Saturday, July 4, 2009

weight loss and sabotage

Thank you for the comments yesterday Ellen and Suzanne.

Concerning the "special" promotions that our fast food friends inundate us with to try to get more of our business...yes, it seems ludicrous that when the nation's leading health problem is obesity, corporate America tries to fatten us up even more. But, I guess we can understand this somewhat because profits are involved and these are companies trying to turn more profit, keep peole employed, etc. But how anout what we do to each other??? No offense to the nursing and teaching professions, which I believe to be two of the most noble professions of them all, but I hear stories all the time from my patients in those fields about how there is constantly high-caloric snack foods being brought into the break rooms. All one has to do is to look around to see the extent of weight problems to realize that bringing cupcakes and chocolate into work for others to eat, when , in fact many of the "others" are overweight, is HARMFUL. Is it really a "nice" or "good" act to harm others? Would you bring alcohol into a workplace if you knew there were a significant number of alcoholics working there? Would you bring discounted hotel coupons for Las Vegas hotels if you knew many were gamblerholics? Why is bringing high-caloric snack foods to a workplace with many overweight people any different?

Yes, Pizza Hut, McDonalds, Ben and Jerry's all want you to spend lots of money buying their foods and snacks, and I am sure that it is nothing personal and it is not their agenda to get you to die early from heart disease, diabetes, etc. Keeping a social awareness of the obesity epidemic is something we all, individually, should keep vigilant of, and not harming people's efforts to change to a healthier lifestyle

1 comment:

Patty said...

I had to laugh (or cry)..because this is sooo true of nurses (I'm one of them)..i would fix myself a box of brownies..take my 1 or 2 or 3 and then bring them to work...there is alwyas food for us there..people bring it in, Docs order it for us when we are very busy and there is an almost audible groan for the weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas! The food never ends. Now I will think twice about bringing the "wrong" kinds of food..If I bring in veggies, everyone will still eat it (nurses eat anything on the run)..so a much better idea