The Checkup Archive: Weight loss

Why do women hate their bodies so much?

I just read an unsettling article in Glamour that said 97 percent of 300 young women surveyed by the magazine reported having multiple negative thoughts about their own bodies in a given day. The average number was 13; many women said they had as many as 35, 50 or 100 such thoughts per day. So I'm sitting here thinking mean thoughts about my thighs and wondering, why do we do this to ourselves?

By Jennifer LaRue Huget  | February 24, 2011; 7:00 AM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (18)
Categories:  Life's Big Questions, Me Minus 10, Nutrition and Fitness, Psychology, Weight loss, Women's Health  
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Weight loss's link to better health questioned

We as a nation have put a lot of stock into the notion that being (or becoming) slender equates to better health and longer lives. But a body evidence calls into question whether that connection -- or, conversely, the connection between overweight and poor health -- is all that strong, and even whether it exists at all.

By Jennifer LaRue Huget  | January 24, 2011; 7:00 AM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (35)
Categories:  Cardiovascular Health, Chronic Conditions, Diabetes, Eating disorders, Nutrition and Fitness, Obesity, Psychology, Weight loss, Women's Health, life expectancy, osteoporosis  
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Is food addiction real?

Even if there is such a thing as food addiction, it's not likely that all or even most of the people in the U.S. who are obese or overweight suffer from such an affliction. While some people may have genetic or other forms of predisposition to addiction, others of us just plain overindulge, and we can't blame our neurochemistry for our decisions to eat more than we should.

By Jennifer LaRue Huget  | January 18, 2011; 7:00 AM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (9)
Categories:  Alcohol and Drugs, Drug Abuse, Eating disorders, Neurological disorders, Nutrition and Fitness, Obesity, Psychology, Weight loss  
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Is that right? Santa should shed 50?

I would say that suggesting Santa lose 50 pounds this soon before Christmas is risky business. But that didn't stop about 60 of 100 U.S. physicians recently surveyed in a "Holiday Healthcare survey" conducted by the big Asian bank CLSA.

By Jennifer LaRue Huget  | December 24, 2010; 7:00 AM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (1)
Categories:  Cardiovascular Health, Family Health, General Health, Is That Right?, Nutrition and Fitness, Obesity, Weight loss, heart failure  
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What's up with Weight Watchers?

At the end of November Weight Watchers switched up its popular weight-loss system, moving from the now-familiar Points program, wherein every food was assigned a value mostly according to the number of calories it contains, to the new PointsPlus program. What's the diff? Under PointsPlus, points are assigned according to a formula that takes into account not just calories but the mix of key nutrients a food contains and other, harder-to-quantify values.

By Jennifer LaRue Huget  | December 21, 2010; 7:00 AM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (5)
Categories:  Me Minus 10, Nutrition and Fitness, Obesity, Weight loss  
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