Before we proceed with the exercises, let us first be familiar with the words, Obesity Genes.
A gene is the smallest hereditary unit of life, which is responsible for all kinds of physical and functional developments in our body. Without genes, we cannot exist and these are transferred from parents to offspring. These are present in our DNA. For all the internal developments in our body genes are responsible. Some genes make molecules called proteins, some internal organs, some external organs, etc. In humans, there are about 20,000 and 25,000 genes and each gene is instructed differently.
Each person is inherited with two copies of each gene, coming from each parent. Most of the genes are the same in all the people, but a small number of genes (less than 1%) are slightly different between people. These small differences contribute to each person’s unique physical features and because of which we all look different.
Now let us Understand What Obesity means (Obesity Genes)
Obesity signifies the gain in weight. It occurs when we eat more calories than our body uses up. If the food we eat provides more calories than our body needs, the excess is converted to fat. Initially, fat cells increase in size. When they can no longer expand, they increase in number. If we lose weight, the size of the fat cells decreases, but the number of cells does not.
Causes
Obesity can be caused by any of the factors which could lead to more calorie intake than its consumption, some of them are discussed below-
Genes: Genes play a major role in the efficiency of metabolism and storage and distribution of body fat.
Family lifestyle: Obesity is more likely to run in families. This could be because of genes or by shared diet and lifestyle habits. If one of your parents is obese, they have a higher risk of being obese.
Emotions: It is also observed that some people overeat because of depression, hopelessness, anger, boredom, and many other reasons that have nothing to do with hunger. It is not so, that overweight and obese people have more emotional problems than other people. It just aggravates their feelings for eating and these habits cause them to overeat.
Environment: The most important environmental factor is a lifestyle. Our eating habits and activity level are not balanced properly. Overeating and sedentary habits (inactivity) are the major risk factors for obesity.
Socioeconomic factors: If there is no good space around the house for freshness, outdoor activities, pollution-free environment and no fresh green groceries available could cause obesity.
Sex: Men have more muscle than women, on average. More calories is burnt by muscles than other types of tissues; men use more calories than women, even at rest. This is the reason, women are more likely than men to gain weight with the same calorie intake.
Age: People are more likely to lose muscle and gain fat with age. Their metabolism also slows down. Both factors lower their calorie requirements.
Pregnancy: Women most probably weigh an average of 4-6 pounds more after a pregnancy which gets added on with each pregnancy.
Symptoms and Signs Associated With Obesity Genes
For most people, sometimes obesity becomes a lifelong struggle. As described above it is caused by multiple factors, though the basic principle is decreased caloric intake and an increase in exercise is a relatively simple concept.
The need to manage obesity is must as obesity increases the risk of many other diseases and health problems like:
- Diabetes
- Heart diseases
- High blood pressure
- Stroke
- Osteoarthritis (especially knee and hip joint pain, and lower back pain)
- Gout
- Gallstones
- Lung disease
- Insomnia from sleep apnea (snoring)
- Fungal rashes in skin folds
- Colon cancer
- Endometrial cancer
- Depression
- Dementia
Out of all these depression may be one of the most common effects of obesity. Many obese people suffer after this suffers emotional distress due to physical appearance because our culture connects slimness with beauty. Obese people may feel unattractive. They also are subjected to ridicule and discriminated, which may make them feel embarrassed.
Obesity is also a major risk factor for the development of diabetes mellitus. But it was good to know that a high risk of developing diabetes decreased the risk by almost 60% with less than 10% weight loss in three years.
Home Remedies for Obesity
Best remedy is to cut calories intake by 500 calories and spending an extra 500 calories during exercise each day, with this one will lose about 1 pound per week.
Any good diet plan will include exercises. It helps to increase metabolism. One should exercise for at least 30 minutes, five times a week. Regular exercise also helps your heart and lungs and lowers triglyceride levels that can cause heart disease. It also increases the HDL (“good cholesterol”) levels.
Simple measures such as using the stairs instead of the elevator and short walks eventually add up to a lot of calories burned.
