| I don't know if pressure to be slim has some kind of rebound effect, making people get fatter. But I will say that as an obese person, a fat person all my life, I have never felt more "at home" and comfortable in the world than I do now. I feel so much less judgment or lack of acceptance than I did when I was a child or in my 20's or even 30's. (I am now almost 50.) There are so many more obese people around that I am just one of the crowd now. And even people who seem to be considered normal weight by everyday standards are much chubbier than they used to be.
When I was a teen, I had trouble finding clothing big enough for me. I wore a "junior" 15 --or 17 on the rare occasions it could be found. Now there are extended sizes available at every store, and even whole departments of their own for extended sizes. It is easy to find large size clothing because it has because those sizes are now common. And I see teens shopping in the same areas as me, many of them getting sizes larger than me, who has only gotten bigger over the decades. Where can they go from here? What is in their future?
I look at teenage girls who are probably50-80 pounds heavier than I was at that age and they may be walking with their boyfriend. My body size pretty much precluded me having a boyfriend when I was a teen. I look at my teen photos and think that if I were growing up now, I would barely even be considered a little heavy. But at 5'2" and 145 pounds I was then definitely one of the fat girls.
So on the whole, I think that Americans have shifted their perceptions. They may know, academically, that a girl at 5'2" and 145# is not likely to be her healthiest, but they probably no longer think of her as "that fat girl." I really don't think there is any real stigma anymore to that height/weight. It is okay, comfortable.
So I also look at the many teens who are as fat or fatter than I was at their age and think, oh my gosh, we might soon be a society of diabetics. How can this be? What has happened? I was diagnosed at about 35; when will so many of these young people be diagnosed?
My diagnosis age used to be considered young for T2. I don't think it is unusual any longer.
I am sad about the idea of more and more people having this T2 problem.  | 
