Monday, November 23, 2015

The Mysteries of Fatness

In my profession as an exercise physiologist, I have interest in the fatness of mankind.  In fact, my Doctoral mentor, Dr. Kirk Cureton, was an expert on measuring body composition, and I learned a good deal about measurement from him.

As you may have noticed, our US population, along with many others in the world, suffers from a pandemic of obesity.  I am loathe to even mention it, because people are very sensitive to this and I lose a lot of friends when I talk about this issue.

However, maybe this short post will be impersonal enough not to offend anyone - that is my sincere desire.

I have the privilege of traveling around the world in my work, so I get to eat a lot of different foods.  I like the foods in every country I have visited, but I often lose weight.On my last trip to Costa Rica, about which I posted several stories, I only lost one pound.  I was surprised a bit, but not much.  We ate 3 hardy meals a day, mostly rice and beans, but hardy, filling meals each time.  There was little sugar, and thus I expected to lose a few pounds.

Hmm, no.

Admittedly I did less exercise in the jungle.  Most of the time I was teaching, but though I put in a lot of energy, that doesn't compare to a workout.

As I have mentioned, I think the flora and fauna in our digestive system are impacted by travel- different foods, preservatives, and different native flora and fauna that interact with our own.

Our physiology is extremely complex, which keeps me in business.  Weight loss is still a thermodynamic equation of energy storage being relative to Energy ABSORPTION (not eaten) - Energy expenditure.

But that Energy absorption is more complex than I appreciated in the past.  Not anymore!

Now keep that in mind for Thanksgiving!!


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