-Purchasing Compliance through Food
from "Rust Out" by Dr. Royce Bailey, page 50

“Overeating has a worse effect upon the system than overworking; the energies of the soul are more effectively prostrated by intemperate eating than by intemperate working.”  -Counsels on Health, 160

Your Waist
Typical risk factors for heart disease include Diabetes, Smoking (increased cholesterol), Family History, Hypertension, and a Sedentary Lifestyle.  Now here comes a new one, Central Obesity.  Yes!  Researchers followed 44,000 women for eight years and found that those who had waists larger than 32 inches (Men 37 inches) had more than double the risk of having a heart attack, nearly 50% more likely to have high cholesterol and close to 50% more likely to have high blood pressure than their slimmer counterparts.  The same fatty deposits that clog arteries and lead to heart attacks can also clog arteries that feed the brain, putting you at higher risk for a stroke.  

Insulin Resistance
Women with the highest waist circumferences (36 inches or larger) were five times more likely to develop diabetes than those with waists at about 26 inches.  Abdominal fat causes insulin resistance, which means that your cells don’t respond to insulin and your blood sugar stays dangerously high.

Breast Cancer
Another disadvantage of abdominal fat is its’ unbalanced effect on hormones.  Women with breast cancer had an average of 45% more belly fat than healthy women.

Breathing/Swallowing Problems
Women with larger waists have 20 to 50% more back problems.  Belly fat can actually crowd your lungs, causing breathing difficulties.  Even moderate amounts of abdominal fat can make you more prone to wheezing, coughing (from regurgitation of food) and shortness of breath (from smaller lung volumes and aspiration of stomach contents).  It increases the likelihood of sleep apnea, which therefore, increases strokes, high blood pressure and heart attacks fourfold.

We Eat for Comfort
So how are we to explain this tendency of Americans to be overweight?  Early habits are lifelong habits.  Why is it that some obese people find themselves compelled to eat when they become emotionally disturbed?  They get angry or depressed and then go to the refrigerator as a way of coping.  I have patients tell me that they wouldn’t be fat if it were not for their compulsion to bury their disappointment under a stuffed stomach.  This certainly isn’t the only reason for obesity but the human tendency to accept conditioning is extraordinary.  

Food = Pacifier
When a baby is breast fed, there are physical limitations to how often and when he/she can nurse.  With a bottle fed baby—the bottle becomes a mighty convenient baby-sitter.  An emotionally disturbed child can be quieted by simply poking a synthetic nipple in their mouth.  As the food goes in, the tension and anxiety go out.  An angry child can be pacified by a “pacifier” or bottle.  A child can be put to sleep with food.  You can purchase for yourself a reprieve from almost anything through a bottle or pacifier.  What have we done to this child?  Not only are they failing to learn self-control, they are learning to cope by putting something in their mouth.

Oral Habits
The addiction to cigarettes is not all nicotine.  Have you ever noticed how a person who quits smoking will often keep something in their mouth?  Many a tree has been eaten one match stick at a time.

PM Indulgences
Many obese people have no desire for food early in the day.  Not until the day’s responsibilities mount up, does their nervousness drive them to the refrigerator.  Late at night, when problems of the day are backed up, the refrigerator becomes their emotional support.

First Sin Was Eating
Remember, the first human sin involved eating.  The Devil’s first temptation to Jesus involved food.
“Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.  For he that soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption.”  Gal. 6:7,8

Lack of Self-Control
To allow—much more, encourage—lack of self control in any area is to condition the child (or adult, for that matter) to be generally intemperate.

So what are we to do?  “You are not able, of yourself, to bring your purposes and desires and inclinations into submission to the will of God; but if you are ‘willing to be made willing,’ God will accomplish the work for you, even ‘casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.’ 2 Cor 10:5”
“The victory is not won without much prayer, without humbling of self at every step.  Our will is not to be forced into cooperation with divine agencies, but it must be voluntarily submitted.”  Thoughts From The Mount of Blessings, 142

References:
“Nurses Health Study”, JAMA, Dec 2, 1998.

Veilleux, Z., “Ultimate Belly-Flattening Plan,” Prevention, August 1999, 128-133.

Pearl, M.& D,. “To Train Up A Child,” The Church at Cane Creek, 1994; 88-89.