I believe that one of the best things we can do to succeed on our weight maintenance journeys is to learn more about how our bodies work and why we all have the tendency to return to higher weight set points. If we don’t understand how we got here, how can we keep from making those same mistakes again?
I enrolled in the Coursera class Understanding Obesity last year to learn more about this disease. My first blog post on this topic is here: https://lindawbrowning.com/2023/01/02/coursework-understanding-obesity/
This time we will touch on some of the points made in the second unit, Physiology and Stress. Beginning with the physiological component, the instructors explain some of the extremely complex processes that come into play involving hunger. Eating certainly involves conscious decisions, but so much more is going on behind the scenes.
Our body transmits signals in many ways. Since I’m not a medical professional, I won’t attempt to explain them all. However, Professor Suzanne Dickson (University of Gothenburg) mentions two key hormones that you may have heard of before, ghrelin and leptin. Ghrelin is produced by the empty stomach and it signals the brain that we need to eat. Leptin, produced by fat cells, also signals the brain, providing information on our body’s fat – especially changes in the amount of fat (1). So our brain is quite aware when we diet, and it doesn’t seem to be at all pleased by our behavior!
We can see the problem here. If you are actively trying to lose weight, or even maintain a new, lower weight, your brain is being hit with an onslaught of these hormones saying, “eat, eat, EAT!” No doubt there are additional processes going on in our bodies, all trying to defend that old, higher weight so we won’t starve to death in a famine. What was once useful to our ancient and medieval ancestors is now a burden to us in our current environment.
This is further complicated by reward behavior, because the reward and pleasure processing areas of the brain are activated by eating. Yet another reason to eat! Some wonder how this may be related to other addictive activities, such as drugs or alcohol, as the same brain areas are being activated when we eat. So is overeating a form of addiction? Can we be addicted to food (1)?
There is reportedly much debate on this, at least at the time the course was written. While the majority of the instructors for this course find little evidence for food as a substance addiction, they do claim that eating can take the form of a behavioral addiction. Simplifying this, it seems that – in their view – eating is more similar to such addictions as gambling or shopping, rather than alcoholism or drug addiction. (This is a generalization – please take this free course if you’re interested in more technical or specific information.) (1)
Some of the information in this course does seem a bit dated (especially diet drugs dealing with hormones and views on psychological aspects). I can easily find more current sources that maintain that food can indeed be an addictive substance (2). Eliza L. Gordon et al in What Is the Evidence for “Food Addiction?” A Systematic Review explain that
Overall, findings support food addiction as a unique construct consistent with criteria for other substance use disorder diagnoses. The evidence further suggests that certain foods, particularly processed foods with added sweeteners and fats, demonstrate the greatest addictive potential. Though both behavioral and substance-related factors are implicated in the addictive process, symptoms appear to better fit criteria for substance use disorder than behavioral addiction (2).
Several other interesting topics are addressed in this unit, such as exposure to various types of foods during childhood and even during pregnancy. Condensing all that material down – basically exposing your children to wholesome foods as early as possible can play a role in their future health. As early as possible even means before birth! In addition, during pregnancy both over and under eating can later cause obesity as the child matures and into adulthood (1). This information may be a bit late for us, but hopefully we can break the cycle for future generations.
When we look at the third unit of Understanding Obesity, we will examine more psychological factors as well as the economics of obesity.
Maintain Weight Loss 
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