I wish you many fat babies*
There has been a lot of research done of late on obesity and children. Lots of studies trying to pinpoint where obesity begins (here’s a hint, it’s 70% genetic); what to do about it (since dieting doesn’t work); what parents mothers (of course it’s mom’s fault!) are doing wrong or right (way to go, Super Moms!)**; what role environment plays; how much, what and when kids are playing/eating/studying; and how it all ties together in the end when it comes to health. Some say that our kids are going to die much sooner than any other generation because of the obesity epidemic, that this generation is the fattest, and therefore most unhealthy, in history. Drastic measures must be taken, like putting weight and BMI on report cards, taking kids away from the “abusive” situations of livingin households where they got fat in the first place, whole months devoted to addressing this “crisis,” and, of course, the First Lady making it her own personal crusade with “Let’s Move.”
After all of this, even trying to get fetuses to slim down via Metformin through their mums during pregnancy, it turns out the old wisdom is still true: fat babies make healthy people in the long run. The BBC is reporting that research is showing babies who are heavier at birth have a much less likely chance of getting all those awful chronic diseases later in life that the medical community just LOVES to associate with being fat: heart disease, cancer, diabetes.
Long-term studies there and elsewhere have shown that people who develop chronic disease often grew differently to other people in the womb and during childhood. Their birthweights tend to be towards the lower end of the normal range.
For the record, the lower end of the normal range for a baby is about 4-6 lbs. A baby can’t leave the NICU in my hometown until it weighs at least 5lbs. So which is it, medical community? Is our fat making us sick or are our attempts to change WHO WE WERE MEANT TO BE, combined with a culture that shames and hates on fat people for existing, making us sick? I think I know the answer, and I think they do too.
It’s no secret that the diet and weight loss industries are making billions of dollars a year, and every study like this one and this one and this one and this one that comes out is another nail in their coffin. Fat Acceptance and HAES is reaching a critical tipping point, one where every post, every discussion in the elevator or on the playground, is another grain of sand in the inevitable coming avalanche of Body Acceptance. We’re going to see even MORE push-back against us and our ideas because that’s what always happens. Something awesome shows up, like equal rights for anyone who’s not a part of the privileged ruling class, and a few people (fringers, the “crazies”) go for it. Then more people, and then enough people so that the hegemony is threatened, so it pushes back. Then it tries to co-opt whatever new awesomeness has hit the scene and make it part of itself. (Aren’t some of our favorite fat ladies pushing Jenny Craig now? Isn’t “intuitive eating” becoming a new diet?) Sometimes this works and all the momentum is lost. Sometimes it doesn’t and ladies like Rosa Parks don’t go sit at the back of the bus, or Susan B. Anthony decides she’s going to hand out birth control to women who want it and to hell with going to jail, and MORE momentum is created, and then there’s a surge and struggle until, finally, victory.
Fat Acceptance is here to stay, and it’s only going to keep growing and becoming stronger as more and more people realize they DON’T HAVE TO HATE THEMSELVES TO BE HAPPY. Wrap your head around that one if you can. If you can’t, it means you’re still sane. In the meantime, I wish you many fat babies* and a very happy life.
*If babies aren’t your thing, then I wish you great prosperity in another way!
**Didn’t you know? Men aren’t parents unless it’s Father’s Day. They’re too busy at work to be parents. Gender roles are fun!
JeninCanada
Hello from Team Bastard Europe. I’m a big douche who has nothing better to do than troll fat acceptance sites in a pathetic attempt to make myself feel better about who I am. I’m too scared to read up on HAES or make any changes in my own life to be a more loving, compassionate person so I spend too much time on the internet spewing hate.
Great-now it’s having fantasies that it will ever leave Mom’s basement in Podunk to go anywhere. You have to have a job first, loser aka Fat Hans Bastard.
Hello Team “We Figured Out How to Use a Web Proxy” Fat Bastard’s basement.
Peace,
Shannon
“One problem I face is this book is unique. Unlike most diet books it dose not follow a formula. The typical formula in a diet book is to act as an apologist for the dieter, villianize a food group, justify their absurd theory, ignore reality and then fill the next 200 pages with recipes. I don’t want to ******right****** a book like that.”
The emphasis was mine, but I laughed out loud when I saw that typo on one of this guy’s posts.
