Foresight Obesity System Map

holwellcourtfarm said:

I've never had my body fat measured (although it will be one of the suite of measures I get done soon) but I suspect it's fairly low.

Fat flats but muscle doesn't. I've never been able to float in a swimming pool without moving. I can sink just by staying absolutely still and breathing out.

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Ffermer Bach said:

no need to measure body fat, just measure your circumference round the biggest bit in the middle (usually by the navel), ideally it should be half your height, and as a maximum 37" and it's not trouser waist size!

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Ffermer Bach said:

no need to measure body fat, just measure your circumference round the biggest bit in the middle (usually by the navel), ideally it should be half your height, and as a maximum 37" and it's not trouser waist size!

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SteveHants said:

Oh?



I see.

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5020man said:

Should read 34 ins.

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Bury the Trash said:

I actually thought that there can bad fat around your viral organs down there even if you are relatively thin

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holwellcourtfarm said:

I did eat way too much sugar. Typically 100g of milk chocolate, 4 slices of bread and spuds or pasta or rice most days. Cake 2 or 3 times a week. 1 or 2 packets of crisps a week. Plenty of fruit and veg though. All meals were home cooked. Pre-pandemic we ate out once a month.

10 years further back, in my EA days, I'd often eat a supermarket sandwich and 5 jam doughnuts for lunch then have 200g of milk chocolate in the evening. I did so much walking I told myself I was burning it off. I'd swapped butter for Benecol spread and blue top milk for green on doctors advice and thought I was healthy. We ate out 2 or 3 times a week, albeit at a proper restaraunt, and had take out once a week.

I now eat zero chocolate, even at Christmas, rarely eat cake and limit myself to 2 slices of wholemeal bread a day and spuds / pasta / rice no more than 3 times a week. I eat more veg, swapped from spreads back to butter and lard, swapped skimmed milk for full fat and eat much more cheese. I no longer snack between meals and skip breakfast some days. Rarely eat out, rarely buy take aways (maybe 1 every 8 weeks) and all our meals are cooked from scratch by by Mel or me.

I fell from 83kg to 75kg in the 3 days I was in hospital (April 2020) and I've remained at 75kg ever since, give or take 500g.

My only ticks in the risk boxes were cholesterol 6.2 (I've already discounted that one) and family history of heart attacks. Dad's brother died of one at 52, nearly 40 years ago but he ticked most of the high risk boxes (sedentary, smoked, schizophrenic, terrible diet, overweight etc). Mum's brother had a heart attack leading to full cardiac arrest at 51 with no warning, 30 years ago, and is fit and active today (but he was very fit and active then too).

They did find a small heart valve defect in me which could apparently cause clots to form. I now think I was just bloody unlucky that a tiny clot from that ended up blocking my coronary artery.

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Bury the Trash said:

I actually thought that there can bad fat around your vital organs down there even if you are relatively thin

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ollie989898 said:

Yes, there is a certain amount of fat that will always be laid down in somewhere convenient, brown fat is found in a couple of places, white fat or white adipose tissue is then laid in other areas. In particular around the kidneys and other internal organs. This is useful for insulation (mechanical as well as thermal) and as an energy reserve.

After this, fat begins to be laid down around the limbs and on the surface of the body. The exact location and total % of body volume varies amongst individuals and also between men and women.

It is important to remember that whilst a certain amount of fat is essential and preferable to have, fat is an organ, it isn't inert and just sitting there- it is richly vascularised and also metabolically active- fat responds to insulin being secreted by the pancreas. You can spot fat cells because they are very simple in structure and shape. Just a little roundish cell containing a single droplet with the nucleus crammed to one side which demonstrates their clear 'storage' role. Here:

View attachment 1009120

A lot of fat (i.e. obesity) becomes a problem because it can cause inflammation, the markers of which will show up in a blood test. Lots of fat also promotes insulin resistance. Fat cells can also become knackered and start to leak free fatty acids. This eventually leads to fatty acids accumulating in places where they should not. This is called ectopic (something in the wrong place) fat deposition and your liver is one of the first places it will begin to collect up. Try hard enough and your kidneys are the next most obvious location and this leads to kidney disease.

It is important to remember though that consuming fats is healthy and normal but fats in both the animal and plant kingdoms are primarily storage molecules which nature designed as convenient and space efficient ways of storing energy (calories) for a rainy day. You just can't consume large volumes of fats because they are so calorie dense.

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ollie989898 said:

By the sounds of it your genetics are the source of blame.

I do not eat chocolate or jam donuts rarely if at all. No cake in this house and biscuits are non-existent so I neve get the chance to eat such things. I do enjoy crisps or something savoury once in a while but we do not put salt in any of our food.

If you had a small valve defect it is possible a clot was the cause of your blockage rather than full blown atherosclerosis.

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holwellcourtfarm said:

Fat causes inflammation?

Do you have a link to a technical explanation of that please?

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DaveGrohl said:

I’ve heard the point about fat cells being involved in the metabolic syndrome process before. No link soz. Can’t remember if inflammation was a factor though.

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holwellcourtfarm said:

I'll look for a quote but my recollection is that diets high in sugar and fat, the processed foods secret weapon, interfere with natural satiety mechanisms bypassing the natural intake control but causing insulin resistance leading to high risk of T2D if eaten long term.

It's the T2D, not the fat per se, that causes (massive) inflammation.

Eating animal fats is not bad for you so long as it's in moderation and not combined with high sugar. An occasional "full English breakfast", high in fat and protein but very low in sugar (unless you have loads of hash browns) is actually very healthy, contrary to the distorted "findings" of processed food industry funded studies".

That's why "low fat yoghurt", marketed as healthy, is such a bad idea. The fast has been reduced but replaced with sugar changing it from a healthy natural product to an ultra-processed dangerous one with a healthy label.

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holwellcourtfarm said:

So what good was it putting me on Atorvastatin, Ramipril, Tricagrelor, Bisoprolol and Clopidogrel?

Other than that being the generic NICE guidance based on "typical" heart attack patients with numerous features I don't have?

Pharmaceutical medicine gone mad..

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