New research studying whether there’s a genetic basis for obesity has turned up a surprising find: for some, feeling constantly hungry might be in their genes. The researchers discovered that a gene, FTO, affects patients’ appetites. When a person has one copy of the gene they tend to weigh more than someone without it, while those with two copies way significantly more.

Lead researcher Professor Jane Wardle said: “It is not simply the case that people who carry the risky variant of this gene automatically become overweight, but they are more susceptible to overeating.

“This makes them significantly more vulnerable to the modern environment which confronts all of us with large portion sizes and limitless opportunities to eat.”

Of course, assuming there’s a genetic basis for an appetite that’s always on “high”, wouldn’t there be more people who’ve been fat all their lives, dating back to the days when they rolled around on baby bedding? Or is that what our “childhood obesity epidemic” is about?

Although it has nothing to do with the genetic research itself, I found another bit to be particularly interesting: the “limitless opportunities to eat.” That’s something I’ve become increasingly conscious of since my diagnosis: ours is a society that’s practically built around food. Want to celebrate? Have a cookie. Feel bad? Have cookie dough ice cream. Need to keep the kids entertained on a rainy day? Make cookies together. Want to sell your house? The aroma of freshly baked cookies sure helps.

Of course, it’s not all about the cookies.

These days I can’t go to a grocery store without someone offering me free samples of foods I can’t have: baguette slices laden with dips, crackers smeared with spreads, even tiny little cocktail sausages skewered on brightly colored toothpicks. It all contains gluten so I’m just not interested. When friends want to get together, they usually want to go to a restaurant. It’s easy enough to get out of that — most have understood when I explain that I can’t risk gluten contamination. But, as I’ve learned, the risk of getting glutenated at other peoples’ homes is high, too.

Want to know just how much food has taken over your life? Try going gluten-free a couple of weeks. It’s been a real eye-opener for me. Snacks aren’t something I grab without thinking about anymore; now I have to pause and read the ingredient list to know if something is safe, or else just opt for fruit or veggies, which is so much easier. Meals take planning now instead of simply whipping up convenience foods, and that means actually thinking about what’s going into them (and, hence, in to me). That candy bar I used to grab at the grocery store to eat on the drive home? It’s a thing of the past now that I’ve always got a small bag of raw almonds in my purse.

So, has it helped? You tell me:

Minutes exercised today: 85 - Pounds lost so far: 7 - Pounds to lose: 33

After looking over one of my food and exercise logs, Donna B. wondered what BRM was. Well, it’s a typo. I meant to type BMR, which stands for basic metabolic rate. That’s the number of calories your body needs just to live and maintain minimum functions, assuming you didn’t move a muscle all day (e.g., you slept).

Although I’d answered Donna in the comments, she pointed out that this is useful information for those of us trying to diet rationally. So, at her suggestion, I’m sharing that here with you, too.

When it comes to dieting, your individual BMR is the single most important number to determining how many calories you should be getting (or not) per day. Many of us have a tendency to cut calories back too far in the hope of speeding up weight loss. But when you understand your BMR is what’s needed just to keep your lungs and heart working, well, you can see why your body’s metabolism will slow down if you aren’t eating enough calories for those functions along with your other activities.

Ultimately, calculating BMR is a complicated mathematical equation that’s well beyond me:

Yeah. Er, I just use a BMR calculator.

Once you know your BMR it’s easy to figure out how many calories you need to maintain your current weight at your current level of activity:

• Sedentary (little or no exercise) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.2
• Lightly active (light exercise/sports 1-3 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.375
• Moderately active (moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.55
• Very active (hard exercise/sports 6-7 days a week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.725
• Extremely active (rigorous hard exercise/sports & physical job or 2x training) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.9

So, if you’re trying to lose weight you take your BMR x (whatever your number is) and subtract 15-20% to get the number of calories you should eat in a day. Cut back beyond that and you’ll stall your metabolism, along with putting your health at risk. Eat too much more than that and, well, you just aren’t going to lose weight no matter how much you try to convince yourself otherwise.

