Monday, July 21, 2008

Is weight loss harder for Black women than for White women?

Yes apparently it is.


All my life I've always heard that as Black people we have to work twice as hard at everything (academics, the work place, etc.) Well, recently I found that this even applies to weight loss. I came across this link at sweet potato pie.
The article from Web MD states that past researchers found that:

"Obese African-American women lose less weight and at a slower rate than Caucasian women do across a variety of treatments including conservative interventions, very low calorie intake, and surgery."

In the present study researchers found that obese black women had more adenosine receptors in their deep abdominal fat than the obese white women. They suggest that this finding may help doctors come up with new strategies to prevent obesity.

click here to read whole article.


So what do you take away from this article?
I plan to continue to work just as hard as before on my weight loss. But it does help to know what is going on chemically in my body. So we have to work a little harder but it is worth it!

Ladies, please share your thoughts.






5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think that this article was extremely interesting as well as motivating. It is my opinion that many African Americans lose hope after exercising and dieting because they are unable to see noticeable, positive results. I do have friends that constantly ask me whether or not I notice a change in their physical appearance after they have only been at their weight loss regiment a couple of days. When I say no, they get mad and just give up because they believe that their efforts are not working. However, after reading this article, it may not be that their workout plans are not working, it may just be that they just need to work a little harder, stay consistent and wait. I too had the same belief at one point when I tried getting back into shape. It appeared as if nothing was working for me so I just stopped trying. (I had the belief that why keep trying something when nothing is working?) Now, thanks to this blog and article, I think that I am going to take another stab at exercising more,eating right, and getting back into shape.

Anonymous said...

Oh my. This is so true. It seems that maybe our bodies get so comfortable at a certain weight, even if we were to be obese. When we start to work out, our body clings to the weight with it's dear life, even if you do everything the way you're supposed to!
Though I'm far from overweight, I always see room for improvement. As I started back working out, it took me an entire month to lose 2 pounds, even though I'm a faithful gym goer who eats healthy.
But as you stated, black folks have to work extra hard. So if that means pushing aside the snacks for an hour of gym time, so be it.

Anonymous said...

This is interesting. I never knew this to be true. As a matter of fact I'm participating in a weight loss study now, and I'm actually keeping up with the guys in weight loss. And we all know men lose weight faster than women.

It has never been difficult for me to lose weight when I actually try. My issue has always been not trying. Maybe it is because I have an athletic past? I don't know. This article is very interesting though. After 9 weeks in this program I have dropped 18 lbs.

bodybuild said...

This looks interesting in some other views. But does it really matter if you were a white or black women in getting weight loss. I guess all are the same,it depends on the effort of every individual put every time they do workouts or exercise.

Thomas - Waist, Hips, and Thighs said...

My wife says she thinks its harder for her to lose weight compared to her counterparts at work that she used to workout with. I dont know though if I totally agree with that.