This may not come as much of a surprise to some, but lawyers report some of the highest rates of weight gain of any professions due to stress eating and eating out regularly. The study also reports high weight gain for administrative assistants, travel agents and other desk bound folk.
Notably, however, police and firefighters are included in the list despite their more active professions.
As shown by Supreme Court Chief Justice Taft, this is not a recent problem. Moreover, the country as a whole is certainly getting wider. However, the combination of stress and weight gain is a killer for lawyers. I have long discussed whether the law school should do more on programs related to health and fitness in light of the problem. I can personally report weight fluctuations during litigation. I tend to gain when in court due to stress eating and lack of exercise.
Source: Larry Bodine as first seen on ABA Journal.
CLH,
Love the ideas that pop up when reading other’s comments.
Your’s gave the insight (right or wrong) that I felt I could understand the trials (pun) of a trial lawyer.
He is the matador. He stands there alone with all eyes on him. Hia words, research, knowledge, judgement and results will follow him forever after, good or bad.
No doctor stands here in the same way. Oh yes the systmem will protect him. As others here can attest.
But the damage is or can be done to mark him forever.
No wonder he drinks, smokes too much, is a workaholic, inclined to mistresses to bolster him, has poor contact with his children. etc. Any other failings we can add?
Tough profession.
very clever title, IMO.
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OT – also, too, what with airlines ever increasing tariffs for extra baggage and just about everything else, how come super jumbo sized people are A-OK to be in just one seat (+ the neighbor’s usually) and no extra charge for being oversized? Don’t mean to start a food fight ;-), but I imagine it might.
Drinking has a certain effect on weight too. I don’t know how accurate it is, but lawyers do have a bit of a stereotype of enjoying their share and then some of booze. I’m the son of a heart surgeon- physical fitness and the need for exercise is something I take for granted, but I’ve never had quite the conditions an attorney might have to deal with, things like trial stress, uncertain scheduling, etc. that can interfere with a fitness schedule. Still, I feel like crap all day if I don’t get my swim and weights in, and even on days that I work a double shift I head to the gym. I may be a bit addicted to it.
Attorney’s are generally speaking not stupid people. They know the benefits of exercise, and the consequences of poor diet and eating/drinking habits, so I don’t think a health course should be mandated. I do think that they could benefit from law school publications providing empirical based stories and evidence of how physical fitness impacts life span, mental success, financial success, and favorable impressions among coworkers and, potentially, jurors. There are studies showing that people will view somebody more or less favorably based on physical appearance.
BarkingDog and Woosty,
As a solo practitioner, I am sitting in front of a computer screen most of the day. That does add to the weight, if you do not exercise and eat properly. As to the internship idea, any practical experience in the legal field can be useful, but I found that the best experience is doing the work, with proper supervision. When I came out of law school 3 years ago, I had a boss who gave me some guidance, but I learned most of it the hard way and by asking clerks and fellow young attorneys. The bar associations now have young lawyer groups and mentoring programs that can be useful for young and inexperienced attorneys.
idealist707 1, June 12, 2012 at 11:46 am
While I’m writing my little tale, the world leaves for other themes. Sorry missed Woosty’s complaint in the meanwhile.
A very just one too. Who are worse: doctors or lawyers in termn of qualifying, and supervision of competence after examination?
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My guess is that is is doctors, because they are emboldened by the burial of their mistakes.
Big fat lawyers have a difficult time overcoming their appearance when they pick a jury and proceed with the trial. Randy Newman had a song called Short People. Substitute the word fat for short and it says it all.
BarkinDog
Someone above made a comment about solo practitioners. Lawyers who can make it on their own have to be independent, self movitvated, and good with business skills. They dont necessarily have to be good. But as with any lawyer if you are choosing one–look to their track record. Find out from someone at the courthouse who the lawyers are who try cases, who win jury trials. Look on google to see what cases they ever had on appeal and how they fared.
The client needs to do this with a law firm of one or more lawyers as well. A big law firm means nothing. It might bode ill for various reasons such as greed, bureaucratic attitudes, slovenly habits. The lawyer who handles your case from the law firm is the one that matters. Does he or she have independence or is big Senior Partner going to tell him to drop you if your case is controversial or your position is repugnant to the snide little community where you live?
If you would go to the courthouse and watch trials in any given locale, the best trial lawyers are likely to be from solo or small firms of less than six.
