Why do we gain weight?

There was a time when the answer to question "How to lose weight?" was "Stop eating!" Now, we know that everything is not that simple. What happens to the food that we eat depends on many factors: what we eat, how much we eat, how we eat, and what our body does to the food consumed.




Certainly, people do not eat continuously. We have a breakfast, then lunch, and later a dinner, and every process of the meal consumption has the beginning and the end. When the food is processed inside of our bodies: one part of it is used for production of energy and necessary substances, and the other supplies for "better times" in the form of fat. It is unfortunate, but the second part is larger than we may want because of the malfunction of one of the 4 stages of feeding (ingestion, digestion, absorption, and ejection) or the metabolism.




We eat due to a number of reasons, the biological hunger being only one of these reasons. People often eat when they are not even hungry, which occurs as a so-called "social eating". At other times, a person may eat because he or she liked the appetizing smell or appearance of the food. Sometimes, almost like Pavlov's dogs, a person may indulge simply as a result of habit to snack while watching TV or a movie. Sometimes, people eat simply because they are accustomed to eating when midday comes. As a result, we eat more than we actually need to eat.




The process of food consumption and the properties of the food consumed are based a number of factors: on instincts (to chew and swallow), on dietary preferences (to prefer a salad over fried potatoes), on the duration of a meal (to eat slowly taking pleasure in the taste of food as opposed to eating to rapidly as if being afraid that somebody may take away the meal) and on level of attention to the meal (to eat silently and with concentration or to eat while being distracted by a conversation, TV, or reading). Each and all of these factors influence the metabolism, and the reasons to end the meal. Normally, we stop eating because we are full. However, sometimes outside influences are needed because the body does not appropriatly send signal "full" to the brain to stop. In such case, a friend or a spouse would tell us to stop engaging in gluttony.





Metabolism depends as much on what we eat, as it does on the level of hormones and ferment activity in the body. This biochemistry is partly inherited from our parents, partly determined by our environment, including sports activity, age, and presence of diseases. Simple calculations of calories, or how much to eat and to run, does not reflect the essence of the matter. Physical training can influence these balances only where methodical and systematic increase in metabolism is implemented.




Thus, diets and physical training alone does not work for all, and cannot help those people who cannot control what they eat and when they stop eating. Especially, simple diet and exercise cannot help those whose hormone levels are not normal due to age-related natural changes. In these cases, professional psychotherapy will be necessary to help the first group, and specialized medical aid with corresponding preparations will be necessary to aid the second group.