The Single Most Disastrous Cause of Being Overweight

Obesity is the disease of this age and can predispose you to many dreadful diseases. Aside from losing good body shape, being overweight makes you vulnerable to heart diseases, kidney diseases, diabetes, lethargy, etc. Unfortunately, the major cause of overweight is due to the lifestyle of a typical busy person today. Many people starve through a busy day and compensate for the hunger strike by taking heavy dinners.

Thus, the greatest cause of overweight today is actually 'eating heavily at irregular intervals'. This is inevitable if you do not eat well during the earlier periods of the day.

Culprits of the Single Most Disastrous Cause of Obesity

Culprits of this sin often include both men and women who have busy schedules. Unfortunately, stay-at-home mothers also suffer from this condition when they get hooked in their routine duties and neglect food.

In addition, you may hold the erroneous idea that eating three times daily (at about 6 hour-intervals) is the ideal; this will make you eat heavily these three times and injure your body system.

What to Do About This Cause of Obesity

On the contrary, healthy eating habit involves eating at shorter intervals to compensate for the decrease in glucose level in your blood that occurs every 3 hours. However, you must consistently eat healthy food to achieve this result.

Blood sugar rises every time you eat and gradually declines after about three hours. Similarly, most food items digest in an average of four hours. Therefore, the key to stay slim and fit is to eat smaller foods at regular intervals. Try to grab healthy snacks every 3 to 5 hours to replace lost energy instead of eating heavy meals at inconsistent periods of the day.

A lot of people eat less to get slim but gain weight instead. Unless you understand how your body system handles the food you eat, you may just be suffering yourself. Learn to study your body and its reactions to the food you eat; that is the only way you can effectively slim down (or retain a good size) without hurting yourself.

Above all, listen to the still small voice inside of you. Remember, eating right will positively influence your physical and mental fitness and will make you more alert and sharp.

How Can You Tell If You Are Obese or Just Overweight?

Being overweight or obese are two closely tied conditions of the body that have serious health implications. Obesity is the advanced stage of being overweight; and both obesity and overweight are the common type of malnutrition in advanced countries. While malnutrition in less developed countries result from inadequate quantity of food intake, in advanced countries, malnutrition results from taking excess calories and exercising less; daily exercise does not commensurate with the quantity of food that is being taken.

Causes of Overweight and Obesity

Overweight and obesity result from two distinct factors- genetic and lifestyle. Overweight and/or obesity can run in families such that almost every member of the family easily accumulates fat from the food he or she eats. Similarly, as mentioned earlier, eating foods that are high in fat and exercising less is a lifestyle that naturally leads to overweight and may advance to obesity.

Percentage Fat that Indicates Being Overweight and Obese

A person is said to be overweight when the body fat increases above the ideal by 1% to 19%. This means, a 1% -19% increment in your body weight beyond the desirable or ideal weight for you is a sign that you are being overweight. Consequently, obesity results when your body weight reaches 20% or more above your desired or ideal body weight.

However, there are degrees of obesity- mild, moderate or gross. About 90% of obese people have mild obesity which is between 20% and 40% above normal weight; 9% have moderate obesity which is above 40% but less than 100% above the normal body weight; whereas about 1% of obese people have gross obesity which is 100% or more above the normal body weight.

What is the Ideal Body Weight?

A common method you can employ to determine your ideal body weight is your body mass index (BMI). A BMI of over 25 is overweight and over 29 is obesity

Other methods of determining your weight are waist/hip ratio, measuring of skin fold, hydrostatic weighing, electrical impedance etc. Yet, the most common and widely accepted method of determining being overweight or obese involves using the BMI. However, it is still used together with other methods e.g. waist circumference.

To conclude, the most basic solution to overweight and obesity is regular exercise and healthy eating habits. Once you detect that you are approaching overweight, you should begin to institute measures to stay fit.