I’m producing a show of Plus Size Performers from Los Angeles (details here) and moving this week, plus we’re taking care of a rescue puppy who is severely sick so today is going to be a repost based on a number of conversations that I’ve heard recently about how things should be different if someone is “really fat.”
Often I get comments that say something like “I mean it’s ok to be a little big, but what about people who weigh [some random amount of weight that seems really high to the commenter from 200 pounds to more than 1,000, and/or some life circumstance, illness, or disability that seems like a big issue to them], when people are REALLY fat surely weight loss, including drastic measures (like stomach amputation or an at home stomach pump) should be taken.” or “Studies show that very fat people tend to die younger, what do you say about that?”
Let me start by saying that I am a “REALLY fat person” based on the BMI scale. I am Class III – Super Obese, as fat as you can get on the BMI charts. When I first found that out, I ran to the mailbox for weeks hoping to receive my cape and secret decoder ring. I’m still waiting – it turns out that it doesn’t come with a secret identity but it does come with a bunch of shame, stigma, and concern trolling. I want my freaking cape, but I digress.
As far as studies that say that very fat people (Class II and Class III) die earlier, that’s not as cut and dried as it sounds. To clarify some things: this “class system” of obesity is based on BMI and its many, many problems. Class III Obesity is defined by the World Health Association as a BMI of 40 or above. To use me as an example – I am 5’4 so anything over 232 pounds makes me Class III Obese. I weigh about 300 lbs. if I weighed 67 pounds less or 3,000 pounds more, regardless of body composition or any actual measure of health, I would be in the same class in study’s conclusions about weight and health, lifespan etc. when they are based on BMI. This does not exactly smack of stringent science.
It also doesn’t take into account that there are health issues and medications that cause weight gain and may also shorten lifespan as a side effect, or treat illnesses that shorten lifespan. Nor does it take into account that many people who are super fat spent most of their lives dieting and, considering statistics on weight regain and the dangers of weight cycling (aka yo-yo dieting), it’s entirely possible that this lifetime of dieting is the source of their current size, their health problems, and a possibly shorter lifespan. It doesn’t consider the dangers of being under the stress of constant stigma and shame and how that can affect someone’s health (Peter Muennig out of Columbia found that women who were concerned with their weight had more physical and mental illness that those who were ok with their size, regardless of their size.).
It doesn’t take into account the difficulties super fats can have getting proper healthcare – doctors who don’t listen to a word we say and suggest stomach amputation as a cure for everything from strep throat to near-sightedness, the dangers of being put on drugs for health issues we don’t have based on the idea that we might get them someday (I once had a doctor try to prescribe blood pressure medication before having my blood pressure checked – it was 117/70), and other issues including not being able to get proper treatment because machines aren’t built to fit us. Then there are people who avoid healthcare because of the shaming, stigmatizing, bullying experiences they’ve had, the fact that medical students don’t practice on fat bodies in gross anatomy classes and the first time surgeons see the inside of a fat body it will likely be when that body belongs to a patient on their table, the fact that when we are sick, super fat people can be under-medicated because the amount of medication is based on someone much smaller, or over-medicated because the amount of a medication doesn’t necessarily depend on body weight etc. So acting like body size=early death and the only solution is thinness is a massive oversimplification.
I also think that the larger someone is, the higher the temptation to suggest that whatever issues they are dealing with would be solved if they were just smaller. In truth, neither how fat a person is, nor the abilities and disabilities they may live with, change the fact that weight loss almost never works. In fact, weight regain is the most common outcome of intentional weight loss attempts, so even if someone is arguing that high body weight is dangerous, the worst advice they could possibly give is to try to lose weight. In study after study after study weight loss has not been shown to be successful at changing body weight or making people healthier. In fact, the only thing that weight loss interventions are shown to be highly successful at is causing long term weight gain. Weight loss does not meet the criteria for evidence-based medicine, and a fatter patient doesn’t change that simple fact. So even if someone thought it would solve all health problems if everyone was thin, we don’t know how to get it done. But we could stop stigmatizing fat people, thereby solving many of the issues I talked about in the last paragraph, and we could do it today. We’ll never truly know how much healthier fat people could be without all the shame, stigma, bullying, and oppression until we end it.
