MODERN medicine has long regarded people with a higher BMI as unfit because doctors tell them that being overweight automatically means unhealthy.

But a new study has debunked that, suggesting you can be fat AND fit.

4

4

A study at the University of Michigan sampled from two groups of people with BMIs over 30 who were matched for body fat mass, weight and sex.

Half had been Exercising four times a week or more for at least two years, while the other half had never exercised.

They found that those in the exercise group had healthier abdominal fat and fewer cells that cause inflammation.

They also had a better ability to store fat under the belly skin, which is healthier than around the organs.

Michelle Thomas, 57, had always been a thin child and only started thinking about weight in her teens.

But it was a throwaway comment in her mid-twenties that really knocked her for six.

“I was going out one night and I was wearing a dress with straps,” recalls the Ramsgate-based PR expert. Kent.

“Mum said, ‘You look lovely, but it’s a shame you inherited your grandmother’s fat arms.’

“He didn’t mean to upset me, but from that day on I didn’t have arms – I had fat arms.”

Michelle, who has a 14-year-old son, says it took her years to overcome this mindset and she’s tired of being made to feel bad about her bigger shape.

She says: “Mum was a yo-yo diet because that was the culture at the time.

“But I want to show my teenager that women eat normally food and they can be strong.”

Michelle, who is 5ft 4in and a size 16-18, has exercised over the years but started working out regularly during quarantine in 2020, using Chris HemsworthCentr’s app.

And last June, she took up powerlifting.

She says, “I had a woman health control and the doctor wanted to put me on statins.

“I thought it was better to keep fit than take medicine.”

I want to show my teenager that women eat normal food and can be strong

Michelle Thomas

Today, Michelle can lift up to 120kg in the gym and trains three times a week. And she rides a bike, she walks swimming in the sea and not box and yoga.

But she remains at 15 3lb and her BMI is 36, which is considered obese. Michelle says: “I think BMI should be banned.”

“It makes you anxious and paranoid, plus shaming people never motivates them.

“Doctors don’t take into account that I’m mixed race. The studies I reference are all based on the average white European woman.

“I’m in too menopause and hormonal changes make it harder to lose weight.”

Michelle says she’s made peace with her shape, but stops short before saying she “loves” her curls.

She says, “It’s not about how I look, it’s about how my body feels and what it can do.”

But dr. Hussain Al-Zubaidi of the Royal College of General Practitioners warns: “While exercise can help reduce many of the health risks associated with being overweight or obese, evidence suggests that excess body fat remains a risk factor for cardiovascular, metabolic health and musculoskeletal. , even in active individuals.

“BMI remains a good and simple tool to raise awareness of what a healthy weight range might be.”

Despite being fit and active, Katrina Rohman was always bigger.

As a child, her dance teacher referred to her as a “fat girl”.

“I stood out from the crowd, which makes you self-conscious,” she says. I’m 5ft 9in and 5th over the ‘ideal’ weight, so people make assumptions about my lifestyle.”

4

But while the 40-year-old marketing manager is a size 20 and has a BMI of 39, her fitness level puts many thinner women to shame.

She does spin and body pump classes several times a week and enjoys swimming and cycling.

Katrina, who writes a travel blog called Real Girls Wobble, puts her body shape down to genetics and polycystic ovary syndrome, which she was diagnosed with when she was 19.

“I was prescribed a drug called Metformin, which is also used for type 2 diabetesand we had good results,” she says.

“But over the years, the weight has gone back up.

People will say things like, “You have a bike, but do you actually ride it?”

Katrina Rohman

“I lost more than 2st during the lockdown when I had time to exercise once or twice a day, but I put it all back on because it’s not sustainable.”

Katrina has been with partner Michael, 41, for 12 years and lives in Cardiff.

She says she’s often the butt of embarrassing jokes: “People will say things like, ‘You’ve got a bike, but do you actually ride it?’

“But I played hockey in the sea school and I’ve had a gym membership on and off since I was 18.

“I also try to eat healthy and especially cook from scratch, but I won’t miss the odd cider or treat on holiday.

“It frustrates me when I see thinner women who eat junk and stay thin.

“But they tell me they’re saving their problems for later and I know they’re taking good care of me.

“I may not be as small as them, but I wake up with energy and I have stamina.”

Tammy Davidson, 49, with a BMI of 31, also suffers from PCOS and admits that her desire to be a mother led her to fad diets – but she ended up miserable.

She says: “I wasn’t always curvy, but I have polycystic ovaries and it wasn’t until my thirties that my weight became an issue.

“I can lift 100 kg”

“I needed it IVF to get pregnant and the doctors insisted that I lose weight first.

Tammy, from Gloucesterfollowed the doctors’ orders: “I went on the cabbage soup diet, Dukan and The world to lose weightwith varying success.

“I lost size 3 and dropped three dress sizes but my IVF didn’t work.

“I felt angry that the medical profession was pushing me into unhealthy eating habits when I had fertility the problem wasn’t about the weight.”

As a child, Tammy hated PE because of her asthma, but after failed fertility treatment, she started exercising.

She says: “I started with gym classes like boxing and fell in love with weight lifting. After ten years, I can lift 100 kg.”

Tammy says experience has taught her that you can’t just go by the number on the scale.

Strangers in the gym will make assumptions based on my body shape, but I can keep up with people in their twenties and thirties.

Tammy Davidson

“I focus on how I feel in my clothes and also my ability to live a good life, rather than the fact that my BMI hasn’t been below 30 in a decade,” says Tammy , who is 5ft 8in.

“I also accept that eating less and moving more doesn’t have the same impact now that I’m perimenopausal.”

Tammy has now retrained as a Sport and Exercise Psychologist (themindfield.co.uk).

“Strangers in the gym will make assumptions based on my body shape, but I can keep up with people in their twenties and thirties,” she says.

“Best of all, I haven’t stepped on a scale in ages. Strength and functional movement are more important to me now.”

4