty years ago. I blame it on growth hormones. Too bad some scientists don't do a scientific study about it.

you didn't get driven to soccer practice for an hour a day, you played and rode your bike all afternoon. remember?

Is it the video games or the growth hormones? It would be nice to know for sure.

it's the intake of calories vs. the expenditure of energy, plenty of studies show how much energy is burned by various activities and plenty of data on how many calories various foods contain. It's pretty basic math, really.

Which is, IMO, why staying inside and playing video games has such a mass appeal. Going out to play is no fun when your parents constantly have to be watching you. At least that's how I felt when I was a kid.

The thing is we hear about EVERY abduction/molestation reported anywhere in the country. It is not more dangerous, it just seems as if it is.

In junior high in the 1960s, I was of normal weight. However, every afternoon I came home from school (driven home by mom) at 4 pm and crashed into bed for three hours, exhausted, because my thyroid gland had conked out. I got my exercise in orchestra playing an instrument. I'm still taking thyroid extract, have to take it my entire life. It's an autoimmune disease.

I was of normal weight growing up and in college, and have gradually put on pounds. I have always been a very picky eater and sometimes I forget to eat, and start to have a low blood sugar attack and get nauseated. I have a lot of food allergies and some foods I just don't like.

A lot of people have undiagnosed metabolic problems that doctors fail to recognize. The doctors tell the patient they're just depressed. Well, if you had no energy and slept twelve hours a day, and were tired all the time, wouldn't you be depressed?

Check out this website for more info about what I have, which is estimated to affect one in five American women:

www.stopthethyroidmadness.com


This woman went thru all the foolishness I did, with doctors, and then some.

folks out there, and I know there are differences in metabolism, but I think the vast majority of the obesity problem in this country is lack of physical activity. (and I know even that can have various causes, for instance I have obstructive sleep apnea which caused a lack of energy for YEARS that in turn resulted in less energy expended and the to be expected gain in weight)

I hardly ever see a kid on a bike any more, but every school morning all the schools around here have long lines of moms in SUVs dropping off their kids. In all of my K-12 years, my parents never drove me to school one single time. I would have been ashamed if they did! Now kids can't get to school without being driven.

...even with the high fat content, the meat-and-potatoes western food I grew up on, the ingredients were fresh, there were no preservatives like in processed foods. Now a lot of kids not only go thru fast-food drive-ins, but dinner at home could be Hamburger Helper or some other vile processed chemicals masquerading as nutrition.

3 squares, a home baked dessert and a lot of playing outside is why most of the kids I grew up with were skinny minnies. But the idea of a stay-at-home-Mom who's a nutritional nazi ("don't eat that-you'll spoil your dinner!) a mom who had a COOKIE JAR for godssake! Well, I for one don't wanna see women go back home like our moms in the 60s, but someone has to be responsible for the children's nutritional needs. I don't know how that can happen without putting more of a burden on working women.

(Oh, and PS: don't mean to fault men in this equation, but guys don't get pregnant, guys don't have a menstral cycle and when they're young they don't care half as much what they put in their bodies as women do. And the bad food doesn't affect them until they're older, so they can load up on crap and not gain weight. We're far more attentive with food for us and food for our children.)

I was 201 lbs only a couple weeks ago. I've already lost 12 lbs by eating less. I still eat, just not as much. And what I do eat is not crap, well aside from the occasional treat.

... Various factors might affect, especially, *cals out*, of course.

our ancestors got, so while the calories IN has maintained or increased, the calories OUT has declined.

until my trip to the doctor's revealed some ugly truth.

without what I would consider a LOT of effort.

:shrug:

with the heat, it's been frigging awful here but being 85 pounds light has made it bearable.

I know a lot of people have dealt with being overweight their whole lives. I was always underweight for my first 25 - 30 years, so I sort of took it for granted.

Hey, congratulations on doing your 10k this year. :-)

I lost about 60 pounds eating less calories, higher quality food, and getting a moderate amount of exercise.

Some people have more barriers than others, so I don't want to discount that, but for the majority (if not vast majority) it's really just a matter of energy balance.

