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one year to be thin

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Many women would trade a year of life to be thin - Health - Women's health - msnbc.com Many women would trade a year of life to be thin
One percent said they'd be willing to give up 21 years or more, small study shows By Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
LiveScience
updated 4/5/2011 8:13:38 PM ET 2011-04-06T00:13:38



Almost one-third of young women would trade at least a year of their lives to have a perfect body, according to a new survey of British undergraduates.

The survey found that 16 percent of young women queried said they'd trade a year of life for their ideal body weight and shape. Ten percent were willing to trade two to five years, and 2 percent were willing to trade up to 10 years of life away. One percent said they would give up 21 years or more.

The new research is based on a relatively small sample, so the results may not be representative of women in general.



But there is past science suggesting such body-loathing is common. The stigma against fat people is going global, according to a recent study. A study published in October in the journal Sex Roles found that even preschool girls are fixated on thinness.

About 320 women with an average age of 25 were surveyed on university campuses around the U.K. by researchers from the University of the West of England (UWE) and U.K. eating disorder charity The Succeed Foundation.

"The findings highlight that body image is an issue for all women, and not just adolescent girls, as is often thought," survey researcher Phillippa Diedrichs of UWE said in a statement. [Read: All Women Worry About Getting Fat ]

The majority of the women surveyed were dissatisfied with how they looked, the researchers found. Although 78 percent of the women sampled were normal weight ? or even underweight ? 79 percent of the survey group said they wanted to lose weight. Only 3 percent said they'd like to gain weight.

'Fat talk' makes even skinny women feel huge

Negative thoughts about body image were almost universal: 93 percent of the women said they had negative thoughts about their appearance within the last week. Almost one-third had those thoughts several times a day. Almost half of all women surveyed said these pressures weren't entirely internal: 46 percent had experienced ridicule or bullying because of their appearance.

Replies

11
BeachbumAggieBeach Fanatic
#2
I might give up a year or two of boring old age to get to live a fun and happy life at the beach starting now but I'd have to study on that one to decide for sure!
scooterbug44 avatar
scooterbug44SoWal Expert
#3
The sad thing is many women DO literally give up years of their life trying to be thin because of the nasty and unhealthy diets and products.

Cleanses, liquid diets, malnutrition, diet pills, aspartame and other dangerous food additives, eating disorders that cause severe organ damage, you name it.
LuciferSam avatar
LuciferSamBanned
#4
I'd rather be given an additional year to engage in sinful gluttony and excess.
NoHall avatar
NoHallhmmmm......can't remember
#5
The sad thing is many women DO literally give up years of their life trying to be thin because of the nasty and unhealthy diets and products.

Cleanses, liquid diets, malnutrition, diet pills, aspartame and other dangerous food additives, eating disorders that cause severe organ damage, you name it.

Then again, I feel like I've given up many years to being overweight...

I'll post something positive here. I met a dear, dear woman when I did a show, Nunsense, a couple of years ago. She was 29 years old, and I've learned since then that she weighed 347 pounds at the time, and she was a smoker. She wasn't happy--she felt bad and she knew that she wasn't doing herself any favors smoking, but there are so many things that go along with being overweight: There are no cute clothes for fat people, nor does it matter if you have great hair and makeup. There is an undercurrent of judgment...I could go on.

Anyway, we were dressed as nuns for this show, but since I was playing piano I didn't have a crucifix under my collar like the others. During the last week of the show, I wore my medal from the Disney Marathon instead.

Valerie saw it and was fascinated. She told me she wanted to do that, too--she ran in high school, and she wanted to run again. I smiled and said something nice, but she could barely walk across the room without getting winded.

Little did I know what this woman could do. Right then and there, in May of 2009, she determined that she would lose 100 pounds within the next year. On June 1 she began her journey with a radical plan: Less food and more exercise. I'm being sarcastic about the radical part, but if you've ever tried to exercise with 347 pounds hanging on your skeleton, it is somewhat radical. But she started...

