Too much of a good thing?

Food, that is. Most of us love to eat--and it shows.

In my case, of late, Extra Cheese Tombstone frozen pizza is my version of "too much." I often eat a whole one when I get home from work. Since my IBS is a little touchy at times, I usually don't eat anything until I get home from work and a little 25 ounce pizza is just the thing to ease those hunger pangs.

LOL I'm lucky I'm not as big as a house! There's almost 1,500 Kcals in that pizza I use as a big after-work snack.

The same issue of the British Medical Journal that contained the back study that I mentioned yesterday also had a discussion of obesity and how the public health community might--or might not--be intentionlly misinterpreting how much obesity exists and how much impact that extra weight has on our collective health.

*whew* That was one long sentence!

I doubt anyone questions the intentions of the public officials in question. Their motivation in encouraging people to lose weight is no doubt pure however public policy is made based on their recommendations. If those recommendations don't really improve our health or medical costs then it's ill advised for the government to use its own considerable weight to try to shift our behavior. Personally I have no interest in giving up my evening pizza. I'm comfortable with being a little chubby!


This page determines BMI if you don't already know yours. There's a chart down below that can be used also if you don't want to click through to NutitionData site. You might have to click on the chart tho to make it big enough to read. The highlighted area is the part that has pertained to me since I turned 30.

Speaking of that chubby thing and government data, I have some issues there too. According to the official BMI thingy I'm a 28.7 which is just a stones throw (if the stone weighs 8 pounds) from being officially obese. Yikes. I'm only 8 pounds from being obese! Not chubby, OBESE. Scary stuff--but I don't believe it for a second.

You see, I've gained weight in stages during my life. I gained my current height, 72 inches, when I was in 8th grade and for the next several years I stayed around 125 pounds. I looked like I was dying of starvation. That was 15 pounds under the "normal" BMI standard. During my college years I was in the 135 - 140 pound range. That's the lower edge of normal for 72 inches of height, but I still looked quite emaciated. Skin and bones.

The year after I graduated I got up to 155 pounds and I stayed around there until I got married at age 30. That's the middle of "normal" and I can assure you, I wanted to weigh more. It wasn't until I was 33, in my last year of marriage, that I finally got above 175 pounds and was comfortable with my weight.

That 175 pounds though, according to the official BMI chart, is on the border between normal and overweight. Ha! Any less meat on me than that and I look like a scarecrow!

So that's why I don't give much credence to those BMI charts. They seem biased towards too low a weight and I wonder if these charts are based on solid science.