To get annoyed with people regarding diets?

[Arya2017]

I'm 5ft 10in and have struggled with my weight for the past few years. Ive never been overweight clinically but just much fatter than I was used to being and fatter than I wanted to be. I tried numerous diets but because I'm a fussy eater and notorious salad dodger I could never stick to them. At my heaviest I was 12 stone. Past few years I've hovered around the 11st 7lbs mark.

Anyway I eventually got sick of looking for a magic cure (Atkins, akai berrys, 5:2 etc etc) and decided to go back to good old fashioned calories in vs calories out - basically eating less and exercising more. A few months of this and I was down to 10st 11lbs. The rest wouldn't shift so I started macro counting too (limiting fat, protein and carbs in recommended amounts). I'm now down to 10st 5lbs. My goal weight is 10st.

In addition to this, I've drastically reduced my alcohol intake which has obviously had a number of benefits (including increased weight loss!)

Anyway, point of the thread, when I see people now they comment on my change in appearance and ask how I've done it. I explain the above only to be told "oh I couldn't be arsed with all that, why not just go on slimming work?" Or "so you're starving yourself?". These people then continue to constantly moan about being fat and comment on how "lucky" I am to have lost mine "so easily". It's not easy! It's fucking hard! I was bordering on being an alcoholic so the alcohol reduction alone has been torture. Everyone wants a magic cure and when they can't be arsed to put the effort in, they say those that have have basically been lucky.

AIBU to think more education (starting at school level) needs to be implemented so that people don't grow up thinking unlimited amounts of pasta for example will help you lose weight? Then maybe people will realise there is no magic cure - it takes hard work.

[araiwa]

who thinks eating your own bodyweight in pasta would help you lose weight.

knowing how to lose weight is easy

doing it is not

[SafeToCross]

When they ask, they are not really interested in the answer.

[Arya2017]

I think they are interested in the answer - as long as the answer is "oh it was easy! Just follow slimming world/cut out bread/drink skinny coffee"

What people are not interested in is "actually, it was really hard work requiring a whole lifestyle change ... "

[Moussemoose]

I get told I am 'lucky' I am not overweight while I eat my salad and they eat a burger. It's all down to my genes apparently

[PeaFaceMcgee]

Anyone who asks is pretty much going to compare themselves - what they say is what they think of themselves, not you

Very well done for cutting down on alcohol. I'm your height and have taken to a 30min jog around the house of an evening!

[Arya2017]

Yes mouse, I've had that too!

"Oh but you've never been fat, you're just naturally thin like your dad" err no, I've just never had a huge appetite - if I ate like my sister I'd be fucking huge (as she is!)

[TheoriginalLEM]

Some people can "get away"with eating unhealthy foods. Others can't. i think everyone knows there is a genetic element to being overweight or rather not being. People who are slimmer tend to eat more healthy foods.

I am not one of those people and i am woth the OP it is fucking hard. I also have cut down massively on alcohol which has helped. I am aiming for 10.5 stone and am currently 13 stone. I have lost two stone since January. Have really slipped recently as i hurt my back and wasn't able to run so i sort of list motivation. Have started running again but christ its sooo hard. i get home from work at 7, am starving and if i eat i wont run so its eat or run and sometimes eating wins I am.very lucky that dp cooks.

I did my fitness pal and it works. i refuse to be exploited by ww or sw.

[nebulae]

Here we go again. SW does not tell people to "eat unlimited amounts of pasta". It says you don't need to weigh/measure it but a third of your plate should be speed food (ie veg) which naturally limits the amount of carbs on your plate and you should stop eating when you're full.

Some people choose to misunderstand the plan so they can carry on overeating. That's their own fault, not SWs.

[Sirzy]

So you have found what works for you. That doesn't mean that would work for everyone though so you are being unreasonable for being so judgemental.

For the record I have lost large amounts of weight the majority of which has been done via slimming world.

[specialsubject]

Lesson might be to find something else to discuss...

As a matter of interest I ran the bmi calculator for your height. There is more to it than that, but the healthy weight range is between 9 stone and nearly 3 stone more. Which is why people look different.

No food is unhealthy.

[MikeUniformMike]

Nutrition should be taught in school.
Many people think they eat about 2000 calories a day when they probably eat about 3500.

[TheoriginalLEM]

The problem i have with slimming world and the like is that it charges ££££ for disguising common sense attitudes to food as some sort of magic formula. Mfp is free and far more straightforward to so. I guess people benefit from the groups but for me it seemed crazy to pay for what mfp allows me to do for free

[TomaszCanSchafernakerMeAnytime]

Someone told me at work the other day 'you're so lucky you're nice and slim'
I said 'actually I've had to go to bed early the past 3 nights cos I was so hungry'

[KrayKray00]

I agree. I have lost over a stone in the last two month by calorie counting and generally eating better. More protein less "bad" carbs. I also go to the gym 6 times a week and work out hard, it is like an addiction.

