Breathe
By Adriana Sandoval
Body weight has carried different meanings throughout history.
history. There was a time when being overweight was a symbol of wealth and abundance; today, on the other hand, thinness and muscular bodies have become synonymous with discipline, success and, most delicately, beauty. This cultural distortion has complicated the perception of health: weight, which should be a clinical parameter for risk assessment, has become a symbol of personal value.
I often ask my patients: do you feel less attractive if you are told you have high blood pressure or high cholesterol? What if you are told you are overweight? Both are signs of risk, but the emotional responses are abysmally different. Weight is the only health indicator that also alters our perception of ourselves.
And this is worrying. Whether we like it or not, weight remains a simple tool to detect possible metabolic changes that may increase the risk of diabetes, hypertension or cardiovascular disease. Yes, you can be slightly overweight and healthy, but reaching that conclusion requires evaluating many other aspects. Similarly, you can be thin and have metabolic disorders; thinness is no guarantee of well-being. In a country where many people do not have easy access - due to economic or territorial issues - to laboratory studies or more specific check-ups, the scale and the tape measure are still accessible tools to detect warning signs. In the clinical consultation, weight is still important, but we are not talking about height, we are talking about avoiding health risks, having energy and, above all, improving quality of life.
However, in social discourse, body weight is often loaded with unfair symbolism: we interpret it as discipline or slovenliness, beauty or carelessness, virtue or defect. But the body is not a moral statement. It is a biological territory shaped by genetic, hormonal and environmental factors, alien to simplistic judgments.
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