Of course, we could talk about all of the social factors that come in beyond health, and those are certainly valid, but on a purely scientific level, calories in v. calories out decides.

It shoots straight to your blood cells, throws your insulin out of whack. It also digests faster, making you hungrier more often.

Start eating a fruit, vegetable, and whole grain item with every single meal. You'll feel better and not gain a pound.

We are what we eat!
The many chemicals used in our food are not tested for much more than possible cancer effects.
Other problems such as immunologic, neurological, nervous system, auto-immune and any other effect are just not considered. That is so when someone does discover an adverse effect, like the exposures that caused Gulf War Syndrome, they can say that there is nothing in the literature to support the cause and effect. Therefore the adverse effect is not recognized. No liability.

Many of the chemicals in our food are stored in fat tissue of people. Many of these chemicals are hormone mimicking - estrogen and androgen to name a few. The chemicals are released into the bloodstream when people diet, are under stress or exert themselves.

Chemicals are also added to junk foods that make people feel hungry.

Obesity, auto-immune illnesses, brain defects resulting in learning disorders and behavior disorders, dementia, heart arrhythmias and on and on. Cash cow for the pharmaceutical industry.

I've noticed my daughter's friends are having very big babies. I wonder if that's due to the growth hormones??

I don't think the hormones can make us fat though. Not sure how that would work.

....it was the amount of work and exercise other generations did that kept their weight down. Today's jobs have few of us exerting hard physical labor, as machines have taken the load off. Air-conditioners help keep us from burning off that fat, as well as the televisions and computers we park ourselves in front of. The long and short of it?.....we stopped moving!

I had a fairly active life, with jobs that required heavy lifting or hours on my feet, climbing, sweating, day after day. I was a trim 170 lbs at 6ft 1 inch from the time I was 25 till I was 45. Then, I started moving less. Age was some of it, but the fact that I was able to retire at 45 was really the culprit. No more long laborious, sweaty days. That was seven yrs ago.
Now I settle in at about 195, not obese by any means, and probably still within my heigth limits, but the extra 20 lbs make a difference. I broke my left leg two years ago and my weight jumped to 210! This alarmed me, and I quickly took it back down to 195 by walking two miles a day on my treadmill. I don't get enough exercise, and of course, its my fault.

growth hormones? I don't think so, but heck, I wouldn't know one if I saw it, so I guess it couold be. I still think the best thing you can do to fight obesity is to keep moving, burning calories and toning muscles. I need to heed my own advise, I am 52 now, and live a cushy life. I gotta get moving again!

I also try to stay away from any commercially (non-restaurant) prepared foods.

trans fats, and portion size. IMO, these are the three killers.

It's in everything. Read the labels carefully. A caller on C-Span recently, calling in on a segment about obesity, noted that the HFCS was originally fed to hogs and cattle to fatten them up. I really think if this one ingredient were taken out of foods, the obesity problem would be, if not solved, at least well on its way toward solution. (IMO)

The caller also said that aspartame, and presumably a lot of other artificial sweeteners, while not fattening themselves, make you hungrier and so lead to obesity too. I can't attest to that, but I believe IMHO that aspartame et al. are definitely bad for you and almost certainly carcinogenic if ingested regularly.

Everything. From bread to salad dressing. It's horrid, deadly stuff.

You can pretty much trace the rise in obesity with the increased use of HFCS.

Pickles, some kinds of canned tomatoes, ketchup, snacks, all things you wouldn't expect. I have yet to find bread of any kind without HFCS, and spent 15 minutes looking for ketchup without it. I finally found an organic brand of ketchup without it. I read labels now religiously.

I watch them down massive amounts of calories at lunch day in and day out. Of course that doesn't include snack breaks thoughout the day.

:popcorn:

It's nowhere near a blanket statement.

I know it's insensitive, but I agree with this. I gain weight when I eat large amounts of whatever food I want. When I don't do that, I don't gain weight.

