What should expectant mothers avoid? The same thing everyone should avoid: A diet high in carbohydrate (such as sugars) and high saturated fat. What makes the goose fat also makes the gander fat.

The study, which will appear in Diabetes, found that a mother’s diet while pregnant can alter her child’s DNA–called epigenetic change–to make the child more susceptible to obesity. It doesn’t matter whether the mother herself is skinny or fat, simply what she eats during the early stages of pregnancy. It means that we could perhaps spend money and effort more wisely by making sure pregnant women don’t create obese-prone babies to start with. Surely, there are other causes for obesity, and mothers who eat badly during pregnancy might simply feed their kids crap to begin with. But anything that can alter a baby’s DNA should probably be avoided if you’re pregnant–and might be something you want to avoid in your daily life whether you’re expecting or not.

Fat Thanks to Sunita K. for the tip!

Your Mom Is Why You’re Fat | Fast Company

Let’s consider the butterfly. One of the most taxing movements in sports, the butterfly requires greater energy than bicycling at 14 miles per hour, running a 10-minute mile, playing competitive basketball or carrying furniture upstairs. It burns more calories, demands larger doses of oxygen and elicits more fatigue than those other activities, meaning that over time it should increase a swimmer’s endurance and contribute to weight control.

Ask a dozen physiologists which exercise is best, and you’ll get a dozen wildly divergent replies. “Trying to choose” a single best exercise is “like trying to condense the entire field” of exercise science, said Martin Gibala, the chairman of the department of kinesiology at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario.

Fat Thanks to Sunita K. for the tip!

What’s the Best Exercise? – NYTimes.com

A type of low-carb, high-fat diet that’s typically used to manage seizures for children with epilepsy could reverse kidney disease in Type 1 and Type 2 diabetics, a new animal study suggests.

If successful in humans, the so-called ketogenic diet could have the potential to replace dialysis, which is a procedure that artificially filters blood in place of a damaged or failed kidney, said study researcher Charles Mobbs, professor of neuroscience and geriatrics and palliative care medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City.

Low-carb, high-fat diet could replace dialysis – msnbc.com

In an interview with ABCs Robin Roberts, the 18-year-old singer-actress said childhood bullying contributed to her eating disorder.

“I literally didnt know why they were being so mean to me,” she said of her childhood tormentors. “And when I would ask them why, they would just say, Well, youre fat. I was bullied because I was fat. And then a few months later I developed an eating disorder, and thats kind of what Ive been dealing with every since.”

Demi Lovato: “I Was Bullied Because I Was Fat” – Celebrity News – UsMagazine.com

Taste disorders have been shown to contribute to changes in eating behaviour and could be a contributing factor in childhood obesity.

And the University of New South Wales study has found the amount of Australian children with the problem constitutes a public health crisis.

A taste disorder means a sufferer cannot properly identify a taste as sweet, salty, bitter or sour.

Taste disorders linked to childhood obesity – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

On May 26, 2009, Robert Lustig gave a lecture called “Sugar: The Bitter Truth,” which was posted on YouTube the following July. Since then, it has been viewed well over 800,000 times, gaining new viewers at a rate of about 50,000 per month, fairly remarkable numbers for a 90-minute discussion of the nuances of fructose biochemistry and human physiology.

The viral success of his lecture, though, has little to do with Lustig’s impressive credentials and far more with the persuasive case he makes that sugar is a “toxin” or a “poison,” terms he uses together 13 times through the course of the lecture, in addition to the five references to sugar as merely “evil.” And by “sugar,” Lustig means not only the white granulated stuff that we put in coffee and sprinkle on cereal — technically known as sucrose — but also high-fructose corn syrup, which has already become without Lustig’s help what he calls “the most demonized additive known to man.”

Fat Thanks to Sunita K. for the tip!

Is Sugar Toxic? – NYTimes.com

Whatever we have been doing to reverse the obesity epidemic in America clearly has failed miserably. The latest USDA Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee Report revealed that 35 percent of all the calories we currently consume are from solid fats and added sugars. This is now such a large part of our diet that the USDA has given it an acronym — SoFAS — and, by the way, the 35 percent statistic holds for both sexes, and all ages and ethnicities.

Here are the top five sources for calories among adults 19-plus, in order: desserts, yeast breads, chicken and mixed chicken dishes, soda, and alcohol.

Fat Thanks to Maureen O. for the tip!

Susan Yager: Whats Needed to Turn the Obesity Battle Around

To encourage healthful eating, Chicago school doesnt allow kids to bring lunches or certain snacks from home — and some parents, and many students, arent fans of the policy

Carmona said she created the policy six years ago after watching students bring “bottles of soda and flaming hot chips” on field trips for their lunch.

Schools food is the only option for some kids – chicagotribune.com

Tangerines may prevent obesity and protect against heart disease, Type 2 diabetes, and other metabolic conditions, according to a new study published in the journal Diabetes.

A flavinoid in tangerines called Nobiletin was found to be specifically linked to the effects.

Tangerines May Prevent Obesity, Diabetes | ThirdAge

If you want a big example of how not to eat, just take a look at City Councilman Leroy Comrie, his wife told The Post.

The super-sized Queens Democrat seeking a ban on McDonald’s Happy Meal toys is himself a cautionary tale on the consequences of scarfing down too many Big Macs, Marcia Comrie said.

“He doesn’t do it in front of me — he knows it’s the bane of my existence,” she said of her 335-pound husband’s fast-food-devouring ways. “But the results are there for anyone to see.”

Fast-food restaurants would be forced to yank toys from any kids meal with more than 500 calories, under the bill Comrie introduced yesterday — a measure he says will steer children to healthier options and help them avoid his fate.

Comrie’s wife, 54, a vegetarian who “does yoga and watches every morsel” she eats, said the councilman eats healthy at home but cheats when he’s out.

“He’s not averse to healthy eating,” she said. “He actually enjoys when I make him a wholesome breakfast, and he likes when I cook him tofu.

“But by lunchtime he could be having spare ribs — or a Big Mac.”

Happy Meal toy hating Councilman Leroy Comrie loves fast food too much, his wife says – NYPOST.com