I went to a party yesterday and a lot of people commented on my weight loss. I got the "don't go too skinny" I am still not where I want to be either but I'm liking the changes I already can see.

What annoyed me though was I ate one hotdog and got comments on how do I eat crap and stay so slim? It was ONE hotdog and I went to the gym for an hour and a half that morning.

I'm not lucky at all. It's hard bloody work!

Well done with your weight loss and curbing the alcohol intake!! High five!

[Sirzy]

I think some people need that bit more accountability and support. I used MFP lost 3 stone but soon became complacent and started putting the weight back on.

I have lost 7 stone now in total and have maintained for a year. I still follow the principles of SW and still weigh in regularly there because it helps keep me focused if things start slipping.

The key is finding a way of eating/exercising which is sustainable for YOU in the long term. If you go back to old eating habits you will soon go back to old weight..

[BarbaraofSeville]

One advantage of Slimming World is that it aims to make dieting simple by cutting out 90% of measuring and counting. Also you aren't kidding yourself when you eat a 'small' steak that is nothing of the sort, because portion size for basic unmeasured food is unimportant. You are however supposed to eat until you are just comfortably full not stuffed to bursting. It is not within the plan to eat mountains of pasta.

I for one could not be arsed to weigh everything I eat and log it into MFP. Might work if you eat a repetitive packaged diet where you eat only a small number of discrete food items like ready meals or cereal bars but adding up the calories of home cooked food with 10 ingredients and then working out exactly what fraction you ate sounds very tedious. I also eat different food every day so it would all have to be entered from scratch every time.

[drinkingtea]

People aren't asking because they want a lecture, which by the sound of it is what you're delivering. Of course people hope you have an "easy" answer, if they are interested at all and not just trying to be polite.

If you want to avoid the type of response your long explanation is provoking why not just say "it was bloody hard work and rather boring" or say that "cutting out alcohol and dull but reliable calorie counting I'm afraid, it's the only thing that works for me" and leave it at that?

Your post about your sister also suggests that along with a rather extensive and detailed lecture comedy hefty side dish of judgement for anyone still overweight.

[drinkingtea]

*comes not comedy!

[emilybrontescorset]

Yes op it's annoying.
I got told to ' be careful' and ' don't lose any more weight, you are starting look ill' well yes I was I'll. my ex h had left and I sank into a deep depression. Exercising hard at the gym and running saved me from taking my anger out on him!
I didn't want to look ill or loose so much weight but I physically couldn't face eating. People need to think before they talk.

[ppeatfruit]

specialsubject if no food is unhealthy why are our hospitals bursting at the seams with people suffering from diet related diseases? e.g. IBS, diabetes, heart attacks, some cancers etc. etc.

[therootoftheroot]

Ive never been overweight clinically but just much fatter than I was used to being and fatter than I wanted to be.


This sentence is the whole problem with what you have said.

You have approached losing weight from a position of never actually being very overweight really. if i wasn't really overweight and just wanted to lose a stone or so then it would be relatively easy to count calories and log every bite.

But if you have got 4 stone to lose then doing something like you have done is relentless and unsustainable in the long term. You don't lose four stone in a short period of time and so whatever method you use needs to be sustainable in the long term.

This is like Katie hopkins putting on a stone and then losing it to show just how easy it really is to lose weight.

[Sirzy]

Because some people eat too much of the wrong thing.

No food is "bad", some are better than others. Moderation is key and for most people that's where weight loss falls down. They deprive themselves of to many things which means they then become the forbidden fruit and so tempting and then when you start you can't stop and so the cycle of yo-yo dieting continues.

A "nothing is banned" approach means if you want a slice of pizza you can you just make sure the rest of the diet around it is "right"

[PeaFaceMcgee]

if no food is unhealthy why are our hospitals bursting at the seams with people suffering from diet related diseases?

Everything is pretty ok in moderation, as part of an otherwise balanced diet. I'd say 1 takeaway a week etc rather than a daily fry-up, for instance.

[BoonDucks]

You are right OP.
People I know going to Slimming World it seems to be a hobby, a social event. A friend of mine has been going to SW for at least ten years. Whenever we meet up she will say she has lost 3 lb this week and she will then always choose the bacon butty to my salad. I never comment. She is no fatter or thinner than she was ten years ago.

[Wauden]

I am off alcohol for a while and that helps. Its nice to save up the money, but its not forever. Try to exercise at home but don't enough.