Obesity

Do you suffer from obesity or need just to lose few pounds? Perhaps you found out that your wardrobe from last summer does not fit any more and you need to go shopping again?  Do walk close to the wall or the fence and when you walk on the beach you try to keep the belly in because you feel that everybody can see that you gained weight.  Guess what? You are not alone.

In modern society there is a lot of prejudices towards obesity, people consider those who suffer from obesity have no control over their life and deserve no sympathy. We read in newspapers and magazines what is the ideal look for you. Even though we now that most pictures are photo shopped to show more perfectness we start to believe in these images of people and we start to judge those who don‘t fit into the image.

I expect obesity will get similar treatment as smoking. Nowadays smoking is out. Restaurants, bars and most public places prohibit smoking. Reason? Yes smoking is a health problem that costs society millions of dollars every year. Obesity is also a health problem and with the same propaganda as against smoking we can expect that the health system will invade peoples life's and  take over their control in order to „cure them“.  The problem is that we don‘t have the ideal measurements in our heads, we read about them in the media and believe what is said to be right.

These images we are told that measure the perfect look would have looked a little different two hundred years ago. Then overweight people were considered healthy and well. They who were skinny and almost anorexic were thought to be beggars or poor. It‘s the society which decides whats in or out in every time and today the thinner you get, the better.

But still obesity is a greater problem, I know that personally after suffering from it for almost three decades. The problem of finding the right clothes because the wardrobe shrank again, is a minor problem. The problem when our food bill rises constantly because we intake more and more food is a minor problem. But when you suffer from decease such as heart attack and eight men come to get you, the nurse has to get a bigger equipment to take your blood pressure then we have a major problem.

It‘s not  been helpful that the great deal of our daily food is mass produced and by far much unhealthier food than not long ago .  This mass food production has grown same as obesity has over last few years and fast food has become cheaper  and spread like cancer in our society. Few years ago the norm was that there were few people overweight but today we must be healthy, skinny and of course happy.

Are we more happy today than we were 40 years ago? I don‘t know.