Just keep in mind it’s not safe to go below 1200 calories per day for women, or 1800 calories per day for men. If that’s where your BMR x (whatever your number) - 15-20% takes you then it’s time to give serious thought to upping your activity level.

It’s not very often that my husband and I get to spend an evening out of the house with other adults. So, when a friend who knows about my Celiac Disease diagnosis invited us over for dinner I quickly accepted the invitation.

She was wonderful about my dietary restrictions, too, running every item on the menu past me for safety. Since I’m still learning what I can and can’t have myself, this meant I had to look almost everything up with both of us becoming increasingly frustrated.

Finally I told her, “Look, if a food is more than one step away from requiring water or sunlight I probably can’t eat it.” That certainly seemed to simplify things. She came up with a fantastic menu, too: corn on the cob with butter, salad, baked potatoes and grilled ribeye steaks. No gluten worries on that menu, right?

I knew I was in for problems when we walked in to find she’d made a gorgeous spread of appetizers. The first thing I saw: a platter of crackers and toast rounds sitting next to a bowl of dip and plates of sliced cheese and celery sticks. Well, cool, I’d have the latter two and steer as far clear of the others as possible.

And I did steer clear, too, or at least as much as possible. Still, I felt like a jerk when I’d back away from her toddler who kept running around with a cracker in his hand and when I had to ask my husband to wipe the crumbs off my chair before we sat down for dinner. I skipped the butter on my corn, too, because I know people who don’t have to live GF don’t realize that crumbs in the stuff from that morning’s toast can mean a night of misery for someone with CD.

Oh, it was heart-breaking to skip the two beautiful desserts she’d made: an Oreo pie and some strawberry fluffy thing in a graham cracker crust. But having felt so much better over these past couple of weeks without eating gluten I wasn’t going to risk it. (Not to mention that I’ve enjoyed having lost 6 pounds in two weeks, a faster and easier loss than any weight loss pill has ever delivered.)

Still, despite her best efforts and mine, I got glutenated.

Within moments after finishing dinner I felt the bloat coming on. A gluten reaction-style bloat isn’t like a PMS bloat or even one triggered by eating too much salt. It’s painful, it’s sudden, and it signals the need to have a bathroom well away from polite society soon. I looked to my husband and told him we needed to go - now! - and he simply nodded then went back to his conversation. He, too, is still learning what it’s like for me to get glutenated now otherwise he would’ve understood the urgency.

Moments later my son began acting grumpy. He’d had very little sleep the night before and, despite my best efforts to get him to nap he hadn’t, so I somewhat expected he’d begin acting out later in the evening. Ordinarily I would’ve responded with a quiet one-on-one talk and dire threats of losing his PlayStation privileges if he didn’t snap out of it. But because I needed to get home and he’d provided me with the perfect excuse — one which wouldn’t offend my hostess — I could’ve kissed him (except he’d eaten the crackers).

Halfway home I began itching. Then the stomach cramps grew excruciating. By the time we pulled into the driveway my head was throbbing and I couldn’t think straight. Just getting out of the van and walking toward the bathroom was exhausting. Then the sneezing and hacking started and I felt like I couldn’t possibly hock up all the mucous in my throat, but that was okay since I was soon throwing up into the trash can (the toilet being occupied by my other end already).

It was miserable, to say the least. The saddest part is that I now realize my days of dining out are over. Oh, maybe someday my body will have healed enough that I won’t be so sensitive, but for now any risk of even the smallest gluten contamination isn’t worth it.

On a positive note, though, having witnessed the severity of my reaction last night, my husband said this morning, “Man, I don’t know how we’re going to be able to visit my family if you react like this to accidental exposure. I guess we’ll have to stay at a hotel whenever we go up there, huh?”

Mixed blessing, this Celiac stuff.

