Your Weight

Your ideal weight is the weight at which you are healthiest, and for the average person this has been carefully researched by Life Insurance Companies. This has shown that there is a range of weight which is ideal, and the most popular way of looking at this is your weight relative to your height which is calculated as your Body Mass Index or BMI.

Measuring your waist may be a more accurate indication of health, because fat stored around the waist is much worse for your health than fat stored on the hips, and is a better indicator of your risk of diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and heart disease because these fat cells pump out chemicals which damage the insulin system. So it is the 'apple' or 'beer gut' shape with the fat stored around the middle, rather than the than the 'pear' shape with the fat stored around the hips which is unhealthier.

Body Mass Index (BMI) is the normal way to see which weight bracket you fall into. The actual calculation is your weight in Kilograms, divided by your height in Metres squared, which is a bit of a fiddle to do, but you can easily calculate your BMI from the NHS Direct web site by clicking on this link, and using it's online calculator. You can interpret your results as follows -

Body Mass Index (BMI) can be misleading when applied to people with a high muscle mass, such as athletes.

Women with waists over 35inches and men with waists over 40inches are classed as high risk for health problems . Even a lower waist sizes of of 32inches for women and 37inches for men significantly raise your health risk.

To measure your waist circumference, place a tape measure around your bare abdomen just above your hip bone. Be sure that the tape is snug, but does not compress your skin, and is parallel to the floor. This is normally at the same level as your navel. Relax, exhale, and measure your waist.