Medical Causes of Obesity

Close your eyes and picture this, you are outside of a favorite cafe looking for a table. You are just about to sit on the patio to enjoy a steaming hot cup of coffee, when you look to over and see the most disgusting sight ever. He looks absolutely mountainous; there are rolls upon rolls suffocating his body. Food is flying everywhere, lettuce is being launched through the air, and there are pieces of meat all over the table and floor. You are astounded to see that he is trying to snag his third burger. You then walk away utterly shocked that someone can let their dog get that fat. That is right what I was describing was about a canine, not a human being, which is what I bet you thought while reading the description.

Society and the media have put this picture into our heads that obese people sit at restaurants all day stuffing their faces with food, and are extremely lazy. As it turns out, this depiction of obese people is wrong, and there is more involved in obesity than you think. There are a hundred causes as to why a person is obese, but thanks to society and the media we only think of the one reason. In fact, some of the common causes of obesity are diseases. There are many syndromes that could cause obesity but the most common ones are hypothyroidism, Cushing’s disease, Prader-Willi syndrome, and polycystic ovarian syndrome.

As society frequently passes judgment on obese people they do not stop to think that a disease could be the cause for their obesity. The first genetic disorder that is involved in causing obesity is called hypothyroidism. This disease is fairly common as it affects more than forty percent of Americans (Lowrance, 2009). In order to explain how this disease causes obesity, I will first explain what t...

... middle of paper ...

...ypothyroidism, which is caused by an underactive thyroid gland. Fifteen million have a disease called Cushing’s disease, which happens when the body is overexposed to cortisol. Prader-Willi affects thirty thousand, and it caused by a bad fifteenth chromosome. Fifty percent of women who have polycystic ovarian syndrome are obese. This condition is caused by “insulin resistance and biochemical signaling.” All of these people affected by these disorders are obese because of something that they could not control, genetics, not overeating and laziness. So please, next time you see an overly obese person think first before you judge them. The quote said by Adelle Davis perfectly sums up my argument, “ To say that obesity is caused by merely consuming too many calories is like saying that the only cause of the American Revolution was the Boston Tea Party,” (Davis, n.d).