Obesity in America
Yesterday on Weightlifting Talk(My Weekly Podcast with Jon North and Ryan Grady)we talked about Obesity in America. We definitely went a little over the top because that is what we do most of the time, but there were some points that we made that I am sticking by. One of our listeners, who is also a friend, made the point that none of us had ever been obese, so it would be easy on our parts to think that we have the answer. I agreed with her, and then I realized that we were on a very serious topic. I back tracked a little because I remembered that Martin Rooney had made the point that it was our job to educate and help people. I don’t want to be the person that makes fun of, chastises, or belittles someone. I want to be a source of knowledge, and I want to lend a compassionate heart to people in need.
With that being said I find myself at a crossroads in my career as a Strength and Conditioning Coach. I have always been drawn to athletes and adults that like to train like athletes, but I want to be a part in helping all people. We already offer Crossfit, Group Personal Training, and Semi-Private Training, so I want to be a part in educating the community. Obesity is a killer folks! It’s not cancer! It’s something that we can control, and it is something that we can fix. We are adding Training For Warriors at Mash Elite Performance which is a way of training that was designed by Martin Rooney. It was designed around fighters and wrestlers, but now Martin is using it to get the world in shape. My friend and partner Chris “Ox” Mason will be coaching the groups, and I promise he is just as motivational as Martin. Ox is also someone that lives by what he coaches because he is a 41 year old jacked man!
More than just adding programs I want to start a series of educational seminars open to the community. I want coaches, parents, athletes, and everyone else to come and learn the truth about nutrition, fitness, and health. I still love my athletes, but I want to affect my community. I believe that God has put me in a place to help others and share His love. That is exactly what I want to do. I will be announcing the dates for these seminars in the next couple of weeks.
One of the points that we made I am definitely stick too, and that is if a young child is morbidly obese, that is child abuse. The child’s habits are being formed by the parents, and the food in the house is not up to the child. First I would like to educate the parents and the family, but if the parents aren’t willing to change, then they need to be punished. When a child is obese, their chance of heart disease is forever increased. This could be looked at as attempted murder, since obesity leads to heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and types of cancer. I’m not condemning. I am just saying that America needs change in this area. We need to wake up as a country, and start taking responsibility.
As far as obesity for adults that is your choice. If that is what you want, well do what you want. It’s sad because it kills you, affects your work, affects your ability to play with your children and friends, and it simply makes living life harder, but if that is what you want, then that is none of my business. If you see it as a problem, then get help. You are right when you say that I don’t know what it is like, but I have had other problems. I didn’t ignore the problems, and I didn’t make excuses for having them. I found help from professionals, and more importantly for me I found Christ. Yesterday has given me a new passion. I want to help people! I want to see a healthy America! I look forward to starting our new “Learn to do Life” Seminars!
If you have any questions, email me at Travis.Mash@MashElitePerformance.com or check out the website at www.MashElitePerformance.com
Here is a link to the Weightlifting Talk Episode with Martin Rooney!
http://www.spreaker.com/user/weightlifting_talk/martin_rooney
Thanks for posting this Travis. I’ll admit that I was upset about the direction that this conversation started to go initially yesterday. I felt like a lot of unhelpful anger was being thrown around via a few, admittedly passionate, rants. But this subject obviously hits very close to home for me. I’ll probably end up writing a book on the wall here, but I wanted to offer a little insight. I definitely feel like your attitude of wanting to help through outreach and education is what is needed in this situation, but an understanding of the complexity of the issue is also important.
Obesity is definitely a problem that needs to be addressed, especially childhood obesity, but I think it’s not at all helpful to generalize all obese people as nothing but “fat and lazy” or insinuate that obese children are nothing but the product of child abuse, ignorant/lazy/uncaring parents, or that these “fat and lazy” adults are going to raise “fat and lazy” kids. These kinds of people are definitely out there and are arguably the majority, but it’s obviously going a little overboard to advocate locking up and fining the parents of obese children. I came from a very loving home and my parents cared about me deeply, but they also couldn’t be with me every single second of my adolescent life. They couldn’t control what I ate at school or at a friend’s house. They couldn’t control the fact that once I hit puberty my body didn’t process sugar the same way as other children – we would later find out that I have polycystic ovarian syndrome, which isn’t an excuse but a reality of my physiological makeup.
Being overweight through middle school led to teasing and bullying and depression and comfort eating. I was a secretive eater and convinced myself that food made me feel better. It wasn’t lack of knowledge that led to me making poor choices, but much like someone addicted to drugs chooses a lifestyle that is unhealthy, I was choosing to eat things I knew were bad for me. These habits followed me into adulthood and eventually I found myself a morbidly obese adult. Like Ryan said, I tried numerous times to make changes. My parents tried to get me to change, but by this point it wasn’t as simple as changing what I ate and working out. Like I said before, if you’ve never been 353 pounds, diagnosed with Type II diabetes, staring down the prospect of losing 200+ pounds to save your life, you can’t understand how daunting and hopeless that feels. How long and terrifying a road that is to start walking. Add on top of that the fact that you don’t trust your body anymore because you broke both your legs several years earlier and you aren’t sure that you’re capable of doing what you know you need to do in order to lose the weight.
I finally got scared of death enough to be ready to make changes no matter how difficult it was. As scary as it was to start the journey, the thought of dying in my 30s was even scarier. I was lucky to find CrossFit and great coaches who were with me every step of the way and helped me work through all of my issues and find my strength and fight with me against the problem. It’s still a long road, and it gets even longer when you know that even after losing 80+ pounds there are still people that will look at you as obese and label you “fat and lazy” not knowing how hard you’ve worked or how far you’ve come. People that aren’t willing to take the time to address the deeper causes behind obesity that exist, the mental/emotional issues that lead to overeating, like actual physical or sexual abuse, and think they’ve got a one-size-fits-all band-aid to put on the problem of obesity.
Did my choices as a teen and adult make me into an obese adult? Absolutely. I don’t believe obesity is a disease, but I think that there are more factors in play and much more to work through than just swapping bad choices for good. I think that more people like you need to reach out to people like me and support us through weight loss journeys and help us look at how we got to where we are, why we make the choices we do, what we can do to move forward and change our lives. Share your knowledge and compassion and treat us as individuals with personal goals instead of being angry with us and vilifying “fat” people. Not everyone is strong enough to start this fight on their own, they need someone in their corner that helps them find their strength – you can be that person.
I agree with 95% of this. The only thing that I don’t agree with is the parenting. When I was young, my mother noticed that I was starting to become over weight. She blamed herself, and immediately changed the way the whole family ate. She sat me down, and explained the changes that were going to happen. She told me it was a team change, and from that point on fitness was a part of the whole family. My mother was a single mother, but she was a boss mother. Locking parents up is extreme, but holding them accountable is a good thing. Eating habits are formed early on in adolescence, so I’m all for educating the parents. The problem is that when a child is obese before puberty, they have a higher chance of heart disease for life even if they lose weight later in life.
We were over the top yesterday, and put in jail is harsh. I do want awareness and education, and in cases of neglect resulting in obesity I believe that there should be an intervention of sorts. I agree with you that there are lots of variables, and it’s not always as easy as “stop eating”. I hope to learn more about obesity, and I’ll admit my friendship with you has been a big part of inspiring me.
Your friend,
Travis
I love that I’ve helped to inspire you. The best part of being friends is that we can have great dialogue like this, challenge each other, and not have to agree on everything.
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