Food eaten:

• Breakfast: 2 scrambled egg whites, 3 pieces turkey bacon, 1/2 tomato roasted and topped with 2 tbsp. Parmesan cheese. Calories: 265
• Lunch: Baked potato topped with 2 tbsp. shredded cheddar, 1/4 c. non-fat refried beans, 2 chopped green onions and 2 tbsp. salsa. Calories:
• Snacks: 2 stalks celery stuffed with 1 tbsp. cream cheese each, 2 c. watermelon chunks. Calories: 203.
• Dinner: 6 oz. glazed ham steak, 1 c. steamed broccoli and cauliflower, 1/2 c. green beans, glass of white wine. Calories: 409.
• Total calories consumed: 1,224.

Exercise:

• Light house cleaning, 30 minutes. Calories burned: 108.
• 15 minutes on treadmill at 3 mph. Calories burned: 71
• 15 minute walk around neighborhood, 2 mph. Calories burned: 54.
• 15 minutes calisthenics (squats, crunches, side lunges and push-ups). Calories burned: 75.
• Total calories burned: 308.

Calories Out - Calories In = Weight Loss
1580 (My BRM) + 308 (Calories burned exercising) = 1888 (Calories Out)
1888 - 1224 = 664 (Calorie deficit).

Food eaten:

• Breakfast: Scrambled eggs (1 whole egg, 2 egg whites) topped with 2 tbsp. salsa and 1/2 avocado, sliced; 2 cups coffee. Calories: 284
• Lunch: Massive bowl of homemade pho soup. Calories: 384.
• Snacks: 2 c. watermelon chunks; 2 brown rice cakes; non-fat latte (16 oz.). Calories: 311.
• Dinner: Grilled sirloin (4 oz.), vegetables cooked in packet with Pam (1/2 c. each zucchini, mushrooms, onions, green pepper), 2 c. fruit salad dressed with lemon juice and 1 tsp. honey. Calories: 485.
• Total calories consumed: 1,464.

Exercise:

• 1 hour light house cleaning, 65 minutes. Calories burned: 222.
• 20 minutes on treadmill at 3 mph. Calories burned: 95
• 15 minutes calisthenics (squats, crunches, side lunges and push-ups). Calories burned: 75.
• Total calories burned: 392.

Calories Out - Calories In = Weight Loss
1580 (My BRM) + 392 (Calories burned exercising) = 1972 (Calories Out)
1972 - 1464 = 508 (Calorie deficit).

Since I didn’t particularly know the best way to bring it up, I’ve mentioned on the sly that I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease (CD) last week. CD is an autoimmune disorder which causes the body to destroy its own tissues in response to gluten intake.

It starts with destruction of the villi in the small intestine - those little “hairs” which help ferry nutrients to the bloodstream. Due to this destruction, folks with CD are usually either quite thin from malnutrition or, as in my case, rather large due to an enormous appetite that can’t be satiated since the body’s not correctly processing the foods it consumes. The condition also brings with it a whole host of other unpleasant symptoms, including abdominal discomfort and distension, anemia, GI problems, mental confusion, fatigue and joint pain.

The only cure available is to completely eliminate gluten from one’s diet, which is exactly what I’ve been dealing with all week.

Yes, I still have fibromyalgia, but as I’ve learned recently is often concurrent with CD. With fibro, exercise is almost indispensable. With CD, my health depends on eliminating all sources of gluten in my diet. (As a side note, Sarah K. was the first to recognize my symptoms. Hopefully she won’t charge me for the diagnosis!)

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Dieting in the Big Apple just got a whole lot easier now that chain restaurants are posting the calorie counts of their foods on prominently displayed menu boards. The law requiring such disclosure went into effect in May but enforcement was delayed until last Friday to allow companies to implement the required changes.

Not that everyone’s eager to learn their Cinnabon buns contain a whopping 850 calories each, .

“I’m going to eat whatever I’m going to eat,” said Erika Roberson, 19, after eating at an Applebee’s restaurant. Of course, she’s nineteen years old so perhaps her metabolism can handle the 2,027 calories in an Applebee’s Riblet meal.

But give her a few years to the point where her metabolism slows and salads seem like a more sensible choice. Or not, because even the

Frankly, I love the thought of seeing calorie counts on menus. Don’t get me wrong: I don’t expect the counts to contain too many surprises. When you order burgers and fries or ribs and slaw you know your plate is a diet-buster.

