Wanna...

The point I really want to get across is that those weight guidelines are set by the diet industry! And they have made the normal category unreachable on purpose, so we will continue to spend our hard earned money on diets. There has been numerous studies and research that proves (Kaplods agrees with me on this) that those that are considered to me in the "Overweight" category (according to the BMI) are the healthiest. They live longer and have the least disease!

For years I was mad at God because I would pray, and beg, and try so hard to be "good" so I could get down to a "Normal" BMI! Oh how I thank Him now. Thank you Jesus, that He in His wisdom did not allow, or bless it. Because it's NOT HEALTHY to be so thin! NO WONDER HE DIDN'T BLESS IT!

Sorry, I just don't buy your theory. By the way my doctor who is not a nutritionist but an internist and my oncologist are quite happy to see me at the weight I am now. Much better for my health.

You can't just go by BMI. Really, it's about one of the silliest things in the world to base all health claims on these studies and here's why:

1. I'm currently overweight and just a bit underneath my highest adult weight (prepregnancy). However, I've been lifting weights for over half a year and been eating healthy and exercising for well over a year now. I also look drastically different than I did at this same weight in the past. The "past me" and the "present me" have the same weight and the same BMI but we're two VERY different people in terms of health.

So what doesn't BMI take into account?
- Muscle mass
- Fitness levels
- Types of foods consumed
- Non-food/non-caloric habits (smoking, diet pops, etc)


2. AGE MATTERS. Typically the young are slimmer, however, their eating habits are atrocious (ask me how I know )! So even though they may be young and at a healthy BMI that does not necessary reflect what they're doing to their body.

3. Why are the people at a healthy BMI? Did they stop eating due to depression? Did medication make them lose weight? Do they have an eating disorder? Do they smoke extensively? Certainly not ALL people at a healthy BMI do these things but there are some people out there that have bad habits.

4. Genetics too. People who tend to gain weight are the ones who were "survivers" in the past. Possibly there are other genetic qualities linked to ease of putting on weight (no clue here, just postulating).

5. Exercise only sometimes causes weight gain (people use it as an excuse to eat more, for instance). However, many, many people turn to exercise first when they want to lose.
So fitnesswise they might be alright but they are still overweight.

I'm sure there are more things that I'm missing but I really don't trust studies AT ALL based on BMI. Now, if you got a study that compared BODY FAT percentage on a sliding scale and only compared people with comparable muscle mass at the same time, then, I'd be more interested. However, they'd also have to control for income level, ethnic background, gender, fitness levels, bad habits etc.

The point is, that it's VERY hard to judge by the number on the scale. Right now I still feel overweight, however, I'm infinitely healthier than I was before. I'll never get to the low end of my BMI because I have a large frame and am pretty muscular, that wouldn't be healthy either (no matter what all those charts say). The best for me (going on my past experiences in high school and college) is around 140-155lbs, right at the mid- to high-end of a healthy BMI.

In the end go by your body. Do your joints still hurt at your current weight? What do your blood tests and doc say? Do you like what you see in the mirror? Can you physically do what you want to in your life? THOSE are the important questions to ask yourself.

I also want to add that I think it's VERY dangerous advice to try and generalize and say the obese are the healthiest. I was not healthy at my highest weight. I needed to lose that weight for my joints, for my reproductive system, and for my own personal sanity. I also was going to food to deal with my problems instead of dealing them myself, which was not good for my mental health either. Telling me I was healthy then would've been silly. Instead, one should really address quality of life and where they want to be, rather than going by the BMI. I think body fat is much more accurate, it's unfortunate that we don't have any cheap, easy way to measure it. It'd be nice to have a place where you could just go, pay $10 and check quickly with calipers instead of having to turn to personal trainers and nutritionists (and many of them aren't necessarily experts or will even offer it).

BMI is extremely arbitrary and I really would hesitate to immediately blame the diet industry for the WHO setting BMI standards. Runningfromfat laid it out more eloquently than I ever could—there are way too many factors at play to determine who is "healthy" without running a series of tests.

BMI is so arbitrary that the national and worldwide organizations can move the BMI around and decide who is healthy, overweight and obese without anyone changing their weights. This happened as recently as 1998, when the NIH changed the healthy BMI from 27.8 to 25 which moved nearly 30 million Americans into the "overweight" category. If you check out the wikipedia article on BMI it shows how internationally, the BMI categories are different around the world. You might be "healthy" in one country and "overweight" or even "obese" in another.

