Causes of obesity and its impact on health and life: From genetics to endocrine system

5. Age factor

The incidence of obesity increases after age 35. Foreign experts believe that the obesity rate can reach 63% for men aged 50-59 and 68% for women aged 60-69.

Obesity in women is most common after childbirth (40.9%) or during menopause (35.7%).

6. Psychological factors

The function of the appetite center is controlled by mental state. When the vagus nerve is excited and pancreatic secretion increases, appetite becomes abnormally hyperactive, which can easily lead to obesity.

When under high levels of mental stress, the sympathetic nervous system is excited, and appetite is suppressed.

7. Metabolic factors

Obese people have a hyperanabolism, and their energy consumption is lower than that of people of normal weight, both at rest and during activity.

Obese people react poorly to cold when inactive, unlike normal people who increase their metabolic rate to burn fat.

Obese people often have lipid metabolism disorders and are less likely to develop ketosis when they are starving.

8. Endocrine factors

Obese people secrete too much insulin, which promotes fat synthesis.

As people age, hypothyroidism and hypogonadism can disrupt fat metabolism, leading to slower fat breakdown and increased fat synthesis, resulting in fat accumulation. This is one of the reasons why obesity increases with age.

9. Trace elements and obesity

The essential trace elements for the human body include iron, iodine, fluorine, zinc, copper, chromium, selenium, cobalt, and molybdenum.

Trace elements make up only a few parts per ten thousand to a few parts per hundred billion of the human body weight. Although the amount is very small, their role is very important because trace elements have high biological activity and participate in many enzyme activation reactions, maintaining the normal metabolic processes of proteins, fats, and carbohydrates.

The trace element chromium has a significant relationship with fat metabolism.

For example, animal experiments have shown that 19% of chromium-deficient older animals develop aortic plaques, while only 2% of those without chromium deficiency do.

Chromium deficiency can also lead to impaired glucose metabolism, elevated blood lipids, arteriosclerosis, and obesity.

Iodine deficiency can lead to hypothyroidism and a decreased basal metabolic rate, which can result in obesity or myxedema.

In addition, selenium, vanadium, zinc and other elements have direct or indirect effects on obesity.

**IV. The Impact of Obesity on Health and Life**

People often associate certain characteristics with overweight people, such as sleeping in late, snoring, being breathless easily, and sweating profusely.

Overweight people have racked their brains over these issues.

This is not what overweight people actually want.

But who knows that these grievances that should not be borne by obese people seem to be destined to accompany them throughout their lives, and the culprit is fat.

1. Fat people and sleeping

Do obese people like to sleep? Some people say that they often see people sleeping in large conference halls with thousands of people, and they can also hear people snoring. Upon closer inspection, they find that nine out of ten of these people are obese.

Not only during meetings, but at any time, whenever there is a spare moment, you can see obese people dozing off.

Some people say that it is rare for obese people to suffer from insomnia or have trouble sleeping.

Maybe so, because a broad mind leads to a plump figure.

Is that really the case?

Obese people also have emotions and desires, and they also face various situations and work troubles; it's impossible for everything to go smoothly for them.

So why do obese people fall asleep more easily than thin people? This is primarily because, under normal circumstances, obese people are heavier, and their tissues and organs require more oxygen, while the respiratory movement of their lungs is restricted.

When the body is in a state of hypoxia, the brain is the most sensitive to hypoxia. In other words, if the brain is always in a state of hypoxia, it will easily cause fatigue. In order to protect the body, sleep will inevitably increase.

This manifests itself in the fact that after exercise, after meals, or while watching movies or TV, obese people will seize the opportunity to take a nap in order to boost their energy.

2. Obese people and sweating

Obese people are experts at sweating. Even climbing stairs can leave them drenched in sweat, and afterwards their clothes are sticky, sticky, and chilly all over their bodies, which is really uncomfortable.

Because obese people have a thicker layer of subcutaneous fat, their body heat is not easily dissipated through radiation or conduction, so they can only rely on sweating to lower their body temperature and maintain a constant body temperature.

Because the heat dissipation process is obstructed, it exhibits poor adaptability to the surrounding environment and cannot withstand heat.

Obese people rely on sweating to maintain a normal body temperature. If the temperature is too high or the humidity is too great, they will immediately develop prickly heat, which will cover their entire body and cause them great pain.

Prickly heat is a skin condition caused by an imbalance in the body's temperature regulation in obese individuals, and it should be treated by increasing ventilation.

Applying prickly heat powder will not be effective if prickly heat has already appeared.

I felt a little more comfortable after applying prickly heat powder, but that was only because of the slight cooling sensation from the mint and talcum powder. In fact, applying too much prickly heat powder would actually make it harder to dissipate heat, which would worsen the prickly heat.

Therefore, in summer, especially when the weather is hot and humid, obese people should mainly rely on ventilation to help regulate their body temperature.

3. Obesity and Snoring

Snoring, also known as snoring, is a common lifestyle phenomenon after middle age. Some people snore to a lesser degree, while others snore to a greater degree. Generally, obese people snore more, and some are even nicknamed "Night Thunder God".

This is because after middle age, physical activity decreases significantly, weight increases, the neck becomes shorter and thicker, muscle tone decreases, the base of the tongue becomes thicker, the soft palate droops, the uvula (also called the little tongue) becomes large, the posterior pharyngeal column becomes wide, and the pharyngeal cavity becomes narrow. The resistance during inhalation increases significantly. The impact of the airflow causes the uvula and the lower edge of the soft palate to vibrate more rapidly, resulting in snoring.

If there are also conditions such as a deviated septum or nasal polyps causing nasal obstruction, not only will the snoring become louder, but it will also be accompanied by intermittent shortness of breath, which will have a greater impact on health.

If snoring is louder than 60-70 dB, or if it is accompanied by sleep apnea at least 10 times per hour, and each apnea lasts at least 10 seconds, it should be taken seriously.

Based on your own feelings, such as feeling unwell after waking up in the morning, being prone to drowsiness during the day, decreased work efficiency, memory loss, and having many dreams at night, you should consider the possibility of high blood pressure and arrhythmia caused by long-term hypoxia.

4. Obese people and heavy breathing

Some comrades on the front lines of the fight against obesity are terrified of gaining weight, yet some people deliberately tease obese individuals, saying, "If I say you're fat, you'll be out of breath."

In fact, obese people don't want to breathe, but the subcutaneous fat in their chest makes breathing particularly difficult. On the other hand, the fat deposits cause the pharynx and nasal cavity to be relatively narrow, making it difficult for air to pass through and often leading to mouth breathing. The third reason is that even if the resting metabolic rate is low, the burden on the heart and lungs is still very heavy due to the large body weight. In case of an emergency, the physical or mental burden will be more severe, which will inevitably lead to difficulty breathing.

Of course, for obese people, shortness of breath is just a compensatory symptom and does not necessarily indicate whether there is hypoxia. However, for severely obese patients, it is important to pay attention to whether there is hypoxia and carbon dioxide retention.

5. Obesity and Laziness

Because obese people are overweight, which increases the burden on their musculoskeletal system, bones, joints and muscles.

Meanwhile, fat deposits in areas such as the chest restrict the completion of respiratory movements, and large amounts of fat deposits around joints restrict joint mobility.

That's not all. Being overweight and the accumulation of fat further burdens the cardiovascular system, reducing its blood storage capacity. In addition to poor exercise performance, the respiratory system also experiences oxygen deprivation.