Mindfulness report highlights link between mental and physical wellbeing
Slimming World welcomes report on mindfulness and calls on government to invest in further understanding of the links between obesity, mental health and wellbeing, as well as establishing a national training standard for all health professionals to sensitively raise the issue of obesity and weight management.
It is refreshing that an All Party Parliamentary Group is embracing the newer psychological strategies to help change the way our society works and to help people live happy and healthier lives. We welcome the Mindful Nation UK report and, in particular, the acknowledgement that mindfulness has an important part to play in helping people with long-term conditions such as diabetes and obesity.
We agree with Lord Stone that there is undoubtedly a clear link between mental and physical wellbeing. Being overweight or obese can have a serious impact on a person’s mental health as the result of stigma, bullying and discrimination, which in turn can affect a person’s confidence and ability to address the issue.
In our experience, supporting people to make sustainable lifestyle changes must include ongoing understanding, care and motivation and is most successful when delivered in a non-judgmental, inclusive community setting.
Slimming World was started 46 years ago from a conviction that the burden carried by overweight people is two-fold. There is the burden of excess weight itself and there is an often far greater burden: that of shame, self-criticism and poor self-esteem. Last year we welcomed NICE’s acknowledgment of the need for compassion in long term weight loss success as it is something we’ve been lobbying for, and advocating, for many years.
Mindfulness has a number of benefits in weight loss success. It's beneficial psychologically, by being aware of how you are treating yourself, for example, by being aware of and learning how to cope with self-criticism and self-compassion. Research has also shown that mindful eating can help enhance satiety whilst eating when distracted, for example when TV watching, has the opposite effect and can cause over consumption.
Compassion and mindfulness are closely linked and in recent years Slimming World has been working to identify ways to support members to develop techniques to be kinder to themselves and raise their self-esteem and confidence. We have also been working closely with health professionals to raise their awareness of the importance of raising the issue of weight sensitively.
A number of studies have demonstrated improvements in mental and emotional well-being associated with weight loss achieved through Slimming World’s supportive behaviour change programme. For example, a research paper entitled ‘Changes in self-esteem associated with weight change in longer-term participants of a commercial weight management programme’[1] found participants initially reported lack of self-respect, lack of self-pride and sense of failure all of which decreased in association with reaching their current weight. Self-satisfaction, feelings of self-achievement, positive attitudes towards themselves, sense of self-worth and self-efficacy all significantly increased, indicating that engagement with a behavioural change programme and accompanying weight loss is associated with self-reported increases in self-esteem in Slimming World members.
We would like to see a better understanding of the links between mental and emotional health and obesity. We call on the Government to develop and implement mandatory national training for all health professionals to equip them with the skills to sensitively raise the issue of obesity and weight management and for the introduction of a training module applicable to all undergraduate and professional studies that addresses raising the issue of weight with compassion and sensitivity, and never with judgement, criticism or humiliation.
Notes:
[1] Avery, A., Stubbs, R.J., Pallister, C. and Lavin, J.H. (2013). Changes in self-esteem associated with weight change in longer-term participants of a commercial weight management programme. Obesity Facts, 6(1):178.