NOW, I'm not saying that someone who is overweight (as I myself am at the moment thanks to Utz potato chips and french onion dip) *should* lose weight - I just don't like the excuses. Most people can lose weight, if they want to, but eating less and exercising more.

http://physiologyonline.physiology.org/cgi/content/abstract/11/4/157

Unlike other mammals, primates can respond to growth hormone (GH) only of primate origin. This species specificity results from the incompatibility of the positively charged arginine found uniquely in primate GH receptors with histidine in the GH molecules in all nonprimates in place of the aspartate found in primate GHs.

The question would more aptly be whether animal growth homones have an impact on human metabolism that may contribute to obesity. This probably has NOTHING to do with growth hormone receptors.

I do think that's part of it. I also think new "food" items like high fructose corn syrup are part of it.

People don't do physical work like they once did, so if we do exercise we have to make a point of it. Less exercise is a factor too.

Also, more people used to grow their own food and/or make things out of whole foods rather than eating garbage convenience foods.

as mentioned already, fast food & empty calories are a huge culprit. High carb consumption does throw your insulin levels all out of whack and your body starts doing all sorts of crazy stuff to balance itself. But the "type" of carbs matters, too. The glycemic index is what is important.

http://www.glycemicindex.com/

http://www.diabetes.ca/Section_About/glycemic.asp

This is just a personal situation that I've experienced in the last 4 wks. As a high school teacher, I see the worst diets imaginable. Teens are junk food addicts. Our school lunch programs are nothing but carb-fests. But the high glycemic index of soft drinks & snack foods wreak havoc w/your body. This year our principal instituted a no-drinks-or-food-in-the-halls-or-classrooms-other-than-water policy. The only time kids can drink sodas is b/4 school, or at lunch. The difference we have observed in behavior is absolutely amazing!

I don't have to repeat instructions as often, they are able to concentrate much better, fewer altercations, less trash, and much better attitudes! I think all schools should look at this strategy; it's made a huge difference for us. I imagine it will have a big effect on weight gains, too.

Many of you remember the days when the only Coke machine was in the teacher's lounge & kids were not allowed to have them at school. THOSE WERE the "good ole' days"!

is a factor.

yessiree bob.

It causes a much greater insulin reaction than sugar.

And very simply put: Insulin reaction = fat. And eventually diabetes due to insulin sensitivity.


My Favorite Master Artist: Karen Parker GhostWoman Studios

I took paxil and it has a definite weight gain side effect. But depression is worse than being obese. It really is.

Shrink put me on Adderal to help me - I didn't eat. But it changed my metabolism, which hangs onto fat knowing you are not getting more to eat. I really didn't eat, and actually gained weight!

Now off Adderal and trying to eat better. I can't concentrate like I could - that's what is great about Adderal - but I live more sensibly.

I also think there are increasing environmental factors that do not help, but for most people a carefully considered diet of good, healthy foods in the right proportion and an active lifestyle will lead to a healthy body.

Of course, long ago, it was a lot easier to maintain a healthy weight without analyzing every bite - the quality of our food goes downhill while we become more sedentary as a culture.

But sitting on our butts all day sure doesn't help. I think the lack of physical movement is the biggest factor in the nation's obesity epidemic.

But, your theory is pretty interesting. I wouldn't be surprised if it's found to be true.

When I was a kid I ate three good meals a day. I also walked to and from school - a little over a mile each way - and rode my bike seven days a week. I walked to the stores, the library, the public swimming pool. I walked just for something to do. Our parents used the car for work, and nobody drove us anywhere very often.

Here's the thing: our town was laid out so people could get around on foot. It was okay to walk. You could get there from here, without having to cross multiple lanes of high speed traffic. I don't think many kids can do that anymore.

I also don't think people are aware of how little they move around, or of how much they put on their plates. Americans in general eat out far more frequently than they used to; the large servings have distorted their perception of how much they need to eat to satisfy hunger.

And since they don't prepare a large percentage of their own meals, they lose track of the amount of fat, sugar and sodium they consume.

They also graze constantly on both solid foods and a limitless variety of beverages that are loaded with calories: coffee drinks, fruit juices, teas, energy drinks and more that are supposed to keep them "energized" and "hydrated" - as if there was a crisis of people fainting during their rush hour commutes. As if calories don't count in liquid form.

