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Re: Other side: "Why don't you just gain some weight?"
of course, I never had anyone say nosy pregnancy things to me when I was pg either, so maybe I just scare people Lol.
I'm not trying to say that it is the same, I just would like to point out that if one more mofo makes some comment about me eating a biscuit, I'm going off. I should have cussed my grandfather out about the miscarriage comment, but I was in another family member's house and it was Christmas. Baby Jesus saved his azz.
Then obviously you've never had your own mother tell you that you deserve to have the other girls in school shun you and say, "Why do you think, skinny minny?" when you ask her why they are so mean to you for no reason. Obviously you've never had a boss who you overheard telling another supervisor that she passed you over for a promotion because "there's something wrong" with you being so thin, meaning an eating disorder, meaning you are too distracted by constant diets in their minds to handle extra responsibility. Obviously you've never tried 20 things on in the fitting room and found yourself crying because they were all too big and made you feel like a mutant, and the sales girl practically shouted at you, "NO, we don't have any petite sizes!" If you had family members behave as if their love was conditional upon you gaining weight so you would "fill out" and "look like a woman," or forced yourself to eat even when you felt sick just to make other people happy only to find that the 5 pound weight gain isn't good enough for them, you might understand about the emotional pain. I'm glad nobody did this to you, because nobody should have their own family do this to them, but I assure you, it can be very emotionally painful.
Speaking as a fatty fatty fatterson, absolutely none of this was offensive. I agree with everything you said. The part I bolded about the media is one thing I was trying to get at earlier, so thank you for saying that better than I did.
40/112
Yup, I have gotten similar comments when talking about IF. "Maybe if you gained some weight, you'd get pregnant!"
I have always struggled to maintain a healthy weight (can't gain no matter how much I eat) and have been mocked for being anorexic/a "concentration camp inmate"/you name the insult since I was a kid.
It sucks.
Even if it stems from jealousy a lot of comments to skinny girls are mean spirited, not all but definitely some.
On the flip side, not all comments made to overweight/obese people are out of disgust, some are out of pure concern and nothing else.
Legit question here- Did anybody in any of these threads (both too skinny and too heavy) have a mother who was encouraging and positive about body image and health and you still ended up with eating/food issues?
Maybe I'm completely naive here but I find the number of people who had mothers that were constantly tearing them down based on appearance to be really, really high.
Maybe I really was just that lucky to have the mother I did.
This is why I didn't tell my family about my m/c. I started to tell my mother and she immediately changed the subject to my diet. I let it go and we have never discussed it again, nor did I bring it up to any other relative. I don't think I could have handled it. Kudos to you for not killing that crusty old bastrd where he stood.
My mother has NEVER done that to me. Namely because she too is thin. LOL I have never felt anything but normal when I was home. That's why I was shocked in jr high when someone asked if I had an eating disorder.
My mom was always a stickler for eating a well balanced meal. I don't always eat as well as I would like, but like my mom, I tend to cook meals that are balanced and always keep veggies and fruit in the house.
The only comments I've had about my weight were from other people - classmates, co-workers, and my azzhat grandfather. Right before my wedding, my grandmother noticed that I had gained weight ( was around maybe 142lbs) and said "GIRL, You are getting FAT. What are you eating?!" *sigh* No woman, I changed bc pills and I was fighting with my dr because I was convinced that the pills caused the weight gain. After I stopped taking the pills, my weight stabilized.
Girl, look, my uncle and my husband (my now ex-h) did one of those Color Purple close up the piano moves because they KNEW I was about to cuss him flat the fluck out. I didn't but told him that my weight had nothing to do with a miscarriage. Azzhole.
I agree, but even comments coming from a place of concern are still hurtful and embarrassing. A few years ago my boss - my actual boss - asked me if my doctor had ever spoken to me about my weight b/c he was worried I had an eating disorder. Yeah apparently he was "just concerned," but since he had no reason to be it's still hurtful to think people you encounter view you as a walking, diseased skeleton in need of medical attention. I imagine obese people want to throat punch their "concerned citizens" and burst into tears just like I did.
I've had people make comments about my weight before (I'm 5'7" 130# now, at my lowest for this height I was closer to 120). It doesn't particularly bother me, although it does often strike me as stupid, since I'm nowhere near underweight (which I think gets into our societal misconception about healthy weight).
I do get a little irritated by comments like "You're so lucky, you can eat whatever you want!", because I can't. I'm hypothyroid, I have to be quite careful about what I eat and how much I exercise to maintain a healthy weight, and I think it's sh!tty in general when people assume that because they are having a difficult struggle with their weight, and that it has included gaining weight, that someone who isn't overweight isn't actually having to work to achieve that.
I don't think it's the same issue as fat-shaming, but I don't think it matters. To me, comments about being underweight aren't that cutting, because I'm happy with my weight. There are obese people who feel the same way. There are plenty of people who are thin that have body image issues, and it's just as sh!tty to poke at them as someone who's fat, and I don't give a rat's ass whether it's from disgust, jealousy, or whatever.
That is kind of my point though.