It is true that the profession is flooded with too many law school graduates and that those who cant get jobs to learn the basics for the first few years might go out on their own right from school. Bad decision but what are they going to do. For a trial lawyer you want someone who spent three years as a public defender, prosecutor, or civil trial jury work in personal injury or some other field that puts one in jury trials.
In this day and age a solo practitioner can use the internet, word processing, and obtain research and writing skills so that a full time secretary is no longer needed. One needs a live person to answer the phone, to greet clients. One needs nice office space with a conference room, complete copy room and work areas, wating rooms in a nice environment. An “office suite” arrangement provided by some landlords in large office buildings is the answer for the solo practitioner. Been there, done that in a prior life before I was a Labrador.
BitchinDog sitting in for BarkinDog.
While I’m writing my little tale, the world leaves for other themes. Sorry missed Woosty’s complaint in the meanwhile.
A very just one too. Who are worse: doctors or lawyers in termn of qualifying, and supervision of competence after examination?
What misconceptions: I thought that lawyers were like surgeons, if it fails it not me that dies.
As for:
“Being at constant battle is a very good way to create stress, which in turn leads to cortisol pumping and derangement of the insulin feedback system. Then syndrome
x, then heart damage or heart attack.”
Just to get technical: Is continuous high stress=continuous high cortisol, OR IS IT the surging of stress and cortison (ie pumping up), that causes syndrome X?
Are there blood tests, not glucose tolerance, which reveal these “hidden” problems?
And don’t blame me, Woosty started it.
me too. But mostly I am appalled that it just gets ignored and shoulders shrug and then it happens to someone else….all over again.
Sorry you had a bad experience with a lawyer.
Swarthmore mom
1, June 12, 2012 at 8:58 am
Woosty, Most law students do internships or externships in the summers during law school.
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really not the same thing. If it’s not a requirement to the degree, if it isn’t attended with scholarly oversight….why not?
Why don’t lawyers take themselves seriously?
Again, the damage that can be done is terminal. And it isn’t like the profession has demonstrated such a great track record in policing itself.
I can’t imagine a law student graduating into this current legal environment and not being terrified. Why do you do that to students? Why do you do that to the public?
Swarthmore Mom, internships attended prior to classroom requirements are potentially harmful. In nursing the new gradfs are grabbed so they can be taught to comply w/corporate demands….not as patient advocates….it is the same thing.
Throwing some kid out of school and onto the public to ‘learn’ at the expense of the client…is just cheap. Really cheap……
A lot of judges and lawyers are also full of shit, so maybe a huge enema.
I’ve lost 40# since going back to work. Too busy to eat.
I run a restaurant.
I used to balloon up as well….
Woosty, Most law students do internships or externships in the summers during law school. Some are paid and some are not. Last summer my daughter had two six week positions and she has the same this year. Most do legal clinics during the school year. In most law firms the associates don’t have that much authority during their early years and are under the guidance of more experienced attorney. If you are hiring a solo practitioner, then you better do a thorough job of researching her or him and get plenty of references.
Woosty’s right.
http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=53304
the combination of stress and weight gain is a killer for lawyers.
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that is a combination that is a killer for anybody.
Being at constant battle is a very good way to create stress, which in turn leads to cortisol pumping and derangement of the insulin feedback system. Then syndrome x, then heart damage or heart attack.
Being a first responder is high stress as well.
As far as lawyers are cocerned, is there one particular type of practice that
has been discerned to be more disadvantageous to ones own health?
As far as school goes, it is appropriate to inform students of the link and letting them be pro-active….but incorporating health classes in law school? Come on, talk about a nanny state.
I would however like to see new legal grads having to practice under experienced lawyers in an ‘intern’ capacity like Physicians do, as they are just as capable of causing the destruction of lives (if not more so…) as inexperienced Physicians are. In fact, why don’t they have to practice for years as interns after graduating as a licensing condition?????
It ain’t Hanes until Big Momma says so.
If you go to a hospital or clinic that has courtesy wheelchairs, take a look at them. Years ago, wheelchairs had one size, about a sixteen or eighteen inch seat. Now it is hard to find one that size. Most wheelchairs nowadays have enough room in them to seat a a committee. We are turning into a nation of widebodies. I blame TV, the Internet and air conditioning.