Parents’ Performance…

This is for all the parents out there. Do you have a fat kid? Does your kid just sit around and watch TV after school? When the family goes out to eat, does your kid look at the menu and say, “okay”? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. There’s plenty of other parents that have fat children too. As a matter of fact, about 20% of the children in this country are overweight. And it’s only getting worse. It’s been said (I forget by whom) that this generation may just be the first generation to NOT outlive their parents…Isn’t that nice?!?!

Chances are that if your kid is fat, you probably are too. Like anything else, it always goes back to the parents. It’s parents’ performance that initially shapes a youth’s mind. If you sit on the couch for hours on end and eat potato chips and ring dings while the button on your jeans is screaming to release some pressure, you’re kid will inherit that same talent. Therefore, you should really lead by a good example. Go out and be active, put down the cheese doodles and take a walk….and take your kid with you. Have you ever taught your kid how to throw a baseball? Now’s a good time to play some catch with him and actually tell him that kids used to play outside! How about you get in shape yourself. Buy a treadmill and some free weights and tell your kid that you’re sick of not being able to fit through a doorway. If that’s too strenuous for ya, at least teach your kid about physical activity and enroll him into sports. Believe me, when you have a heart attack at 50, he’ll thank you for it.

If you don’t know what can happen to an overweight kid, here’s some stuff to get you started, consider it a reference of sorts:

- childhood obesity is the leading cause of pediatric hypertension

- childhood obesity is associated with Type II diabetes

- childhood obesity increases the risk of coronary heart disease

- childhood obesity increases stress on the weight-bearing joints

There’s also psychological factors too, like a drop in self – esteem and poor relationships with peers. What this means is that your fat kid goes to school everyday and gets picked on by kids specifically for being fat. They call him “jellyroll”, “tons-of-fun” and “Fatty McButterpants”. In turn, your kid is now thinking he’s worthless and feels lower than whale crap. Who wants to deal with a suicidal 10 year – old? In some cases, it also leads to anorexia.

I’m not saying go out a purchase a treadmill and weights for him, that’s for you. Instead, get him active! Get him away from the Playstation, the after – school cartoons and the four cans of soda a night. Have him join a football league, a baseball league. Instead of feeding his face with fatty junk food, have him eat fruit and drink water. Also, like I said, lead by example. Kids aren’t going to take you all that seriously if you don’t do it yourself. That “Do what I say, not as I do” crap doesn’t work. Stop making excuses for your child (ie. “You’re not fat, your big – boned…”, “You’re just a growing boy, don’t mind those Husky pants we just had to buy”, “It’s just baby fat…”) and tell him to go outside and run around. Let me tell you, the thinner he gets the less he’ll be coming home from school with an “Oversized Load” post – it on his back.

The Skinny on Anorexia

Further Response to “The Skinny…”

Hey Ladies…

Would you rather look like this:

Or like this:

But, let’s hope you don’t wanna look like this:

Here at The Public Gym, we don’t just make fun of obese people. We make fun of very skinny people too…we don’t discriminate on eating disorders! There may be an “obesity epidemic” (everyone knows we love that term here at The Public Gym…) running through America, but there is also another disease festering itself in the underbelly of this nation. It’s like the big pink elephant in the room, everybody sees it, but nobody wants to acknowledge it: Anorexia.

Anorexia is an eating disorder, especially in girls (approximately 95%), where people starve themselves because they think they’re fat. Weight loss is usually 15% below the person’s normal body weight. The disorder is largely psychological in the fact that since someone thinks they’re fat, they just don’t eat. They continue to do this over a long period of time, all the while losing more and more weight. The problem is, when someone with this eating disorder looks at themselves in the mirror, even if they weigh all of 95 lbs. in wet clothing, they still think they’re fat.

Anorexics’ diet mainly consists of water, diet pills and diet soda. The “Anorexic food pyramid” shows their diet in more detail:

The reason why coffee and smokes are up there is because these are stimulants. Stimulants raise the body’s metabolic rate, thus burning more calories and losing more weight.

Needless to say, this is not healthy at all, and people do die from Anorexia. Plenty of therapists are working with anorexics to recover and maintain a healthy lifestyle, but this eating disorder continues to escalate in people at an alarming rate. Anorexics are even setting up pro – anorexic websites to suck young girls into their warped little reality.

The thing is, if people want that killer body, guys or girls, the key is to eat. Having a lean, toned, muscular body is about 70% diet, only 30% actual exercise. There’s no way that you can get all of your nutrients from coffee and diet soda. If you have a balanced diet of proteins, carbs, and fat (very little), and even a little bit of exercise, and you’ll achieve something that looks a lot better than a twig and you won’t look like a strong fart could knock you over. You’ll look very healthy, very attractive and you won’t feel starved!