According to the "old" guidelines, my current BMI of 26.9 would be healthy. 13 years later I'm considered "overweight."

When I was 200 pounds—nearly into the obese class II category—I always got a clean bill of health. I exercised frequently and ate healthy foods (although too much). I was one of those obese folks that was better off than sedentary fast-food eating thin folks.

I really don't know if I'll be better off losing weight. I'll be completely honest that I don't know why I even started in the first place; I just began experimenting with my diet. I was happy before and I'm certainly happy now, but I agree with you in that we shouldn't have to be thin to gain self-worth

Medical professionals do not use BMI as a judge of healthy or unhealthy. They use it as an easy preliminary screening tool, potentially indicating a need for additional measures.

This, and pretty much everything else kaplods said.

If you want to accept this research then you HAVE TO understand it's limit. I do scientific research for a living (although absolutely nothing related to health and nutrition). However, the first thing you need to do as a scientist is be upfront (both to yourself and others that read your papers) about what assumptions you make and the limitations of your work. This is essential so that others can truly understand what your data means.

It doesn't mean that these studies are necessarily worthless but clearly more research needs to be done, taking into account many of the things I mentioned in my previous post.

On the topic of God.... I'm not really sure how this applies? I'm assuming you're a Christian because of the Bible verses and the only verse I only know about your body is:

I take that to mean that we need to take care of ourselves. For me that meant getting past emotional eating, exercising and watching what I eat! My previous habits that got me to an obese BMI were not treating my body well at all. Now, I agree that unhealthy dieting methods are just as bad. Nobody's going to say that it's OK to get to a healthy BMI by starving yourself and throwing up.

But as a general rule that the obese and overweight have more willpower? I just don't get it. I didn't have any willpower at that point. Now, if you have someone who truly is happy at a higher weight, doesn't have bad habits, is exercising, and eating well. Well, good for them! That wasn't me, that wasn't my DH, and honestly? That's not anybody in my family (I have a large number of obese/overweight individuals in my family...). However, my thin friends? Well, they exercise, eat well, and appear to be happy.

Certainly, yo-yo dieting is NOT the healthiest thing for a person and there are people in the diet industry that take advantage of people. I don't have a really good solution for that but ignoring a connection between weight and health entirely (or better put body fat) is not the right answer either. Unfortunately, when it comes to healthy and weight loss, it's SUCH and individual thing that it's hard for researchers to perform meaningful studies and interpret them accurately.

As a Christian and an overweight woman, I think the topic is quite interesting. I would agree that the optimum BMI index is a false standard based on a numeric estimation of what people believe will keep a body at its optimal health. I agree those numbers are unreasonably low and I think standard research has recognized the numbers are skewed and do not account for various factors.

I just wanted to make a comment about the people who have been referenced as "naturally thin." While many of them have never dieted, I also have noticed that they do not have many of the negative habits that obese people have. In other words, while there are naturally thin people, even naturally thin people have to make smart choices. More calories, less movement/exercise will result in weight gain for the overwhelming majority of the population.

For example, I've noticed that thinner people choose smaller portion sizes. I went to Subway with a "naturally thin" person and I ordered a foot long (with cheese), chips (regular) and a regular soda. My naturally thin friend ordered a six inch, a diet soda and ate baked lays. Again, this is someone who doesn't diet.

I have noticed a list of behaviors that I have that most naturally thin people don't (and I think this helps contribute to their natural frame). I could write forever about things like: 1) stoppin when their body says its full (as opposed to me who can eat until I'm almost sick), 2) choosing healthier options, 3) smaller portion sizes (etc.).

I know this is a bit off topic but I just thought I'd add my two cents on the naturally thin issue (and that's really what it's worth)

No, I don't really agree with you on this. I agreed that SOME research suggests that being "slightly overweight" has health advantages (which advantages depends on the study). But there is OTHER research that suggests the opposite (and which disadvantages were found also depends on the study).

Also, the studies aren't really clear on the reasons the slightly overweight may have an advantage - and it isn't necessarily the weight itself.

For example, if you're quite athletic, you are probably going to be slightly overweight - or even obese by BMI standards.

Most of the research that I've encountered that has found health advantages to being slightly overweight, used BMI. And just as an example, quite athletic individuals are going to have BMI's in the overweight and even obese categories.