By September of that same year, she had already lost 80 pounds. In May of 2010 she went to Atlanta to the Biggest Loser casting call only to realize she had already lost too much weight: She was down 120 pounds to 227.

She has lost more than 150 pounds, and has a goal of losing 50 more. She ran the Disney marathon in January and has run a couple of other marathons and half marathons to boot. No pills, no surgery, no diet--she burns more calories than she eats.

I believe she gave up a year of her life to be healthy, and there is no calculating how many more years she added, qualitatively and quantitatively.

Just something to think about...Here's a visual for you visual people:
lms47 avatar
lms47Beach Lover
#6
NoHall, thanks so much for the inspiring story! As a BBW all my life, I have a special connection with Valerie's story. Good for her and thanks to you for sharing your experience with her and for planting a seed to enable her to change her life.
NoHall avatar
NoHallhmmmm......can't remember
#7
NoHall, thanks so much for the inspiring story! As a BBW all my life, I have a special connection with Valerie's story. Good for her and thanks to you for sharing your experience with her and for planting a seed to enable her to change her life.

She inspires ME now--I'm pretty sure I outweigh her now. I tell her that she's half the woman she was, and twice the woman I am!
MrMentalFitness avatar
MrMentalFitnessBeach Fanatic
#8
I'd rather be given an additional year to engage in sinful gluttony and excess.

Now DATS what I'm tawkin' bout!
Teresa avatar
TeresaSoWal Guide
#9
great story, Nohall. I don't believe she gave up a year... she dedicated herself to a year of learning to care for herself. That is the hard part. Most of us want it quick and easy, but it just doesn't work that way.

I believe we need to be okay with aging bodies, but constantly learning and taking steps to look and feel our best. Nothing worthwhile is ever easy! and we are worthwhile, aren't we? I wish for women to dedicate a year of their lives to learn what it means to be healthy and happy!

I'll keep the year, maybe travel and definitely eat some damn good food.

Edited

scooterbug44 avatar
scooterbug44SoWal Expert
#10
I think healthy trumps skinny and wrinkles look MUCH better than too much plastic surgery!
MrMentalFitness avatar
MrMentalFitnessBeach Fanatic
#11
I'm of a view that I'd rather keep the year and 'sacrifice it' by displacing crappy thoughts with uplifting thoughts, dour moods with pleasant emotions, self-sabotaging urges with positively compelling desires, self-abusive habits with conscious, destiny-changing action. So, I'll keep the year, cuz there are many life-altering, fantastic things to fill it with that, at the end of it, will make all the difference.

The real problem with people who would give up so much for what they are actually already capable of achieving, is that their mind does not stay put on a target, and wanders from thing to thing so that their best intent is seldom in the cross-hairs of their inconsistent attention.

If they could resolve the lack of control over their power of attention, they wouldn't never feel themselves so desperately weak.

Edited

LuciferSam avatar
LuciferSamBanned
#12
I'm of a view that I'd rather keep the year and 'sacrifice it' by displacing crappy thoughts with uplifting thoughts, dour moods with pleasant emotions, self-sabotaging urges with positively compelling desires, self-abusive habits with conscious, destiny-changing action. So, I'll keep the year, cuz there are many life-altering, fantastic things to fill it with that, at the end of it, will make all the difference.

The real problem with people who would give up so much for what they are actually already capable of achieving, is that their mind does not stay put on a target, and wanders from thing to thing so that their best intent is seldom in the cross-hairs of their inconsistent attention.

If they could resolve the lack of control over their power of attention, they wouldn't never feel themselves so desperately weak.

Yeah, why not spend that year trying to get there on your own, and what if you miss? You've still got that year of spiritual fulfillment and debauchery. In contrast, how would you like to have that perfect body with six-pack abs and the ref blows the whistle and signals game over?

Edited

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