Hey, Balldez. You still as much of a misogynist as you were in 2008 on Youtube? You still laboring under the delusion that you’re a liberal?
Your cause is so weak that you’ve been reduced to a petty troll who harasses a single blog. If you had any faith that your cause was just, you’d be more approaching it in a more dignified fashion, but as it stands, you’re just a lonely, pathetic sociopath who can’t unplug and go outside, bashing fatties because it’s all you can do to keep your self-esteem out of the suicidal range.
If you ever come to the realization of how pathetic you actually are, do be sure to tell us.
DON’T FEED THE TROLLS. They’re not worth your time and effort OR our comment space. Thank you.
So, I did a bit of research and I found this profile for a Balldez on eHealth forum, where some of the comments are weight-obsessed, but I also discovered this gem, which may explain his hatred of women:
Hmmm… no friends and not only his wife will touch him? Sounds like somebody is taking out his sexual frustration on the world.
Peace,
Shannon
Oh, plus he’s a disgruntled, oft-rejected author, who has begged MeMe Roth and Michael Karolychyk to help him get his book published. He blames a medical establishment conspiracy against him for his inability to get an agent.
LOSER!
Peace,
Shannon
Don’t feed the trolls, Shannon.
It just makes them multiply, like gremlin’s after midnight.
I know, I know. I just wanted to poke him in the eye with these two revelations as to the source of his angst. I’ll knock it off now.
Peace,
Shannon
The thread for this is fucking hilarious. Balldez starts out begging for help, then comes off as the antagonizing, ignorant asshole that he is and gets reamed for it. This is from 2005, by the way.
Peace,
Shannon
I’d say “he needs to get a life,” but I think we’re past the point where that insult has any real relevance or meaning. He’s not even pitiable anymore- his obsession has destroyed over 5 years of his life, and has rendered him a gangly, pathetic, mentally-detatched loser whose antics are actually a nice personification of the insanity that we in this movement are fighting against.
Every time he says the word “fattitude,” I think to myself, “that’s one more point against him ever getting laid.”
It’s amazing he doesn’t trust Fox News- he’s exactly the kind of field they’d love to till and plant in.
Wow, so much disturbing info in such a compact post. That Metformin trial is really disturbing. The odd thing is that the only opposition they cited in that article on Metformin was from a weight loss company. His beef? “Women wanting to conceive could instead lose weight by following a healthy weight loss plan, including diet and exercise.” Yeah, clinical trial, don’t put our potential client pool at risk!
That birthweight article is interesting, though. They included this gem: “One of the most striking studies of the causes of diabetes was carried out in rural India among villagers living what might be considered a model lifestyle. They typically ate a vegetarian diet, were physically active and thin. Yet diabetes was prevalent.”
Gee… it couldn’t be because diabetes is largely genetic, could it?
Great post, and great message at the end. I think we are definitely building momentum. There are small, but significant signs, popping up all the time. And the pushback will be brutal, no doubt. Just wait until Fat Acceptance and HAES begin to acquire a bit of public credibility… then you’ll see the sparks fly.
Peace,
Shannon
The Metformin trial makes me froth at the mouth because noone is 100% sure what happens and when during gestation. There’s so much happening; you’re literally building a human being. It’s a delicate process and messying with mommy’s blood sugar and diet can have real negative results for that fetus literally for the rest of it’s life. It strikes me as grossly irresponsible, especially since um, fat babies? Not the worst thing ever! And there wouldn’t BE so many c-sections if doctors would just back off, have some patience, and let women give birth naturally instead of worrying about being sued if something goes wrong.
My mother has diabetes, and did while she was pregnant with me. They put her on a really rigorous diet and basically starved her, and I was still 10lbs. It was a shitty pregnancy, with not a lot of eating and several insulin shots a day. I don’t know why you’d take otherwise healthy women and put them on a diabetes medication. How is it worth fucking around with someone’s endocrine system, to potentially stop a few babies from being as fat?
There’s a lot more to gestational diabetes than heavy babies and possible C-Sections. If untreated, there is a chance of stillbirth, even though the fetus will be good sized. This is probably why most pregnant women are given a glucose tolerance test now as the standard of care. Also if untreated a baby can be in the 12 pound range which some women can deliver safely, but others might not. A good friend, untreated, lost first baby to stillbirth, second baby (over 12) was stuck in delivery and had nerve damage to shoulder (luckily no brain damage). Four subsequent pregnancies, with treatment, were average weight and healthy.