BMI can tell you if you're over the average weight, but it can't tell you if you have more fat or more muscle than normal - just that your weight is higher.

And while it's normal to gain weight as a person gets older, it's also normal to become more sedentary - and there's a great deal of evidence that becoming more sedentary has negative health consequences.

I think it's just as wrong to attribute immorality to being overweight, as it is to attribute immorality to being ANY weight.

I think that we can only evaluate healthfulness by our own personal bodies. If we're going to the doctor and getting routine blood testing, our health indicators (blood pressure, blood tests for blood sugar, lipid profiles, CRP, mineral levels...) are improving as we lose weight, then that's a pretty good indicator that losing weight is doing something good for us.

As long as the indicators are improving, and as long as the way we feel is improving, that's an indication that we're moving in the right direction.

But it all has to be taken into context. Just because being a slightly above average weight is healthy for one person, or even assuming it's healthy for most people, doesn't mean it's healthy for all people, or most importantly whether it's healthy for you.

We have to use the evidence that we have available to us. How we feel, the results of our checkups, and the knowledge we gain from the research and other sources of information.

Issues such as heart disease, arthritis, high blood pressure, thyroid issues, diabetes and other issues - can all change the equation. They can make being thinner more necessary for than for someone without the issues. Or they can make it harder to lose weight, so we may have to be more patient with ourselves.

We may need to keep a closer eye on what we eat, how we exercise, and how much attention we pay to our diet, exercise, and health in general.

I don't think God expects us all to be the same size, or to have the same level of health or fitness. I also think God gives us a lot of leeway in how we manage our lives. I think that's what free will is all about. Using the resources God has given us, to do the best we can.

I don't believe calorie counting brings us closer to God, nor do I believe it seperates us from Him, unless we choose to allow it to. It's like balancing a checkbook - it's just part of life, for some of us. It's possible to get obsessed, and that can create a problem not just with our relationship with God, but with our relationship with other people and with ourselves.

I don't even think vanity seperates us from God, unless we allow it to. Sometimes I look in the mirror and think I look great, sometimes I dress to look as nice as I can, and I don't think God is disappointed in me for that, and I don't think I'm making God less of a priority by wanting to look nice.

I do agree that we have to take morality out of the weight equation as much as possible, because when we feel guilty and obsessing over what we're eating, or for what we're not eating, or for wanting to lose weight, or for not wanting to lose weight - or for being too thin, or for not being thin enough, all those obsessive thoughts are what fracture our relationships - with ourselves, with each other, and with God.

I understand that gluttony is considered a sin, and there were times in my life that food was more important than myself, my friends, my family, and God. But dieting also has.

This time around, I'm making myself a priority. I always thought that was selfish, but I've found that the more I take care of myself, the more open I am to God's influences, and the more time I have to help others. I didn't love myself enough to feel I was worth it, and God does expect me to love myself (just not to the exclusion of others).

I've also taken morality out of the equation. I don't feel bad when I eat when I'm stressed. I know it's a natural reaction. I want to live longer, so I have to lose weight - but I don't have to feel bad or guilty for my weight - even if I were to become fatter than my highest weight. God loved me at 400 lbs, and he will love me even if gained 400 lbs or if I became anorexic and weighed 60 lbs.

God wants what's best for me, and I want that too - so I have to work at weight loss. How and even whether I do that work, however doesn't make me a failure (or a success) as a Christian.

I think that we have to learn how to incorporate self-care into our lives, and realize that what that self-care looks like can be very different for different individuals.

This is what I was saying when I talked about interviewing those who were "Naturally thin" I interviewed those who I observed to have none of the markers for anorexia, and most were non smokers. I asked them what diets they have tried, and ALL of them told me that they were not dieters. They may have tried one or two, but did not make it a lifestyle.

I concluded that when you don't limit a certain type of food, you don't crave it. i.e. if I tell you that you can't have water for 8 hours, the first thing you want is a big glass of water! Same thing happens with me, if I tell myself I can't have any chocolate or candy, that's what I want. The Bible even speaks of this being part of our nature.

Romans 7: 8-12 (The Message) Don't you remember how it was? I do, perfectly well. The law code started out as an excellent piece of work. What happened, though, was that sin found a way to pervert the command into a temptation, making a piece of "forbidden fruit" out of it. The law code, instead of being used to guide me, was used to seduce me. WITHOUT ALL THE PARAPHERNALIA OF THE LAW CODE, SIN LOOKED PRETTY DULL AND LIFELESS, and I went along without paying much attention to it.