Someone saying something assy to you doesn't make it okay just because they were saying it because they were jealous... even if the one saying it didn't think they were being assy.
Everyone just needs to STFU about everyone else's weight.
Caden -
Lest we not forget being called ...
All three of these I have heard before. Olive Oyl and Skeletor were by kids and family members. Jack the Pumpkin King was in college.
Granted, again, it was never the experience of being bullied like overweight kids have to endure, but I did want to punch a few folks in the eye.
I'm 5'6" and my doc is happy when I'm staying above 120. I get all sorts of rude comments, but it's when I'm weighing below 100lbs. Of course, I've got kid-bearing hips and linebacker-worthy shoulders, so my weight loss is usually hidden until it affects my face.
And frankly, it's not the "Eat a cookie" comments that bother me, it's the "it must be great", "I'll trade you any day", and the "you look great" comments that bug me.
I always wonder how gadawful comments like that are to someone with an eating disorder like anorexia. I'm pretty damned sure they don't take it as a "they're just jealous" compliment, and the pointed attention on their weight helps maintain the eating disorder. (Just like someone being upset over being called fat may cope by eating).
DD #1 passed away in January 2011 at 14 days old due to congenital heart disease
DD#2 lost in January 2012 at 23 weeks due to anhydramnios caused by a placental abruption
I am not trying to minimize the hurt/humiliation that some people get about being too thin, because no one has the right to comment on someone else's body, however; in this country, I feel like:
making fun of someone for being "fat" is also implying that they are stupid and lazy;
making fun of someone for being "skinny" implies admiration and envy for their willpower and/or activity.
Does that makes sense? They are both loaded words, but loaded differently.
I am sorry to anyone who has ever been made to feel badly about their body type, regardless of their weight.
Just jumping in to validate the OP.
To all of the doubters, I actually HAVE heard the "how doesn't he break your hips?" line, too. I, luckily, haven't had anyone hand the guy I was with her numbers telling him to call when he wanted a "real" woman, but like Caden, I could probably fill a wall of text with the nasty comments I've rec'd about my weight over the years.
Until very recently, I hovered around the 105lb mark at 5'4", and was STILL getting nasty comments. I'm now up to about 110lb, and I don't receive quite as many (though I still get a few), but I still get nasty stares and eyerolls when I order a chopped salad, or when I offer to split a candy bar with someone. I just don't like fast food or sugar - though gpoint at tartargua can attest to my weakness for french fries - I'm not a fan of salty things, and I'm one of those weird people who never really recovered from my gallbladder surgery, so I can't physically eat a lot of fatty foods without become ill. I don't know that there's any way I could possibly eat enough to gain the kind of weight that people seem to want me to gain without becoming violently ill all-day, everyday.
I get that the comments are coming from a place of jealousy, I really do. But that does NOT erase the hurt that they cause in the least. I spent a lot of time as a teen (when I weighed closer to 90 lbs and was flat as a board) crying over the comments I heard. And a lot of time in my early twenties a bit teary-eyed over the "you're not a real woman" comments I heard because I didn't have curves.
"You don't get to be all puke-face about your kid shooting your undead baby daddy when all you had to do was KEEP HIM IN THE FLUCKING HOUSE, LORI!" - doctorwho
Ok, so a bunch of people have said now that they don't think the weight I listed for the height I listed is excessively thin. TBH, I don't think so either, but people have always acted like it, and clothes don't fit me, so I presume I must be. Here's a pic of me at 118 about a year before my BFP. I should point out:
1) This is the only full length pic of me on my computer right now aside from wedding pics, which I won't post because my H doesn't like me putting pics of him online, and of course he's in my wedding pics. I do realize that posting a pic of me towel-snapping the Old Spice guy is kind of absurd. (And you might have to scroll over to see me in some browswers--I am not secretly a man.)
2) Later at this same party, a woman my H used to work with was talking a lot of sh*t about me being skinny and being really touchy-touchy on him, right in front of me, until I told her to go the f*ck home and sober up before I put a foot up her @ss. Again, not the first/only time, but one of the more embarrassing ones since we go to this industry event every year so I know I'll probably see her again.
Hello all, lurker popping in. I have always been tiny. I have been asked some of the same things as some on this thread, am I anorexic? Can I not just eat a cupcake or something? It doesn't matter to me if it comes from a place of envy or from spite, it is still extremely hurtful to hear. And I am not sure if the person who is having these comments made to them can tell the difference.
Zeus and Bubba
At 5'6", 105 lbs in high school, I used to get the "eat a sandwich" comments all the time. That didn't bother me as much as when teachers would speak to other teachers about how they thought I had an eating disorder, and then address the issue to their classes (my friends- it was a pretty small school). I had sit downs with the principal a couple times to discuss my "issue". It was pretty embarrassing.
I guess it would bother me more though if I was overweight and people were having the same discussions about me. Because I knew I was healthy, and everyone that was close to me knew I was healthy, it was easy enough to let the comments roll off my shoulders.
(OP, I know you aren't saying one side has it better or worse than the other.)