It was true back when food was "simpler," and almost everything we ate was prepared from scratch. It was true when I was a vegetarian. It's been true no matter what kind of eating regimen I have followed. If I consume more calories than I burn off, I gain weight.

in our diets. I'm a fan of this site:

http://www.organicconsumers.org/

Great source for healthy diets and combating the food industry :hi:

When I lived in Portland without a car, I used to walk 20 minutes each way to my health club, 30 minutes each way to church, walk + bus/light rail + walk some more to reach most other destinations.

Now I live in Minneapolis, where I need a car, and while my neighborhood is very walkable, everything I go to is either too close to serve as exercise (like one block) or too far to walk (as in it would take an hour).

Since moving here four years ago, I've gained about 20 pounds. That's with doing water aerobics three to four times a week.

Exercise and eating excessively seem to be the two biggest factors.

none of the reasons given on this thread or a all of the reasons combined.

Also remember that the cutoff for what is considered obese in America is determined by insurance companies. BMI was created in the 1840's using a group of Belgian men with an average height of 5'4". One has to ask the question... why would we use a system created in completely different time and place using a sample of homogenous men unless insurance companies could benefit from it?

I know I'm a little off topic here but the point I'm trying to make is that there is little credence to what is said about the number of obese people in America. Are there more than before? Yes. Is it the end of civilization as we know it? No.

Growth hormones themselves don't just make you spontaneously fat. And most growth hormones affect muscle mass, not fat percentage, don't they?

Even if they affect your metabolism, making the food you intake more effective at making you grow, its not the hormones themeselve per se that make you fat.

However, I eat at restaurants frequently and have noticed that a significant number of overweight people eat food in the white, beige and brown category. I rarely see any other color on their plates. The portions tend to be very large.

When I'm skinny it's because I worked hard.O8) :evilfrown:

I happen to agree with you and your mother somewhat, but I don't think its the only factor and in some cases might not even be a major factor. Some people eat way too much and/or way too wrong, some people don't exercise, some people have medical or genetic reasons for it.

All those additives and hormones make lots of food cheap. The cheaper food is, the more people seem to consume. When I tell people how much money we spend on 4 bags of groceries a week at the natural foods co-op, they can't believe I'd spend that much money. But I think we spend the same amount as they do on their overloaded carts. We try to hold to the portion sizes and not eat it all in a few days. Our 4 bags last a week for a family of 3. When I see what people spend at the traditional grocery on a lot more than 4 bags of food, I think we're about even.

Its really not to hard cooking your own food from scratch or growing at least some of your own vegetables.

In latin America we'd get portions of ice cream at the store which were the size of free tasting portions up here in the States.

But you want to know a bigger difference? The foods in latin America were tastier, so the smaller portions were okay. People also walked from place to place more often so they were thinner.

But, now I find that latin Americans up here in the states eat huge portions of food, and guess what? They have the same weight problems as everybody else.

We have a local diner that I've stopped going to because they load the plate so high you feel like a pig at the trough. On the other hand, if you're cooking at home you need to watch the ingredients in canned foods. You might be making what you think is a healthy chili except there's sugar in the beans (FYI Progresso doesn't have sugar). There's corn syrup in nearly everything and don't get me started on the cereal kids are fed. When you shop, it's best to try to stick to the outside aisles. Once you get into the "instant" meals in a box that inhabit the inner aisles you're in trouble. Most of that stuff is loaded with calories, fat, sodium and mystery ingredients. All that said, I come from a family of heavy people and I've never seen a bona fide "thin" day in my life. Genes matter, too. My brother - also heavy - actually ran marathons and never got to "thin." All we can do is the best we can. Now . . . who wants pie?

As I witness the different eating habits of people I tend to think not. My SIL moved to my part of the world almost a year and a half ago. I noticed her eating larger and larger portions and what do you know? She's really gaining weight.

I've got an 18 year old girl staying with our family, she's incredibly lethargic. She likes to sleep and eat. A lot. She is so very soft and out of shape and her appetite so big, I know that within a few short years she too will put on weight and wonder why.