As always, people are allowed to make whatever choices they want about their bodies and health. From my perspective a Health at Every Size approach makes the most sense regardless of size, health issues, or ability, based on the evidence – there are no guarantees and my health is never fully within my control but I think the evidence says that healthy habits give me the best chance to support my body.
To me, Health at Every Size is about each of us prioritizing health for ourselves and then, if we want to set goals, setting them based on health/habits rather than body size. And it’s about treating health issues with health interventions, not body size interventions. So no matter what I weigh, I would set my goals based on what I want to be able to do within the parameters of my body’s abilities and disabilities and my situation, and let my body weight do whatever my body weight does.
And no matter what I weigh, I would deal with any health issues using health interventions. Let’s say I developed joint issues. I would likely be told that weight loss would “cure” those issues. You know what else would “cure” them? Being able to fly – which is about as likely as losing weight, so I’ll start dieting to fix joint pain right after I jump off a roof and flap my arms really hard. Or I could insist on being treated for my joint issues using interventions that are shown to actually help joint issues. I know that those interventions exist because thin people get joint issues as well and they aren’t told to lose weight, but they are treated.
People of all sizes deserve to be treated with respect and those of us who are “really fat” are in no more need of concern trolling, stomach amputations, or at home stomach pumps than anyone else. Everyone deserves access to foods that they choose to eat, safe movement options that they enjoy if they want them, affordable evidence-based wellness care and a life free from bullying, stigma, and oppression. Yes, even if we’re REALLY fat.
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One aspect, that of joint problems, was beautifully clarified for me last weekend. I was talking with three very dear old friends, all of them extremely slim ladies, and we started comparing knee pains and ankle pains and general joint deterioration (we’re all in late middle age). Not that I’d ever wish joint pain on anyone, but it was ENORMOUSLY encouraging to me that in spite of their very slim physiques, all three of my friends have much worse knee/ankle/hip problems than I do, at pushing 300 pounds! It is NOT weight-related.
Hiya Ragen!
Well, if you are super obese, then I’m super SUPER obese. I think my BMI is over 70. And, for most of my life, other than the side effects of weight loss dieting, I have been pretty darn healthy. Considering what I hear from people in chatrooms, I seem to be way healthier than average.
But, I’m also certain that all of the abuse, persecution, discrimination….. all of the completely unecessary social liabilities of being obese, are going to kill me sooner rather than later.
The main reason I wanted to comment here, is to ask, have you seen this guy? Have you heard of the EDMONTON OBESITY STAGING SYSTEM? I think this doctor is probably operating along similar lines of treatment as most when obese patients are actually sick, but his statistics support the claim that size does NOT translate directly to an indication of sickness. In fact, if you look at the graphs, all three classes of obesity achieve surprisingly similar lifespans.
Anyway, thanks again for the great blog!
Interesting, I’ve seen similar charts to those line graphs before. It showed the same outcomes for Overweight, NOrmal, and Underw. So these stage 0-4 are really applied across the spectrum, and not just to “unsightly fats” but to everyone, and I think this model if applied equally to all weight groups, would be beneficial, seeing as there is no disease that is applicable to only one weight “category”.
Well, they do call it the “EDMONTON OBESITY STAGING SYSTEM”, and the doctor does say it is a way to understand “how sick an obese patient is”, rather than just how big. So, I think they are still applying this only to fatties, and I think they are still probably looking at fatties not much differently than main stream medicne does here in the US. They have just conceded the fact that size does not directly correlate to health status. A small victory I suppose.
Ragen, you really should speak at Medical schools. This would be perfect stuff for those who will be our doctors in the future. We need a new mindset. Thank you.
Thanks, thanks thanks!!
i Needed listen this! ❤
If I had known then what I know now, I would never have gone on those diets and I’d probably weigh closer to what I did in high school. Thankfully, I never did damage to my health but I did get fatter each time. That’s why after learning so much from you, I’m convinced every diet peddler knows this and revels in the fact that they will always have customers, coming back again and again. Diets are planned obsolescence at it’s finest.
