It’s rare that topics like obesity are the subject of a sensitive, thoughtful article in mainstream news publications, which is why I appreciated this recent Time article by Jamie Ducharme such.
In particular, I like how the article mentions how American doctors approach BMI – which is an outdated method of measuring health and can often be misleading.
Believe me: since I started lifting heavy things at the gym a few years ago, I have become “overweight” by BMI standards. My clothes from before I started building muscle still fit, I’m happier and I have less back pain, a constant problem from days before.
My waist-to-height ratio, a more reliable measure of measuring a healthy weight, is now perfect (especially since I also introduced intermittent fasting, which has significantly influenced the horrible bloating I experience when I have PMS , a common problem among women whose BMI, which was designed for men, don’t even begin to bring it up). My stamina is much higher. I sleep much better. But if you look at me purely through the lens of BMI, then you might conclude that something is wrong with me.
Because it was designed for men, BMI doesn’t even take into account the problem of breasts and buttocks: you might have a thin waist as a woman, without excess visceral fat, but generous curves can distort your weight on the scale. A friend of mine was on a disastrous diet that had drastic effects on her health for over a year before a new doctor kindly explained to her that BMI simply doesn’t take into account her body shape (I was told the same thing). She was risking her health, and ultimately her life, to conform to an arbitrary standard that had nothing to do with her.
My friend and I are just one example of how a cookie-cutter approach to health and weight just doesn’t work. A friend who is much more athletic than me is technically in the “obese” category when measured based on BMI alone. He appears to have a place on the cover of Men’s Health, but his deceptively high BMI meant he was initially denied important treatment – which wasn’t even related to his weight – because someone was looking at a chart and not seeing the situation as a whole.
And appearance is just the tip of the iceberg here. People who don’t look like standard fitness models are still perfectly capable of having good cholesterol levels, good physical shape, and good cardiovascular health. It seems weird to have to say this in 2023, but OUR BODIES ARE DIFFERENT AND WHAT’S HEALTHY FOR SOMEONE MAY NOT NECESSARILY BE HEALTHY FOR SOMEONE ELSE.
I’m not saying all this to disparage people’s fitness goals – I have many of these goals myself and, little by little, I’m working towards achieving them – but what I’m saying is that fitness Health is an individualized subject. It is very important to find the right trainer and a good doctor who actually performs tests for you. On the other hand, looking like someone else because you think you should look like someone else can have serious consequences.
Of course, the issue of health care in the United States will always remain thorny until our health care system is improved. We’ve made some progress in this area, but we still have a long way to go, as anyone who has faced arbitrary insurance claims litigation can attest.
For now, the least we can do is move from BMI to better measures of how we look at ourselves and see what could be improved and what should simply be left behind.
And with that said, I’m off to the gym to pick up some heavier stuff.
Pictures: Antoni Shkraba And Anna Shvets
