My opinion – there is so much research and so many different points of view – but for me, the most important thing is to encourage and support a fit, active, healthy lifestyle (both physically and mentally).
I don’t encourage the seeking of the perceived “perfect body”, because it is not attainable for all, and I certainly don’t think it is mentally healthy to spend your life trying to attain an unachievable goal….
I would like to share an exert from a longer article – if you have time read the whole article – it really is worth it!!
““I’D NEVER SAY weight doesn’t matter,” says Martha Gulati, M.D., director of the Women’s Cardiovascular Health Program at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. “Weight will always influence a number of important health variables. But compared to the effect of exercise, weight and BMI have been proven to be secondary. By far, physical activity and physical fitness has been shown to be the single most important factor in maintaining good health, regardless of one’s body weight.”
Early this year, a study of 300,000 men and women in Europe conducted by U.K. researchers at the University of Cambridge found that twice as many deaths may be linked to lack of physical activity compared with the number of deaths linked to obesity. The study also found that a modest amount of physical activity, the equivalent of a brisk daily 20-minute walk, produced significant health benefits, even for people with a high BMI.
Long-term studies by the Cooper Clinic in Dallas found that the death rate for adults who are thin but unfit was at least twice that of fit obese individuals, and that fitness provided protection against early death regardless of body weight.
In short, exercise in general, including moderate exercise such as walking and vigorous exercise such as running, benefits everybody, regardless of weight. By the same token, physical activity, not diet, forms the behavioral key to achieving and maintaining a healthy weight.
By this logic, weight control would seem to be a simple matter of calories in/calories out. Burn more calories than you consume, and your body will adapt by burning fat. The pounds will drop away and you can buy new clothes, and stand a better shot at rewards ranging from getting promoted to getting a date. It seems an ineluctable law of physics, a Biggest Loser calculus relentlessly drummed into our brains by the American media. Hence the suspicion that dogs Mirna Valerio: If she runs so much, how can she still be fat?
“If controlling obesity were a simple matter of calories in and calories out,” says Ludwig, “I would be out of a job.”
“The calories-in/calories-out idea is ridiculously simplistic,” says Freedhoff. “It’s like a financial adviser telling an investor to buy low and sell high.”
Ludwig explains that weight loss, gain, and control are complex biological processes. “It’s a combination of genetic, behavioral, environmental, and psychological factors, and varies tremendously from individual to individual,” he says. “In many ways, obesity is similar to complex diseases such as cancer.”
Dr. Steven Blair, P.E.D., the lead author of the Cooper Clinic studies who is now a professor in the Arnold School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina, agrees. “If you fashioned a hypothetical world in which every person ran 10 miles a day and subsisted on the same daily ration of carrots, you would still have a full range of body types, from svelte to stout.”
“Imagine our bodies as cars,” Freedhoff says. “They come out of the factory with various fuel efficiencies—an SUV’s is always going to be different than a sub-compact’s. How you drive definitely affects mileage, but the SUV is never going to burn less fuel than the subcompact.
“Well, just like cars, our bodies are all wired with their own distinctive genetic makeups. We can modify our BMI through exercise and diet, but only to an extent. Some of us are subcompacts, others are SUVs, and one type isn’t inherently ‘better’ than another. We can be healthy and happy no matter how much we weigh.”
Mirna Valerio has been wise enough and brave enough to strike this balance. Through years of hard but mostly happy work, she has attained her own healthy weight. She accepts herself without being satisfied with herself. “Instead of wondering, If she runs so much, how come she’s not skinny? we could be wondering, How heavy would she be if she didn’t run?” says Blair. “Is she a good person? Is she active, healthy, and contributing to the world? Those questions are far more pertinent and interesting than asking what she weighs.”
“A woman like Mirna makes an excellent role model,” Ludwig says. “She reinforces the fundamentals: Work out, be active, and eat a high-quality diet. Weight loss should be the by-product of a healthy life, not the goal.””
https://rw.runnersworld.com/selects/ultra.html?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=Social&utm_term=1291199031&utm_campaign=Runner%E2%80%99s+World