I agree; gestational diabetes is nothing to fuck around with and must be taken seriously by all parties. However, the Metformin trials were done on women with no gestational diabetes, or any other kind of diabetes. It was done on pregnant women with the express purpose of having smaller babies born and avoiding c-sections. (I am all for avoiding c-sections, but really? This is absurd).
You know, I don’t know if they do this anymore, but I totally remember when they were shilling Wellbutrin for both smoking cessation and obesity treatment. There are some serious chems in a lot of anti-depression medications, and I know at least with Wellbutrin, having the medication encourage thoughts of suicide was not uncommon.
So I guess given the types of things that have been promoted before, I’m not surprised that they think giving drugs to health pregnant women is cool beans.
I really don’t get it with the c-sections for fat women with larger babies. I mean, back in 1972, when my daughter was born, I weighed 235 lbs and she weighed 8 lbs - no mention was ever made of a c-section being necessary and I was only 18 at the time. When my son was born, I weighed 326 lbs and he weighed 9 lbs 7 oz (I was almost 22). Again, no one ever even suggested that a c-section might be necessary because I was so fat and it would be dangerous for me or for the baby for me to give birth any other way. What the hell has changed in the last 25 to 35 years that doctors seem to think fat women can’t have big babies the way we’ve been having them for years in the past? Are they so uncertain of their delivery skills that they think they can’t handle a normal delivery anymore and that a c-section is necessary in order to keep from being sued? If that’s the case, then they need to go back to medical school and brush up on those skills until they know what they’re doing before they even think about delivering another baby.
To suggest that expectant mothers should take any drug that will make her fetus smaller at birth is criminal neglect. They tell women to stop smoking while pregnant because it causes low birth weights in babies, yet they think taking metformin to make babies smaller is a good idea? Which is it, docs? You can’t have it both ways, you know.
I was under the impression that in general, babies get heavier and larger the more times a woman has given birth. So given that, are we going to start giving diabetes meds to women who have already had 2-3 kids, because their babies may be 10-11lbs instead of the maybe 7 or 8 their first children were at birth?
Not always true. My mother’s 5th child was her largest, at 12 pounds, but I, the youngest, was just under 9. All of my mother’s babies were large babies, all vaginal deliveries with no complications, &, yes, my mother was a fat woman. She was also not diabetic, even though, for some reason known only to themselves, some of her doctors put her on diabetes drugs for several years before admitting, “oh, what do you know? You’re not diabetic!” In spite of everything the medical establishment could do to her, inherited kidney disease which cost her a kidney at 45, years of alcoholism, & a life of poverty, my mother lived to be 85. All of us have been fat except my oldest brother, who is built just like our thin alcoholic father, & my thin brother also weighed 9 pounds, 12 ounces at birth. My second son was indeed larger, 9 pounds as opposed to just under 8 for his brother, & I had vaginal deliveries for both.
Can you figure this out? (Kala, maybe this proves the impression you got?)
Baby #1; I weighed about 128-130, got pregnant, gained 60 lbs, baby was 8.8 lbs / 23″
Lost 30-35 lbs by the time the baby was 2 wks old, without even trying to. (I was 19 yrs old)
Baby #2; gained 40 lbs, baby was 8.12 lbs / 23″ went home from hospital about 20 lbs lighter than when I went in. Didn’t lose any more weight after that… (23 yrs old)
Baby #3; gained 17 lbs, baby was 8.15 lbs / 23″ went home from hospital about 12 lbs lighter than when I went in. (27 yrs old)
Never lost any significant weight after this time, no matter which diet I tried.
And today, 28 years later, I’m heavier than I’ve ever been by at least 50 lbs.
BTW, baby #3 turned out to be the thinnest of all three kids (she is a size 6)
Doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to this overwhelming need to base everything on weight (gained or lost) when it comes to having healthy, happy babies- which all my kids were.
