Today’s post is related to our brain and the effects of prenatal experience on becoming overweight. To illustrate, recent research shows an association among prenatal experience, patterns of fat deposition, and appetite regulation in postnatal life. Further prenatal exposure to either increased or decreased levels of nutrition increase the risk of obesity in postnatal life. According to Beverly Muhlhausler, the author of Early Origins of Obesity , all the components of the system which we know regulates appetite and postnatal life are already there before birth and may be responding to signals of nutritional status. This, of course, raises the possibility that changes in the fetal environment can permanently change the way that the system develops and results in changes in feeding behavior. Think about that and allow that to sink in your hippocampus.
More information: evidence suggests that infants who grow very rapidly in the first two years of life, and those with the highest body mass index (BMI) are at increased risk of obesity in childhood and adulthood. Second, maternal diet during pregnancy and breast-feeding also appear to influence risk of obesity in later life. Third, maternal over nutrition and obesity in pregnancy may be as harmful to the developing fetus as under nutrition. Forth, it appears that an individual’s appetite and cardiovascular disease risk may be programmed by excessive maternal caloric intake, predisposing an individual to diabetes or hypertension in later life. If you fit this profile, start and continue to make healthy changes quickly.
The national trend is as follows: most recent data analysis from the Framingham Heart Study show that a 30-year-old has a 74% chance (females) or 92% chance (males) for becoming overweight at some point in life.2. The risk of becoming obese, if you are a 30-year-old today, is 39% for women and 48% for men .3.The lifetime risk for overweight approaches that for high blood pressure and exceeds that described for most other chronic diseases.
A recent study predicts that based on the current increase in obesity rates, especially among the young and minorities, life expectancy in the US can be expected to decline. Obesity currently reduces life by an average of 4 to 9 months. This number is greater than the negative effect of all accidental mortality such as car accidents, suicides and homicides combined. The steep increase in obesity rates is expected to reduce life expectancy of the obese even more severely over the next 50 years possibly shortening life as much is 2 to 5 years.
Again, employing a developmental approach research suggests that prenatal experience is terribly important and heavily influenced by the maternal mother. The expecting mother’s weight, her diet (over-under nutrition), breast-feeding are just three factors that affect the offspring. In other words, the newborn infants, not only had nothing to do with being born, can start off life at a tremendous disadvantage as far as longevity and future health.
What type of training ,education or instruction did you receive regarding marriage , babies, etc.? Can there be, should there be something different than what we have now? And if so, who or what should take the lead in dispensing the information .I’ll bet Public Health and social psychology could devise such a program based on attitude and behavior change.
More information to follow:
After, a week off, my running partner Alpha and I are running today. Good news, he and Debbie are also going solar.
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