For overweight and obese men and women forty years of age and older, drinking a pint of water just before eating will reduce the amount of food they eat. When combined with a reduced-calorie diet, drinking water before meals results in more weight loss than only dieting.

A number of studies have shown that sleep-deprived children and adults are more likely to gain excess weight. Finnish researchers followed 7322 men and women age 60 and over for seven years. After adjusting for confounding factors, they found that 1/3 of women who experienced frequent sleep problems gained at least 11 pounds.

PositiveTip: To make consistently wise choices, we need regular and consistent rest and sleep.

A Danish study reported at the International Congress on Obesity, suggests that men who are obese by age 20 die eight years earlier on average than non-obese men. The unique feature of this study was that the subjects were followed from their teens until age 80.

The study started with over 5000 military men. Deaths among the 1,930 obese men were contrasted with deaths among a random sample of 3,601 non-obese males. Body mass index (BMI) was measured at the average ages of 20, 35 and 46 years.

French investigators have found that erectile dysfunction is experienced twice as often among obese men compared to normal weight men. However, obese women were no more likely to experience sexual dysfunction than normal weight women. But younger obese women were three times as likely to have met a partner on the internet, and were more likely to have an obese partner than normal weight women.

PositiveTip: Obesity not only impacts overall health, it can also negatively impact healthy relationships and emotions.

Kevin Smith, a well known actor/director, was kicked off a Southwest Air flight on Saturday, February 13, 2010 because he didn’t fit comfortably into the airplane seat.  He was too fat to fly.

Jesus says “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me." (Luke 9:23 NKJV) This means that, according to Scripture, all true, actual, practicing, growing, followers of Christ will practice self-denial. Right?

Right. And sometimes that means making difficult choices.

Thomas Aquinas, one of the greatest medieval philosophers, recognized that gluttony involved more than eating too much. He developed a list of other ways in which a person might “abuse” food to the point of gluttony. Here are the different ways in which a person can be gluttonous.

Gluttony is a word that isn’t used very often. Many people don’t know what gluttony means. Gluttony is the attitude, focus, and disposition that lead a person to eat too much food.

The glutton is a person who eats too much at meal time and is often found eating between meals. If the taste buds call, the glutton is quick to answer with a snack.

Have you noticed how everyone is getting fatter? Nearly two-thirds of adults in the United States are overweight or obese. I think we need to begin to use the words "glutton" and "gluttony" more. 

Gluttony was one of the church's seven deadly sins two or three hundred years ago. The entire list includes: Lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride. Gluttony includes more than eating too much food.  

Thomas Aquinas expanded the common view of gluttony to incude an excessive anticipation of meals, which is craving for food. Aquinas developed a list of six ways to commit gluttony including:

In the 1930s, a Cornell University professor of nutrition, Dr. Clive McCay, confirmed that caloric restriction in rodents extends life expectancy by up to 50%--the equivalent of 150 years in humans!(1) This kind of experiment has now been repeated across many species with similar results. Current studies at the National Institute on Aging show the same early adaptations in primates on low-calorie diets as other species. Eating less seems to generate fewer free radicals, thus lessening potential damage to cellular machinery like DNA and mitochondria.