Overweight and obese are two terms that people almost always use interchangeably. It’s easy to do so – both words point to an individual who has more than enough fat stored in his body. In a social way, both will probably be the same.

A person who is obese often has issues about self-esteem in the same way that one who is overweight does. No matter how tempting it is to think that the fatter individual has the lower self-esteem, usually, the way the self-esteem suffers is not even proportional to the amount of excess weight one has. Except for extreme cases where obese people have to be lifted by cranes to pull them out of their rooms,  self-esteem disturbances are usually the same for all people with weight problems.

From a technical perspective, however, an obese person is quite different from one who is overweight. The difference will lie in a certain number called the Body Mass Index or BMI. BMI is the ratio of body weight to height, whereby a BMI of 25 – 29.9 indicates a person is overweight and 30 above means the person is obese.

BMI calculators are widely available online where anyone can just enter weight and height and wait for the numbers to come out. To have a better appreciation of the measurement, though, it is good to calculate this amount manually and there are two ways to do this:adf

Imperial BMI Formula: (uses pounds for weight and inches or feet)

BMI = weight in lbs * 703 / height in inches2

Metric Imperial BMI Formula : (uses kilograms for weight and centimeters or meters for height)

BMI = weight in kg * 703 / height in cm2

It is important for one to know his BMI because to merely estimate heaviness or obesity does not give an accurate picture about the person’s real weight situation.

Another difference between obese and overweight may be the urgency of the need for the concerned person to start losing weight. Naturally, an obese person will have exposed himself to risks of developing a myriad of diseases such as heart disease, stroke and diabetes while a person is simply overweight may still be healthy, except for the fact that he does need to do something about his weight and not have to wait until he becomes obese.

When it comes to weight loss, whether for the obese or the overweight, the classic formula is increasing physical activity and decreasing food intake. These days, however, diet portion of the weight loss formula also requires a careful choice of the food a person eats. This means now, we recognize the value of different types of food and not just the amounts in which we consume them.

Alkaline diets fit perfectly into the picture. An alkaline diet is one that consists of non-acidic, non-addictive and, most of all, healthy food, mostly fruits and vegetables. We know that acidic food such as meat, corn and beans tend to make our bloodstream acidic as well, prompting our bodies to build more fat as a defense mechanism that keeps the acid away from our cells to prevent corrosion of our tissues. Besides, acidic foods are simply nutritionally fattening.

Indeed, going alkaline will provide the perfect food alternatives for anyone, obese or overweight, who wants to shed off that extra poundage and start being healthy.