That BBC article is interesting. There’s been a series of programs on Radio 4 recently on the subject of how gestation and infancy affects adult health - I caught one of them the other day. It’s available here to listen if anyone’s interested: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b013f9d3
Basically, I found it a little disconcerting because it appeared they were implying that starvation in utero (and consequent low birth weight) wasn’t as big a problem in itself as when those babies gain ‘excessive’ weight to catch up with their peers, which seemed to be getting the blame for any health issues later in life. So while it wasn’t ‘fat babies are bad’, it was ‘thin babies are bad because they get fatter later on’, which appears to be another version of the same old tune.
They phrased their conclusion as ‘OK, so maybe we might not actually need to feed underweight babies more, as we currently do, to get them to catch up’…but I can see something there that must have occurred to them: if your body has been primed for famine in the womb, then you’re going to have the kind of ‘thrifty’ body that would require famine conditions for the rest of its life to end up a ‘normal’ size. Expect to hear this twisted by medical authorities into ‘underweight babies are fine, as long as we keep them that way into adult life’ at some time in the near future. Gah.
Research has shown that people who experience starvation in the womb or in early childhood grow up to be larger than their peers. It’s a survival mechanism; the body knows food is not a guarantee so it packs on as many extra burnable calories as it can for when the lean times come. I can’t put my hands on the link right at this second but I know I read about it with people in the Horn of Africa after the famine in the 1980s and possibly also the Dutch at the end of WW2.
PS: BTW Jen, that title immediately reminded me of those statues of Hotei (the ‘fat Buddha’) with little fat kids swarming all over him…
^__^ And here I was thinking Hotei and Buddha were the same guy! My bad. http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/hotei.shtml
Another thing research suggests is that the small babies of heavy women are more at risk for stillbirth than the large babies of heavy women. It still needs to be studied further to confirm it, but a couple of studies so far have shown that it’s the SGA babies (small-for-gestaional-age babies) that are most at risk for stillbirth, rather than the LGA (arge-for-gestational-age) babies.
This is why the metformin trial disturbs me, and also the move to strictly limit weight gain in women of size in pregnancy to almost nothing (or even to weight loss). What if the tendency towards larger babies in women of size is PROTECTIVE, and then they artificially make those babies smaller through starvation or medication? Are those babies then more at risk for stillbirth, or “merely” for more disease down the road once they get catch-up growth after birth? Because research is clear that SGA babies who then experience significant catch-up growth later on are the ones most at risk for diabetes, hypertension, etc.
Will the same apply to the babies of women of size who were *supposed* to be LGA but who were made AGA or SGA by strict wt gain limits or medications?
I’m 398 and I would like to know the upper limit of how fat I can be before it’s a danger to the fetus. I ask my OBGYN but he just gives me vague answers.
Louana - I weighed 326 when my son was born almost 36 years ago and he was fine (he weighed 9 lbs 7 oz and was 21″ long). I would say if your Obgyn isn’t worried and telling you to lose weight, then don’t worry about it too much yourself. If your blood pressure and blood sugar are good and you’re not having any other problems, and there aren’t any problems with the fetus, you should be okay and so should the baby.
Vesta,
Thank you so much for your support. I feel better now.
One thing that he did mention is I’m only 5’1″ tall and small boned and I carry the weight on my belly. They are having a tough time doing the ultra sound because I have so much belly fat.
My blood pressure is high but not that bad cause they have it under control. My first OB told me not to get pregnant until I lost some weight. I got the typical lecture. Because my BMI is over 75 I am considered a high risk pregnancy. They are unable to get a fetal monitor to work on me and I wonder if that is why they all saying it’s a high risk pregnancy.
I do want to try a vaginal birth and my current OB is OK with that. I have had 2 miscarriages and I’m nervous. This may end up being a C-section. I also have some mobility issues but I have plenty of support from my mom.
If I lose this one Brandon I’ll just try again and screw you Brandon. Just because I’m fat is no reason why a shouldn’t a baby.
