The 3 Most Important Tasks To Defeat The Obesity Epidemic
Our nation is the fattest, sickest nation in the world, yet we tout ourselves to have the best health care system and the “most secure” food access in the world. With ample access to healthy foods and the best medical system in the world, why are we the fattest, sickest nation in the world? It is because we are going about it all wrong, and because of this continued misdirection, all funded by big pharma and big food, we will continue down this path to shorter lifespans and ample suffering. Tackling obesity in this country is a massive undertaking but won’t succeed unless we do these three things.
#1: Defeat Food Addiction. The only way that our modern society will be able to reverse obesity is by tackling the 10,000-pound elephant in the room, food addiction. We are a society of food addicts. It is the most prevalent addiction, yet, no one is talking about it. Because of our evolutionary biology, our brains and bodies were designed to give us very strong, almost impossible to ignore, impulses to overeat and to crave the things that will fatten us up the quickest, sugar and carbs. Our biology was designed that way because it helped our ancestors survive. Our ancestors had to overeat when they could because the occasion didn't come up too often. It helped us store fat and be ready for the many times a year where we went hungry, due to lack of access to food because of the season, migration, or famine. Unfortunately, those compelling hormones that urge us to eat ample calories to fatten up still exist in our modern biology. We are addicted to food and unless we address this in ourselves, we will never be able to overcome obesity.
#2: Eat Like Our Ancestors. Playing off of #1, the best way to optimize our biology through nutrition is to eat like our ancestors. Our biology developed this way for a reason and it helped us survive for thousands of years as a species, why not work WITH our biology instead of against it? Think of a typical day in our ancestors lives. Did they get out of bed and immediately consume 2 cups of coffee with ample sugar and a big bowl of sugary cereal? NO! They got up and started work. They went foraging or hunting. They prepared for the migration of the day. They didn't snack or drink all day. They worked, they hunted, they foraged, then they brought it all back to the community, prepared the food, and enjoyed it that evening. They may have brought along a waterskin, or some dried meats as a snack to have during the day, but the largest meal of the day was always at day's end, and there was always ample time in between meals. Not to mention their foods did not have ingredients like monosodium glutamate, Blue 1, Red 40, Yellow 5 and Yellow 6, and High-fructose corn syrup. Has anyone wondered about the correlation between sharply increasing numbers of obesity, cancer, heart disease, stroke and diabetes, with the explosion of the processed food availability in the U.S? You food should have one ingredient. Chicken has chicken. Eggs have eggs. An apple has an apple. Eat real food and eat one large meal a day with small snacks during the day to sustain energy.
#3: Eat More! The whole "eat less calories than you burn" is a completely ignorant assumption about the human body. Our bodies are not clinical vacuums, the laws of thermodynamics do not apply! Has any one wondered why 45 million Americans go on a diet each year, and spend $33 billion each year on weight loss products, yet nearly two-thirds of Americans are overweight or obese? Apparently, DIETS DON”T WORK. Severely cutting calories leads to 3 things and 3 things only: misery, a slowed metabolism and macro and micronutrient deficiencies. We have been told to eat less, move more, but when that doesn’t work, the only answers we get it to “eat lesser and more even more”. As the millions of people who have gone on failed diets can attest, this just doesn’t work. When I am working with my nutrition clients, 99% of the time, they are surprised to be put on an eating plan that has them eating much more than they normally eat. Most of the time, they get concerned that they will gain weight. I have helped hundreds of people and can say that 100% of the time, that is never the case. Eating more always results in weight loss. This is because I have them eating more of the things they were deficient in, protien, essential amino acids, minerals and vitamins and none of the nutrient deficient processed food, and wala! Their metabolism heals and starts working again!
Obesity is an extremely complicated issue, but if these three things above are not addressed, we will continue to see the decline of the health of our nation and shorter average life spans for the first time in recent history.