For me, I seriously think that all my dieting over the years is what CAUSED my eating disorder. If you are a Christian pray about it. I am not saying that being extremely overweight is healthy! But as for me being 5'7" and weighing 180 is Healthy! Especially if I am exercising, (Exercise profits a little 1 Tim 4:8) eating when I am hungry and stopping when I am satisfied. It's easy to stop because I know that I will be able to eat it again.

Do the research for yourself. Don't just take the World's or my word for it. The New Testament has plenty of versus that say worrying about your food is and being over occupied with diet restrictions are wrong.

This REALLY depends on the person. I consider myself something akin to a recovering sugar addict and that does not ring true for me at all. I basically treated it like an alcoholic would (and cut it out of my life completely for about 6 months). I now allow myself to have one serving size/week but I cannot handle having it in the house. I absolutely needed that detox period and telling myself I didn't need to limit myself would've be disastrous.

Like I've said before you just can't make blanket statements about such things because it really depends on the individual. I'm glad that you've found what works for you but that might not ring true for others.



Again, this is what I said before. If you are happy and healthy at being "overweight" by your BMI, there is nothing wrong with that! However, medical professionals need to have some sort of guidelines to look at when it comes to weight & health. Unfortunately, testing body fat for every patient would require a lot of money (you'd have to retrain ALL doctors, provide them with equipment, educate the population as a whole, and run a lot of new studies). So we're left with the BMI charts in all their glory. I'm sure the researchers in this field realize how flawed they are but are doing the best they can with what they have.

Like kaplods said, I absolutely don't think God cares in the slightest about your weight unless it's in someway hindering how you live the rest of your life (like I mentioned with my emotional eating). If you feel you can live your life to your fullest where you're at and you feel like you're even closer to God there, great! You don't need to apologize for stopping with dieting if that's where you feel the best at.

However, I would caution you about making blanket statements about BMI and health. It's way too complicated of an issue.

I've also worked and talked with, and observed naturally thin people and overweight people's habits around food, and I've concluded that there really aren't always clear distinctions.

I've known "naturally thin" folks who were couch potatoes and ate huge amounts of highly caloric and nutritionally empty junk food.

I've known extremely obese folks who didn't eat more than their thin peers either in volume or calories and who were extremely active and made healthy food choices.

Most people of all sizes fall somewhere between those extremes.

Researchers have found and even identified genes that contribute to obesity, which doesn't mean that we're programmed to be fat, but those of us with such genes may find it impossible to think and act like a thin person (especially since we wouldn't know which thin people to emulate).

Unhealthy habits are widespread in our society, among thin, fat, and average weight people. I think we need to stop worrying about weight, and focus on healthy habits that will improve our health regardless of our weight.

Getting enough rest

Eating healthy, unprocessed foods (which can be very difficult when we lack time or money)

Limiting processed and highly caloric foods (which can be difficult when our culture puts the most value, on the unhealthiest foods. We tend to think of healthy foods as boring and bland, and believe that celebration foods have to contain outragious amounts of sugar, refined carbs, salt, and fat.

Making time for healthy social relationships

Learning to de-stress

Being active socially and physically - we encourage overweight folks to isolate themselves, and especially to avoid physical activity in public. We're taught to be so ashamed of our bodies, that we don't want anyone to see them - even when we're covered head to toe (and you can't really find very many head-to-toe swimming suits, except in very conservative Islamic, Christian, and Jewish countries). A modest and attractive swimming suit is almost an oxymoron (I'm trying to find a swimming suit to replace the one I've shrunk out of, and anything that looks nice, I apparently can't afford).


I think we make too much of weight, and not enough about healthy habits. We focus too much on the destination, and not enough on the journey.

Our society values thin-ness at all costs. And as a result, women risk, undermine and sabotage their healths trying to get to the destination by the unhealthiest means.

I remember in college being shocked by the results of a research survey of college women, that found the number of women who said they would abort a child destined to be fat was greater than the number who would choose to abort a child destined to be mentally handicapped.

I was horrified that anyone would want to do either, but as an adopted, morbidly obese child in a family in which no one else experienced childhood or even young adult weight problems. And for the adults who had weight problems they didn't appear until middle age (for some of the women) or retirement (for some of the men).