No kidding! Wouldn’t it be awesome to have never abused our bodies, set up ourselves for yo-yo dieting and all the attached shame and stigma… not to mention money laid out for wardrobe changes?
OMG! So many wardrobe changes. I would rather have spent that money chasing trends than sizes.
I feel exactly the same way. I stopped gaining weight when I stopped dieting.
And nowadays, I avoid the medical profession because I dread getting the pseudo-concerned weight talk. Which probably doesn’t do my health any good either…
Not trying to be snarky, but I have a question. If you were “Super Fat” with the secret decoder ring and cape, what color would your cape be? What would your superhero name be? I’m having a tough afternoon and imagining the design for making you a cape has me daydreaming… but I don’t want to impose my own ideas of color and logo on it….
lol… gosh, it is STILL Tuesday?
I was thinking the same thing! I was picturing a C with III in the middle (for Class III). Colors and fabric type though – oy! XD
The cape and decoder ring is a hoot
Shoot I hit enter too soon, I had never heard the BMI categories put into such perspective before until now. That at 3,000 pounds, 300 or 262 based on your height you are still Cat. III which really does smack of bad science. Even this liberal arts major who did all she could to avoid math and science classes can tell you that there is something wrong with those type of classifications.
Also as a side note I just wanted to thank you for your writing and your blog. You and a few other bloggers as well as the Fat Nutritionist really helped me see that there is nothing wrong with me and that I didn’t need to have WLS (I have no co-morbidities but was being pressured by my PCP) and it was time to find a new doctor.
Whaaa?
So…if I’m 270 or 2,270 I’m considered the same category??
*scratches head*
Yes, the logic fails on the science front.
Is that Babar in your icon?
Nope not Babar, it is my blog logo
The problem with the question of “What if you’re Really Really Fat”, for me, was that no one has really answered the question of “What is Really Really Fat?”. Also, it was irrelevant. Even before the internet became as important as it was and before I found out about Size Acceptance, I knew something was wrong with how dieting worked, because everyone I saw who went on one, myself included, ended up gaining the weight back, with more on top of it anyway…until the next diet and the cycle repeats.
Well said in that last paragraph. Everyone deserves respect, even if they’re “really fat” whatever that means.
Reblogged this on Sly Fawkes and commented:
Endocrine problems tend to spark weight gain. I always knew that hypothyroidism prompted weight gain and made weight loss difficult. I don’t believe that milder cases of hypothyroidism, such as I have, make any negative impact on life expectancy.
What I did not know is that insulin resistance, which I have evidently had for years, and which finally converted to full-blown diabetes, also promotes weight gain, makes weight loss difficult, and also causes nearly insatiable cravings for simple carbohydrates. When I went to doctors for help with this problem, I was always told to just have some willpower and not eat that stuff. I was treated like a silly, hysterical fat woman. My very real problem was not taken seriously.
Diabetes can shorten a person’s lifespan if blood sugar levels can’t be brought under control, because elevated blood sugar levels damage the vascular system, which can cause a myriad of problems. Fortunately, I have had no problem controlling my blood sugar levels thus far.
This has nothing whatever to do with the number on the scale, and everything to do with the number on the blood glucometer.
Here’s the thing: even if I was having difficulty bringing my blood sugar under control, that would not make me a horrible, morally deficient human being.
There is a woman at the retirement/assisted living community where I work who is half my size. She has diabetes. She is completely non-compliant with her treatment regimen. She sits in front of the TV and eats cookies and crackers all day. This is not to say I’m morally superior to her. What she does or does not do regarding her health is nobody’s business but hers. What I am saying is that just looking at us, people would assume that I’m the one that’s not compliant with treatment recommendations for my diabetes, simply based on my size, when, in fact, my blood glucose readings are very good because I am compliant with treatment.
Assumptions based on body type: not a good thing, and, almost always, inaccurate.