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Life is a lot more complex than anyone single factor can ever encompass.

I totally agree. And weight control is a highly individual issue. Food has different importance and use to each of us. Believe me, I wish I could find the magic ingredient that my husband has: he could care less about food! I, on the other hand, have spent literally every day of my life thinking about what I am or am not eating. It took me years, and a long hospital stay, to finally learn that my self-worth is not based on what I weigh!

But my point on this thread is to try and explain, that even though the problem of weight is complex, every tool and bit of information that can help someone is worth the effort. There is no simple, easy solution. And no "one" right way for everyone. But through my own experiences, it seems to me, right or wrong, that people are deceived about what they are eating and overly enticed to eat the wrong things. Any effort to expose the deception is worth it, if it helps just one person.

I thin kthe most useful piece of information is to relax. We're too uptight about stupid sh!t in this country. Even if the studies are true (which they're not) and America is getting fatter so what? We're also living longer (even these panic stricken study people admit that, they just shove it aside with hypothetical discussions of living even longer).

I'd like to get my waistline a couple of inches smaller, not back ot my starving student look, but thinner. But I'm not going to get uptight about it. I like good tasting food, and healthy food quite simply does not taste good (not to me anyway). I'm kind of like your husband in that I really don't think about food too much, but when it's time to eat I want to enjoy my meal, and if I'm feeling to lazy to have a meal that's what Doritos are for. What I'm NOT going to do is get in tizzy. I don't count calories, I don't read the nutritional information, and I don't stand on scales. I eat what I wanna eat, I excercise when I get around to it.

Stress is still the #1 cause of heart problems (you can tell by the occasional reports that come out showing the average age ofthe first heartattache by profession) and the last thing your ticker needs is for you to get stressed out about your weight. And never forget that sometimes people just die. Jim Ficks was probably the healthies man in the country when his well tuned and still quite young heart had simply had enough. Yul Brynner smoked 3 packs a day for the better part of 60 years and was doing 8 shows a week of The King And I (often considered to one of the most strenuous musicals in the world) in his 80s up to about 6 months before he died.

So just learn to relax, go with the flow and enjoy your time on this rock because it could end before you finish reading this post.