Julie

It's OK to eat lard, as long as it's organic and growth hormone free! :crazy:

but most of us are not farmers now. I believe that hormones may contribute but in many cases it is that portions are out of control. At least that's the way it is for me, anyway. Once I started giving attention to portion size, I was surprised at how far off the mark I'd gotten over the years.

Portion control and slowing down while eating is the key. People eat too fast so their body does not have time to tell the brain to stop!!! We are full!

our civilization. The remote control device started our impatience, we change channel when commercials come on, lots more commercials, lots more frustration, and the loss of movement, in the old days we had to physically get up and move to change the channel. JMHO :)

I have absolutely no knowledge of that, but it seems like ingesting hormones that have to do with lactating and milk could have some effect on women's breasts. Just an unscientific suspicion.

And there aren't any growth hormones in sodas, twinkies, chips, cakes, pies, cookies, ice cream, crackers, dips, and other junk foods that people eat. I suspect a lot of people would lose weight if they simply cut out junk food, including bread, and restricted themselves to vegetables, fish, fowl, and meat.

Just my two cents.

:hippie:

It's in everything from sodas to store-bought bread, and is responsible for a big percentage of the caloric content of many processed foods. It makes people very fat very quickly; it's also probably the primary culprit in the big increase in diabetes in this country in the last generation or so. Very, very bad stuff.

Thanks to ADM this is a major ingredient in everything. It's the reason behind "supersizing". And one of the major factors in our obesity problem. A big story that has not been reported.

What do office workers do to relax when they get home from work? Do they stand up and move around or plop down in front of the television set? In my job I am on my feet for the entire shift (12hrs) and going from problem to problem and always moving. I would get fat if I ate much over 2000 calories a day.
Considering the double quarter pounder with cheese meal has 1600 calories I have no doubt why people are getting fat. Look at the average restaurant meal, you will get at least 1500 calories dining out at TGIF or apple-bee's.

You have to eat only what you burn or you will have a surplus.

If you don't believe me go to one this evening. The majority of their customers are obese to morbidly obese. I went to the "Country kitchen" buffet once. I left the place having to loosen my belt and VERY uncomfortable. I saw people eating even more than I did! I will never go back.
Those places are ALWAYS packed. It can not be because of the quality of the food as I found it to be nothing special just standard meat & potato cooking. It has to be the quantity.

Nothing else seems to explain it but the cultivation practices, especially since she often goes on chocolate binges in Oxaca and never eats anything that isn't from a restaurant when she is there.

The month that i spent in Vancouver BC also had the same result for me.


For anyone who doubts this, go to a Cisco food distributors convention and take a look at the chemical additives. I went as a taster/buyer recently and I had to leave with stomach pains.

Since fat is so common in America, and people are usually dieting in some form or other, there could be a contributor.

When I was in high school, I don't remember the majority of my classmates towering over me. But in my son's high scoool a few years ago, SO many of the kids were over 6 feet.

On the other hand, speaking as a non-scientist myself, I'd have to say I don't think it's growth hormones that are making us fat. I think it's the fashion media. Marilyn Monroe was a size 12--she'd never get a movie contract with that "bovine" body today. If you're over size 6, you just aren't considered healthy or attractive per our look-obsessed media. I don't think America is paricularly obese compared to 1950 standards, but our perceptions have changed as we've learned more about health and fitness. A lot of folks "back then" died much earlier than our national avereage, even with all the talk about increased rates of obesity.

when they are only 13...who's mentrual cycle starts far earlier than it used to...when we were created...all that was eaten were natural foods...that IS what our bodies and metabolism were/are geared for...but nowadays, there are so many additives and preservatives...it's a wonder we even get wrinkles in old age any more...we are thoroughly pickled from the inside out...then add to that, all the man made medications that people take, just cause the Doc...said I needed them....uh huh...pickled and preserved are we, along with overweight and stressed...wb

But then again, the other people who also believe it also don't understand that meat that's treated with hormones has the same level of hormones as meat from animals that haven't been treated by hormones.

"I'm no scientist, just a common sense gal, I think??"

Unfortunately, science and common sense often don't mix.