My parents raised 4 kids, 2 adopted, and 2 biological. My brother and I (not biologically related) had weight issues different than my parents (my brother underweight throughout childhood and me obese - a stranger once scolded my mother for starving my brother and overfeeding me). My sisters (the bio-kids) follow our parents pattern. One like my father (at least until retirement, which my sister hasn't yet reached) has never had a weight issue, and one began gaining in her late 20's - just like Mom.


Because of the pattern, and because of the research I've read, I believe that obesity is a combination of genetic and environmental factors. Our genes aren't changeing, but the way we feed and raise children has. We're eating (nad feeding our kids) a diet much higher in fat, salt, sugar, and processed carbs, and lower in fiber. And we're moving less (and encouraging our children to move less - or at least not encouraging them to move more).

And worst of all, we discourage activity for the children and adults who need it most. There's such a social stigma against obese folks exercising or even being normally active, that fear of shaming ourselves prevents many of us from swimming or joining a dance class, or whatever out of fear of being the fattest person in the class (and why exactly is that such a social crime?)

We've created a world in which being overweight and unhealthy (or thin and unhealthy) is becoming the norm, because we're eating more (especially more crap) and moving less.

The unhealthy thin people may actually be at the bigger disadvantage, because they may be assuming they're healthy because they look ok in the mirror.

I wanted to comment on the idea that if you limit something you crave it. I grew up in a Christian home where I was never told that a product was completely off limits and I craved unhealthy foods anyway.

I think the problem has so many facets that it would be a mistake to pin it down to just one thing. A huge part of the problem is making junk foods so appealing, increasing portion sizes, including additives that increase cravings and encouraging a "if it feels good do it" society.

I do believe the media/scientific reasearch has fostered an unhealthy body image FOR WOMEN primarily. However, I think the suggestion that the more "overweight" you are, the healthier you might be is just as dangerous.

I could think of so many other factors that may effect the "healthier" determination. In other words, could it be that the ones considered "healthier" have another common denominator that may effect their assessment?

KAPLODS....I agree with so much of what you said.

I also disagree that limiting or forbidding something causes a person to crave it.

If we all craved the forbidden, we'd all be having sex with our siblings, murdering our children, and would be using heroine and methamphetemines (and would invent worse).

Social taboos (forbidden behaviors) are so ingrained we don't even realize that they're forbidden. Most people don't even think of doing the "very forbidden" things in their culture, because they're so ingrained that we don't even think of doing such things.

If junk food were that forbidden, we wouldn't even think of eating it. But it's not "that" forbidden.

Instead, we're all taught to believe in "moderation" which actually may be a myth.

We're taught to think that if we don't succeed in acheiving moderation, it's because there's something defective within us (and maybe there is, and maybe there isn't. I suspect there isn't).

We're also taught to judge moderation by it's effects. If you weigh 115 lbs and seem to be healthy and are eating two pounds of sugar a day - you're encouraged to believe that 2 lbs of sugar for you is moderation. Only if you gtet fat or sick is your moderation questioned.


For years, I bought into the "forbidden cravings" theory of junk food until I tried at forbidding nothing. I still ate crap, so I decided that I was "broken" as a result of the forbidden cravings (believing that I couldn't "get over" feeling the foods were forbidden. That if my parents had never limited the junk, I wouldn't be interested in it so much).

I was wrong.

I think it's our warped view of moderation, more than "forbidden fruit" that accounts for overeating junk. We're taught to be as hedonistic as we can be, without crossing the "forbidden" lines, but "forbidden" is getting fuzzier.

But that's only one small component. The foods we're eating have physically addictive properties, so limiting them may have no effect at all on overeating (or less than we have popularly assumed).

There was an experiment that was often quoted in Psychology and biology classes in college that found that when allowed to choose from a wide variety of foods, and allowed to eat when they wanted, toddlers chose a balanced diet (they might eat a stick of butter one day, but over the long haul, the diet was balanced).

That was used as rationale to let children eat whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted.

One huge flaw in that study. Junk foods weren't included in the mix. When allowed to choose from healthy foods, the toddlers choices were heathly.

A releatively recent study found this is NOT true when foods high in sugar, salt, and fat (especially the combination of all three), children will overeat those foods.

The book "The End of Overeating" by David Kessler changed the way I looked at these foods, and made me realize that "forbidden" probably had almost nothing to do with why I was overweight. The book, and the research Kessler cites suggests that the fat/sugar/salt combination is physiologically difficult to limit. Thin folks, fat folks, perfect-body folks, and even lab rats and polar bears will overeat these foods.