The Public Gym also has another idea on how to battle anorexia…Like I said, the eating disorder is mostly psychological. Let’s start with how men would look at anorexic girls. Men like curves, not a lot of curves, but they like healthy – looking women. Contrary to popular belief, men do not like stick figures. They feel like they could crack them in half, they’d have to be very careful with an anorexic. So, there is no way that a man would think that an anorexic is attractive or even worth their time, plus, no man wants to be seen walking around with someone that looks like a cancer patient…that would be a big blow to their ego! They think anorexics are downright ugly, gross and disgusting. How would this go over psychologically with an anorexic girl? Probably not too well! So, men, the next time you see a girl that’s anorexic, don’t tell them they’re fat (obviously…), tell them they’re ugly! No girl wants to hear they’re ugly. Tell them you would rather sleep with a slobbering bulldog than her. Then tell her to go eat a cheeseburger to put some meat on them bones! Or better yet, take her out on a date: buy her $10 worth of cheeseburgers from the dollar menu from Mickey D’s and sign her up at the local gym. Get her a personal trainer and a nutritionist. Don’t forget to give her your phone number and tell her that when she transforms herself from a ratty chew toy to a swimsuit model to give you a call.

Put The Fork Down!!

Nationwide, two-thirds of U.S. adults are obese or overweight, according to the fourth annual report from the Trust for America’s Health. Mississippi, where almost one in three adults are obese, also ranks highest in adult hypertension and physical inactivity.

This came from cnn.com. Now I will agree that America is getting fatter by the day, but I don’t agree with calling it an epidemic. Americans are fat because we’re lazy, there’s more accessability to fatty food, and Americans have tons (no pun intended) of lame excuses: “This is just my body, I’m just built this way…”, “I have an underactive thyroid…”, “My whole family is fat, therefore, I’m fat…”, or my favorite: “I’m big – boned…” Oh come on… Rhinos are big – boned, you’re just big. Put the fork down!

Also, in the last 25 years or so, Americans have never really had a problem with being lazy. We think we’re being efficient, but there’s a fine line between efficiency and laziness. We love our 300+ channels On Demand, our maids to clean our own houses, we buy our TV dinners and our “fat burning” pills in very large quantities. This is a problem. Americans want a pill for everything, no work involved. Soccer moms think it’s easier to stop at Burger King so little Johnny can eat, yet she wonders why little Johnny is developing love handles and why she has to shop in the husky department.

We Americans think we work hard and should relax at the end of the day instead of doing something productive. What the hell? We’re rich enough, we’re a world power, time to sit back and relax. Well, does that mean that the rest of the world doesn’t work hard enough? Most of Western Europe has just about the same economy as America. They work just as hard, maybe harder, and they don’t have an “Obesity Epidemic.” Just because we work hard doesn’t mean that we should relax at the end of the day and do nothing.

Last, but not least, fat Americans are the result of rising healthcare costs. Every year healthcare goes up, and it’s not for the people that are in shape, but it’s the people that are in shape that have to pay for it. A Medicare study found that obese patients cost the agency 15 percent more than normal or overweight patients. I wonder who’s pocket that comes out of?

The bottom line is that obesity in NOT an epidemic, laziness is. Stop treating obesity like the Ebola virus and get to the root of the problem: Americans are LAZY! Americans have a laziness epidemic. We have no motivation anymore. America’s gone soft (once again, no pun intended). How many times have you heard an obese person say that he joined a gym, only to say in two days that it hurts too much and it’s not for him? How many people in Wal – Mart, who are perfectly capable of walking, have you seen riding those damn scooters that take up the whole aisle and go a half a mile per hour? How many people complain about rising healthcare? Americans need to stop whining and looking for the easy way out, get off their obese behinds and be productive again.

Keith’s High Cholesterol

This is Keith. Keith has high cholesterol. He likes to eat anything breaded, battered, buttered, basted, baked, creamy, smothered, savory, dipped, rich and fried. He also thinks that fudge and Oreo cookies are a suitable after – meal dessert. Everybody at Keith’s job is worried about him, the only thing is, he’s not really worried too much about himself. They try to steal all of his goodies and he just locks the door to his office so nobody can get to his stash.

Here’s how Keith ranks with his cholesterol numbers. The numbers on the left represent when he was 26, the numbers on the right are present day, at age 33:

HDL: 32 63

LDL: 180 199

Overall: 295 288

Pretty bad, huh….What can Keith do to lower his cholesterol so he doesn’t die of a stroke or a massive heart attack at age 42? Let’s start with diet.

What Keith pretty much likes to eat, and what he should seriously limit is whole milk, cream, ice cream, butter, egg yokes, cheese, bakery goods made with yokes and saturated fat, anything with saturated oils, high – fat processed meats (sausage, bologna, hot dogs…), fatty red meats, solid fats like shortening, soft margerine and lard and fried foods. All of these things are very high in cholesterol as well as fat.

What Keith should be eating is a diet rich in fruits and vegetables, whole grains, high – fiber foods, lean meats and poultry, fish at least twice a week, fat – free or 1% milk and dairy products, beans, peas, nuts and seeds (in limited amounts) and unsaturated vegetable oils.

Overall, the AHA recommends that your total daily intake should look like this:

total fat: 25 – 35%

saturated fat: less than 7%

trans fat: less than 1%

Keith should also start an exercise regimen. He says he runs now. Running is good, but running by itself won’t lower cholesterol. Besides, with the way it looks, Keith intakes more calories than he burns by running. He should step up the running along with a strength training program to build muscle. Remember that muscle burns fat. The more muscle you have, the more fat you burn. The way to increase muscle is by strength training. Strength training will help you burn the fat away and also help you keep it off.

Let’s hope that Keith gets his act together. Everybody at work is worried about you and wants you to live a long happy life. Good luck, Keith!

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