Food, Love, and Obesity

Fat Girls’ Costumes

Walmart advertised Halloween costumes and dubbed one section the Fat Girls’ Costumes. Do I think Walmart deliberately chose to be offensive? No. Do I see Americans everyday carelessly belittling people or going out of their way to be hurtful to people struggling with their weight? Bet your life.

You can slice, dice, or peel it any way you want but the plain truth is that people by and large don’t choose to be overweight or even choose their eating habits. The mind/body connection is so strong that some people believe illnesses like cancer are at least in part caused by our thoughts and beliefs. Do some people simply eat too much? Probably, but since diets seldom work long-term, seems pretty obvious something else is causing America’s health epidemic.

Early Pathways

I wonder what kind of relationship anyone would have with food in the following not so untypical scenario: children raised by emotionally inhibited people don’t receive hugs and kisses; they get rewarded with cookies, consoled by ice cream, celebrate with lavish meals that include everyone’s favorite recipes, and are bribed to do better by the promise of some edible treat. Some parents use food as a substitute for their attention. It’s fast, easy, and shuts up the whining kid.

A person’s personality is formed primarily in the first six years of their life. Neuro pathways march through the brain and tell it how to respond to various stimuli. When a person suffers a brain injury and those pathways are damaged, new ones can be formed, but it takes months, even years of intense therapy before some semblance of normality is achieved and quite often full recovery isn’t possible. Tell me again how easy it is to just stop eating so much. Diet programs don’t come close to addressing the real problem.

Food Is Love

The only love some children receive is through the adults in their lives feeding them. It is intimate. Food and how it makes you feel becomes a part of your self-worth, emotional stability, how you deal with stresses (not just meaning strain, also meaning the importance or significance placed on something, negative or positive). Learning a healthy response to food for such people is a lifelong, day-at-a-time business and not nearly as simple as those who denigrate would like to believe. Eating fewer calories, getting more exercise, etc. doesn’t address the very real and difficult-to-change emotional component.

So next time the temptation to tease or harangue or put down an overweight person arises, maybe we could try a little understanding and support instead.