Please read, from 50's board

new study in the American Journal of Public Health, Sep 2006, found that women lost significantly more years of healthy life being overweight or obese than men who were overweight or obese. Most of the years of health that women lost due to being overweight and obese were due to poor health-related quality of life and later-life mortality. The death rate among overweight or obese women over 45 years of age was higher than in obese/overweight men! Interestingly, the authors suggested that this gender difference could be due, in part, to the social stigma that excess weight carries for women but not for men. The stigma so prevalent for women being overweight causes a lot of stress and distress which can increase morbidity and mortality. We all know about the impact the weight has/had on our quality of life. The take home message is IMHO, if obesity and its comorbidities don't get you, society's stigma and its associated stress just might! Interesting to ponder! Hazel

The stigma is very true, society is cruel and unaccepting of obese people. Look how many posts have come from this group alone about coming out of our shells. Being fat for many people causes you to stay away from "society" because you do not want to deal with the stigma. I read a post a little while ago about one of us coming out ... God Bless, Jen

Going along with that...studies have also shown that when a woman is stressed her levels of cortisol raise extremely high and stay elevated for several hours. Cortisol is the hormone that the body releases when in a life or death situation; it gives us a boost of strenth or energy to save ourselves. Anyway....continued high levels of cortisol in the body can cause several illnesses including death. When we as women live overweight and are under constant stress from society our cortisol levels are at a constant high. Dawn