But what about the hidden chef tricks (like melting pats of butter on plain grilled skinless chicken breasts to improve flavor) that turn seemingly innocent meals into diet land mines? Would you, for instance, have suspected that Pecan-Crusted chicken salad at TGI Friday’s contains 1,360 calories — the equivalent of three double cheeseburgers from McDonald’s?!

I can’t say that calorie counts would necessarily scare me off from ordering an item I was having a serious jones for. But they would enable me to budget the rest of that day’s calories (and possibly the next day’s, too) accordingly. And that means I’d feel better about eating out more often. It also means I’m likely to spend what’s left of our discretionary budget at those restaurants that make my life easier: those who don’t sabotage my diet while still offering choices my non-dieting family members can enjoy, too.

These days, people are cutting back on discretionary spending — whether it’s shopping second-hand or not at all, switching policies to cheap life insurance or going without altogether in favor of filling the tank or taking on second and sometimes even third jobs. One of the first things to go: spending money dining out. Restaurants would be smart to do what they can to attract business, particularly if that means by doing something as simple as posting the calorie content of their menu items.

That’s the new catchphrase for Chubby Mommy, and with it comes a whole new look for the site.

Tell me what you see that’s buggy, will ya? After all, typing comments burns off calories, too!

We’re back from our trek up to visit the in-laws in Minnesota. All in all, it was a good visit: the weather was nice, the food was fine, and even my fibromyalgia seemed to cooperate. The only bad part was my failure to anticipate just how warm it would be up North this summer. Usually when we go up there it’s a good 20 degrees cooler than here in Kansas. This year, however, the summer temps are only just now breaking 90 degrees here, so I counted on much cooler temps at the lake.

Silly me.

By our third day there I’m sure my in-laws began to wonder why I kept wearing the same pair of shorts day in and day out. It’s just so hard to find shorts that fit in the seat without binding at the waist, or which fit at the waist without bunching up between my legs every time I take a step. So far, despite many trips to the mall, I’ve only found one pair that I like.

Fortunately, I remembered to pack all three of my favorite sunglasses. This prompted no end of teasing from my husband who noted that I have more womens sunglasses than I do shorts. What can I say? Sunglasses are a whole lot easier to buy, especially online, and they make such great fashion accessories I just can’t settle on one pair.

My very favorites are my retro-looking cat’s eye sunglasses. When you’ve got a round face like mine it’s important to balance that out by picking frames with angles. (Angular faced gals, on the other hand, should go for round styles while those of you with oval faces are lucky and can pull off any frame style.) My husband can’t stand them, but then he still likes those 1980s style multi-colored reflective sunglasses that make him look like a fly.

Unfortunately, I lost my favorite pair of sunglasses in the lake and wasn’t about to try diving for them. They’re only $15 after all, which is peanuts compared to the cost of a bathing suit (something else I don’t own). So I wound up spending the rest of the week swapping between my Blues Brother-style black sunglasses and my Chanel-style shield shades. The only problem was that I kept forgetting which pair I was wearing and, while the Raybans work great at holding my hair out of my eyes, the Chanel knockoffs have a fitted nose bridge that kept ripping my bangs out every time I pushed them to the top of my head. And, meanwhile, the two pairs are shaped very differently, something which led to some freakish tan lines on my face.

But all of that pales in comparison to the most important thing about our trip: I made it through a week at the lake in Minnesota without one single mosquito bite. Not one! Maybe the funky shorts chased them away?

Leo Babuata has posted a wonderful list of easy (and sexy) ways to lose 50 pounds in a year.

And when he says “easy”, he means it: some are as simple as substituting veggies for chips just one snack per day. Oh, there’s not a lot of ground-breaking info there, but it’s still good, solid weight loss advice.

My favorite:

If you can get 15 minutes of sex in a day, you can burn 150 calories.

Honey, if I could get fifteen minutes of sex in a day I probably wouldn’t find half of my favorite foods nearly as attractive.