Commercial fitness programs such as Boot Camp can help you start or improve upon a fitness program.
Group support programs such as Weight Watchers provide peer support and promote healthy habits.
People who cannot make it to support groups, there are many free or low-cost apps available for the iPhone, iPad, or Android, which keeps track on calories, nutrition, and calorie expenditure.
For women who have gained weight after pregnancy, breastfeeding helps one to shed some extra pounds. Besides the positive effects for the baby breastfeeding will also help one to burn approximately 500 extra calories each day.
Likewise, increasing activity level is largely a matter of changing your attitude. You don’t have to become a marathon runner. Thirty minutes of aerobic activity five days a week will make a significant difference in your health. One should always look for different ways to increase their activity level in which enjoyment is there and also burning of calories.
The researchers claimed that when it comes to obesity, we cannot escape by just putting it on genetics factor, rather the effects can be lessened by several kinds of regular exercises.
Researchers have identified certain exercises that are effective in overcoming genetic effects that contribute to obesity.
Obesity Genes exercise 1 Regular Jogging
It was found to be the best type of all the exercises for managing obesity. But one should maintain the consistency. It is not a magic to reduce it in a day. At least for months it should be practiced. But it is necessary even after that as one has to manage the stability also.
Obesity Genes exercise 3 Mountain Climbing
This is another good exercise of cutting down fat as this process requires more calories for resisting the body against gravity. This is the best way to burn calories fast.
Obesity Genes exercise 4 Walking
This also burn calories, could be little slow, but the consistency will positively show the good results. Initially one can start with this light exercise and later on can switch to the brisk walking, where the effect will be fast, but again it should be continued for months not one or two days.
Obesity Genes exercise 5 Power Walking
This kind of walking shows results faster than slow walking and this power walking not only reduces fat but also tone the muscles of the body. It emphasizes speed and arm motion as a means of increasing health benefits. When done correctly, it is good for our cardiovascular health, joint health, and emotional well-being. Again regularity has to be maintained for better effects
Obesity Genes exercise 6 Dancing
Dance, though it is an art form that consists of selected sequences of human movements. These movements have aesthetic and symbolic value and is recognized as dance by performers and observers within a particular culture but it is more used to keep one fit, flexible and will never allow any kind of fat to deposit on the body and also balances the complete body from head to toe. Ballroom dancing is the best form to work on obesity genes.
Obesity Genes exercise 7 Yoga Practices
This also reduces the Body Mass Index (BMI) in individuals due to obesity. But one has to go for long yoga sessions and again consistency and regularity is required. We know that obesity is a challenging condition to control because it results from interactions between a person’s genetics and lifestyle. Therefore, one should be serious and consistent, if truly wants to lose weight.
Researchers analyzed 18,424 Han Chinese adults in Taiwan and the results were published in the journal PLOS Genetics.
People were taken between 30 and 70 years old and analyzed on five measures of obesity including body mass index (BMI), body fat percentage, waist circumference, hip circumference and waist-to-hip ratio. The benefits of regular physical exercise were found to be more impactful in counteracting the impact of obesity genetics said by the researchers.
They also investigated 18 types of exercises and found that regular jogging, which is light running for 30 minutes three times a week, was the most effective at counteracting the impact of obesity genetics across all five obesity measures.
Less impactful exercises
The researchers found that there were some exercises that did not have any impact on the obesity gene. These included cycling, stretching, swimming, qigong (body posture exercise similar to tai chi), and the computer games “Dance Dance Revolution.”
Researchers said that cycling, stretching, and qigong usually require less energy expenditure means less burning of calories than the six exercises which had already explained above have a bigger impact on weight loss.
Exercises in cold water like swimming can enhance appetite and makes one to eat more. And the computer game “Dance Dance Revolution” is not as formal as other types of dancing; it doesn’t require any kind of calorie burning and effort.
Some of the participants took part in weight training, badminton, table tennis, basketball or tennis, for combating the weight loss but researchers couldn’t determine if these exercises could make any impact on obesity genetics.