(In Alaska, the wild polar bears are becoming obese and ill from eating in human dumps. They've learned to prefer the dumpsters, because it's less work and the fat content in our garbage is so delicious to them. Mayonaise jars are a particularl favorite).

There are no "simple" solutions to obesity. You can pray for God to solve it for you, but as with all prayers to be delivered from any illness, behavior problem or even sin, sometimes God doesn't. And we humans can't know why. Maybe it's our weakness, maybe it's just that while God answers all prayers, sometimes the answer is "No."

I do not believe in a God who would withhold healing because a person's faith isn't strong enough. Locally, we had parents whose daughter died from complicationso t type II diabetes, because the parents believed that their daughter's illness would be cured by prayer. The daughter wastede away, getting thinner and thinner until she went into diabetic coma and died, because she was not taken to the hospital.

I am not questioning those parents' faith, but I do question their wisdom. Surely one of the ays in which God helps us, is by giving us the opportunity for knowledge and wisdom we can use to help one another.

My appreciation for scientific in research and modern medicine, doesn't conflict with my belief in God. I believe that science makes sense because God created a world his children could understand. Sure gravity could work randomly, if God wanted it so - but obviously he doesn't. Surely God could have saved that child, but allowing humans free will sometimes means teaching us lessons we don't want to learn, such as learning to rely on other human beings, because as much as God wants us to love HIM, he also wants us to love and help each other.

And I whole-heartedly believe that God works through 3FC, and every institution in which humans are trying to make the world a better place for each other, because I think that's one of the reasons we're here - to help each other, and there's amazing God-given power in that.

First let me say I am enjoying the passion here on both sides of this BMI plate! So many ways we look at things and how we value the information

I think there is some truth in the "want what we can't have" as far as it concerns food....it is rare that I eat breakfast, usually at work we eat just once and that is at 10....but boy oh boy have the doctor tell me I can't eat from midnight until 10am for blood work or surgery and I wake up STARVING!!

God creates us all different doesn't He?

I don't suppose that we will ever be able to explain all the secrets to how much of what, when, where and why of what we should eat and what we should weigh....so many theories and facts out there...

very confusing isn't it?

Yes it's true satan is out there attacking in big and small ways...Christians are well aware of that...when we "think" of him as far as attacking us in our efforts and information provided...we allow him way too much credit.....

why credit satan for anything?

If we keep our hearts and minds focused on Christ, then satan has no power...none...zippo...over us.

We ask God to help us lose weight, we ask God for information, we ask God to bless us in our efforts....

we ask why things aren't working....

maybe we are asking the wrong question....

God has already told us we are blessed in His WORD. He has already done EVERYTHING we need for us in the gift of His Son

Maybe we should focus a little less on research, facts and numbers on the scale. Maybe we should we ask God to continue to lead and guide us to a healthier life, if it is His will, so we can be stronger vessels with which to share the Good News....maybe by taking more time for Him and less on our own efforts to succeed on our weight loss things will come together for us a little bit better...

That's not exactly what OP said. Nor is it what the research she's referring to suggests.

As much as I've disagreed with OP on a few points, she raises a very important point as to whether the culturally accepted ideals for weight are based on health or aesthetics.

It's a valid point, because trying to get to the cultural ideal of beauty, may never be possible, for many of us. Because we've tied the cultural ideal weight in our mind to "health" as well as beauty, we may be struggling to reach an unhealthy weight because we may not recognize our own healthy weight when we experience it.

Or we may acheive the ideal, and fight to keep it, despite evidence that it's not our healthiest weight.

If we can take the morality and even the beauty element out of weight loss, if we can take out the "perfection-seeking" aspect (especially when perfection is so illusive), I think more people would have more success.

We treat weight loss as if it's a matter of perfection or nothing. When we feel like we can't meet the perfection standard, we give up entirely thinking "it's useless, I'll always be fat."

If the focus was on our mental and physical health and not a perfect number we have in mind, and instead we judged our diet, exercise, lifestyle, and our weight by how we felt emotionally and physically and by our health indicators (meaning that even if we feel good, we see a doctor once or twice a year or more if we have health issues), I think the success rates for weight loss would be higher.

Instead, most often we have this weirdly arbitrary number in mind. A number that isn't necessarily based in any fact at all.