“Overweight and
obesity are rampant, affecting 97 million adults in the United
States. The problem is complex, involving genetic, metabolic,
physiological, cultural, social, and behavioral factors. On the
surface, the solution seems straightforward — decrease the
number of calories consumed, and increase the number of calories
used, and weight loss will result. However, as one begins to
examine the approach to weight management more closely, it
becomes clear that our current interventions are often
unsatisfactory…”
These are the
words of Michelle May, M.D., author of the award winning “Am
I Hungry? What To Do When Diets Don’t Work.” May, who
herself struggled with weight loss, is the co-developer of Am I
Hungry?™, a multidimensional weight management program she
created with psychologist Lisa Galper, Psy.D., and Janet Carr, a
registered dietician and exercise expert.
On Thursday, Oct.
6, at the Ohio University Inn, May will address a group of
health professionals — physicians, dietitians, nurses, social
workers, counselors, certified health educators — from across
Southeastern Ohio on obesity and weight management.
“If diets work,
why do we have an obesity epidemic?” asks May. “But it isn’t
that diets don’t work, it’s being able to sustain them over the
long haul of maintaining weight loss. People vacillate being on
and off diets. That’s the problem for the majority of people.”
“I realized that
I wasn’t able to manage my weight successfully. It wasn’t that
something was wrong with me or my patients. It dawned on me that
even the most accomplished and disciplined people were not able
to successfully lose weight.”
May, a board
certified family physician and the past president of the Arizona
Academy of Family Physicians, began to rethink why certain
people were able to maintain healthy weights without dieting.
“We live in a
society where food is so abundant that many people have lost the
ability to realize how to eat to meet their bodies’ needs.
People who are successful at managing their weight do it because
they have intuitively realized when to eat and when to stop.
They eat when they’re hungry and not to meet other needs.”
Her Am I Hungry?™
seminar is designed to help physicians and other health
professionals look at weight management and the problem of
overeating from a different perspective. May’s approach combines
expertise in the medical, nutritional and behavior aspects of
weight management into an intuitive practical approach to weight
management — retraining yourself to eat when your body is
hungry, not in response to emotional or environmental triggers
that motivate you to eat.
“I try to move
the weight-loss paradigm away form excessive dieting and
exercise to a more sustainable, realistic approach that people
can fit within their lifestyles.
“Health-care
professionals can assist this process by empowering individuals
to become the authority on meeting their needs and helping them
learn to trust their own bodies. They are in a unique position
to help patients identify medical and physical obstacles.
“The reality is
that successful weight management requires a change from a
‘dieter’s mindset’ to building the necessary skills and support
to ‘normalize’ eating. If we can teach people skills and tools
instead of rules, in the long run they will be successful at
weight management.”
“Her program
looks at the individual,” says Ruth Dudding, Athens City County
Health Department health educator. “It’s not a one-size-fits-all
approach. It’s individualized and personal.”
Dudding
represents one in the group of the sponsors of May’s seminar,
which includes the health departments of Washington and Meigs
counties, the American Cancer Society, the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention, the Ohio Department of Health and Ohio
University College of Osteopathic Medicine.
Southeastern
Ohio, as the rest of Ohio and the nation, has a weight problem.
Dudding says May’s multidimensional message fits right in with
what health professionals from the three county health
departments are trying to achieve.
“We are finding
that the best approach to promoting change is to use a
multidimensional approach,” says Dudding.
The three county
health departments’ efforts to fight obesity are part of the
Ohio Department of Health’s initiative to promote cardiovascular
health.
“We want to make
sure that messages about health are properly coordinated and
conveyed so that people can make the best and most informed
decisions, particularly in regards to eating and weight
management,” says Dudding. “We are hoping to support and build
on the foundation of good messages and information that are
already provided by area health professionals.
“May is
passionate about her message. She’s converted to this lifestyle,
and she’s excited about conveying the information so that others
can benefit from it as well.”
“We
have to be willing to explore new and different ideas and
approaches,” says May, “if we want to be able to solve the
problem of overeating and obesity.”
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