When it comes to protecting your heart, ignoring a weight problem is not an option. Here’s why:
* The majority of women who have a heart attack are overweight.
* Women who are overweight, or more specifically, carry excess fat around the middle, have the highest lifetime risk of having a heart attack and dying from heart disease.
* Being overweight is a major contributor to high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes. In fact, 70 percent of women with diabetes carry around too much fat.
* Obesity is a leading contributor to metabolic syndrome, a cluster of risk factors that carries the dubious distinction of doubling your odds of dying from heart disease.
It is an unfortunate irony that for all the salads we eat, desserts we decline, meals we miss, and other obsessive efforts, we make to lose a few pounds, American women are fatter than ever. More than half of us carry around extra fat that can lead to heart problems.
However, here’s the real irony. While American women are typecasted as perpetual dieters that worship thinness, we are actually eating more than ever before. Statistics show that over a 30-year span, starting in 1971, the average calorie consumption among women has increased 22 percent — equivalent to extra 335 calories a day. (In men, the increase is only 7 percent.)
That means the average middle-aged woman is around 30 pounds heavier than she was in the early 1970s—coincidentally, about the same time that Dr. Atkins’ high-protein diet hit the market for the first time.
It is certainly a troubling statistic, but it explains, at least in part, why obesity is increasing at an alarming rate. So, what are we doing wrong? Let’s start with our devotion to a four-letter word: D-I-E-T.