Louana, I didn’t read your postings until after I responded to Brandon who I see gratefully has been deleted. I just wanted you to know I wish you the best of luck and health during your pregnancy and will keep my fingers crossed for you. Hugs
If that’s the case I should just stay pregnant. Pregnancy causes in me hyperemesis, which means I throw up 24/7 and I lose a lot of weight. I have had 2 babies, one while obese, one thin, both were under 8lbs. While my weight goes up and down not that its any of your fucking business, while I am not pregnant, pregnancy is the only thing to guarantee me I will lose weight, bulemia didn’t, diet pills didn’t and wls didn’t guarantee that I would be thin forever. I was in my fitted size 18′s after baby #1 , and fitted size 9′s after baby #2 within 48 hours after giving birth. Don’t stereotype people based upon their weight. You have no idea just by looking at someone what they put in their mouth or everything they have done or not not to lose weight. I should insert the TRIGGER disclaimer here, but most of the peeps know me, that I hope what I say doesn’t trigger anyone. For those who know me as social network contacts, know I’ve done so much damage in this fat hating society I spend most of my time in and out of doctors offices. I am not in poor health because of my weight, I am in poor health because of a fat hating society that made me hate myself and do so many damaging things to lose weight. However you wouldn’t know this by looking at me.Or many others I am sure you assume are fat because they can’t stop eating. Stop it with your trolling and stupid assumptions, you are just mildly pissing me off here and I am kinda bored so I am feeding you, a troll,it’s just too bad they don’t make the internet version of arsenic…
Louana - Brandon is a troll and spreads nastiness just to be nasty. He’s a hater who hates fat people and wants to make them as miserable as he is. Ignore him, he’s not a doctor, he’s talking out his ass, which is where his head is located. Listen to your doctor, follow his advice, and listen to your body - you should do okay.
Don’t get an abortion because you don’t want to or because you are afraid. Lots of women have all kinds of things go wrong in pregnancy and it has nothing to do with your weight. Most complications are also easily treatable. Please don’t let him get to you. You can do it.:)
Screw you. You’re not the first Louana who commented. Get a life, asshole.
Jen is correct, and sharp as a tack. Louana has commented before. That Louana’s comment had the same IP address (184.154.49.106) as a comment published under the name FooFoo Dyke. FooFoo Dyke also commented previously, accusing Ashley of fatphobia, but this came from a different IP address (174.140.169.143). I thought that comment seemed suspicious at the time, anyway.
Anyway, this comment from Louana is from a third IP address (76.2.39.187) and Fat Bastard even used a different email address to register this one because the Dumb Bastard can’t keep his personae straight.
Another example: this comment from Valerie uses the exact same IP address (76.2.39.187) as Louana 2. And Valerie has commented previously from IP address (65.40.110.151), which I responded to, yet the enigmatic Valerie never responded.
These four IP addresses each came from a unique location. The first from Chicago, IL, the second from Portland, Or, and the third from Dublin, NC under Embarq Corporation, and Morehead City, NC, also under Embarq Corporation (which previous Dumb Bastard personae have commented before… possible employee?).
By the way, if anyone has ever wanted to know what Fat Bastard looks like, I am 99% certain that this is him:
If you want to know how I know this, you can check out this thread where, yet again, he was laughed out of existence prior to being banned.
Feel free to analyze this photo, including the significance of the thumb ring, thinning hair he hides with an ugly hat and/or the wife-beater, which may be metaphoric considering this revelation.
So, between last Thursday and today (Sunday), Dumb Bastard has assumed five distinct personalities (including Brandon, although the comments are gone, so I can’t check the IP address) under multiple email addresses in an attempt to gain our confidence for some sort of future “gotcha.” On top of that, he is active in multiple forums and multiple personae attempting to convince the world that calling us gluttons and humiliating us even more than society already does is somehow good for us.
Dumb Bastard, you are mentally ill, of this I am convinced. The fact that you have invested so much time and energy into attacking Fierce, Freethinking Fatties is really, really sad, and I would encourage you to seek help immediately.
I keep adding IP addresses to the ban list, but obviously he’s got a new trick that has convinced him he’s even more clever than before, which may be true, but considering where he started isn’t all that impressive.
So, what may be needed is an official registration process for FFFs. I think we would be able to better control who participates and it would add another layer for Dumb Bastard to have to figure out.
We’ll work on these issues in the coming days.
In the meantime, enjoy the sad attempts of Dumb Bastard to trick us. And let’s all say a little prayer that the sad,little man finds a new hobby soon. Might I suggest deep-ocean diving without a suit or diving bell, That would prove you to be the ultimate man, dumbass.
Peace,
Shannon
I edited the first post to be more hilarious.