To be gently honest with DD 19 about her weight

Did you really not notice yourself at 18? Might be time to stop blaming your parents at some point in life

Mine are amazing to me just because they are them ! So I tell them .

Compliment the outfit but if she asks if it makes her look fat, I would say that it draws attention to places she probably doesn't want to draw attention to.

Unless she wants to go to a councillor, I would offer a listening ear because what she might need is your guidance, not a random person. She needs to feel like you're genuinely interested an empathising.

Regarding the weight issue, I'd have a different attitude. Just be factual - if she carries on eating the way she's doing, she will carry on having the same problems, or they'll get worse. It that's simple and & black & white. She will see limited or no results if she's sensibly at home if she's eating sweets, or having carb heavy items when she's out such as sweet buns or pizza on a regular basis.

I really don’t understand the need to constantly tell kids they’re “amazing”!
Why?
Amazing for doing what exactly - breathing? Meaningless praise is that, meaningless. Praise is only worth receiving if it’s been earned. No wonder they’re so fragile and need constant reassurance for doing the simplest task.

I would say the outfit wasn’t flattering because it didn’t fit properly and she’d gained weight from eating. I don’t think anyone is done favours by being all body positive and pretending it’s not happening. If she is expressing discomfort with her appearance I’d calmly explain that if you eat more you’ll see it in the way clothes fit.. so if you want to fit in your clothes, find a regime for eating and exercise that is achievable and healthy. That might sound simplistic but this topic gets so twisted around in knots for women and girls. If we attach self esteem to looking good, and we will, then it requires an effort.

This,to be honest. I had a similar problem with one of mine, I never commented on her weight but said she looked gorgeous. Which she did, lovely hair, make up , smile. I knew she was upset but nothing I could say would change anything. She had the attitude that no one had the right to judge or comment on her weight.
Them one day she started telling me about a personal trainer weight loss program she’d started. She worked really hard and lost several stone, she was ready. It’s wonderful seeing how much better she feels. But it had to come from her. Don’t say anything.

I'm on ritalin..
Kills my appetite
I bought a rowing machine,that helps .
My ds has got fat
I bought him sports clothes,we bought an exercise bike and a rowing machine,and we both exercise together.
Our family is currently having a bit of a competition to see who can get to BMI 25 first .
I'm obviously winning....but we are all fat fuckers ..all of us have BMI 27 / 28

I’m loathe to sound judgmental, but I will. 😂 I’ve really noticed this lately too. Very overweight/obese people wearing clothes that look far too small and uncomfortable. I saw an older teen the other day - probably a size 20 or so - wearing a tiny playsuit that was digging in etc.

I know obesity is a problem, of course it’s up to people what they want to wear, and there shouldn’t be any shame in bigger bodies…BUT imo, it doesn’t look great. I’m not even overweight but am very pear shaped with a big bum and thighs that are annoyingly covered in cellulite. Been this way since I was a teen. I’d never ever dream of wearing a thong bikini or hot pants. I mean, I could, but I think I look ‘better’ in other outfits. I’ve known this since I was young - so what has changed?

Sorry, bit of a thread hijack I know! I would be gently frank with your daughter, OP.

It is very hard. She already knows she is over weight and because of that doesn't feel attractive at an age when how they look really matters to them.
You can buy and cook all the healthy food in the world but until she is ready to engage with doing what it takes to loose some weight it won't make any difference.
She might well happily eat all the great meals you make, then go off and secretly binge on loads of other stuff in her room, them wonder why the weight isn't coming off. Crisps and sweet packets hidden away.

I would say absolutely nothing for now except when she complains her clothes don't fit now offer her money for new ones. She will feel more confident and attractive in clothes that fit properly. You could offer to go with her, but don't insist.

It's a vicious circle op. The extra weight causes depression then the depression and lack of self esteem causes more comfort eating.
As the old saying goes, you can take a horse to water but you can't make it drink.
In similar circumstances I found that the more encouraging I was, the more I bought in the right food, etc the less engaged my teen got.
There may (or may not) come a time when she, herself becomes really engaged in getting some of the weight off. I found the best way forward, for me, was to say ok let's buy something you like (in a bigger size but didn't say that) and have a bit of fun together. When I did this, took the focus off food choices, the choices actually started to get better. 💐

Surely you knew you needed to lose weight - it's just so hard though I know.

I'm a size 16 and I know I'm fat. I don't need anyone to tell me because it is obvious really from looking in the mirror.

Slimpod- Well I’m not offering any guarantees but it is a sensible approach and not shaming or drastic and includes reframing and a positive culture. It is cheap and you can keep the tracks long term after so many weeks. Personally wish I had know about is sooner. It has had NHS trials but don’t know any more about that personally. I have lost 4 stone with it and failed at every other diet for 35 years so… helps me and still listening to the tracks and maintaining and coping with blips not regaining as soon as something goes wrong. Weight management for those who find this difficult is a chronic problem requiring long term management/coping skills.

When i look at photos of me before I had weight loss surgery, I see a decade of shame and sadness and helplessness and I wish someone had told me I needed to lose weight but they dont. Somehow you do everything you can to disguise it or find other things to make you happy and because nobody actually agrees with you that you look sad and unhealthy you dont do the actual thing you need to. I think we should be more honest about weight, it rarely is beautiful and an act of self love and you only get one life.

Lots of good responses here and I understand your daughter has ADHD so things are not always simple. But have you looked at other possible medical issues? My DD now late 20’s started gaining a lot of weight when she was around the same age as your daughter. This carried on in her early 20’s and I also found it a v difficult subject to bring up. Eventually I had to address it and long story short turns out she has PCOS and one of the many horrible symptoms includes easy weight gain, difficult to lose weight. Under Drs supervision she was put on metformin which she will need to take forever but it did help her to lose weight. I also think that now she has an understanding of why she gained so much weight it has enabled her to understand her body better. In the last 18 months she has lost 4 stone, completely changed her diet and gotten v fit. She is a different person and so much happier. She would still like to lose another 1.5 stone and she will get there.

Equally WL drugs may work for your daughter but first get her fully checked out medically - thyroid issues can also cause weight loss.

Best of luck op, it’s a tough situation to be in.

Can you choose the right moment to start a discussion about those snacks? What’s she buying? Why? Offer no judgement whatsoever. Listen and ask questions. Validate what she’s saying.

Then carefully suggest a few tweaks to those snacks would be a really easy way to cut calories without much pain. Don’t suggest she cut them all, listen and make appropriate suggestions so she doesn’t start thinking that she could never manage to do what you’re suggesting. This could start off as simply as swapping to a smaller size of the same snack; having X one day and Y the next rather than both on the same day, etc. I’m sure she knows the snacks aren’t the best choice, but does she know exactly how many calories she could save by not having (some) of them? I doubt it. People usually underestimate calories. But that’s good because she’ll see that even if she just cuts out Y and Z, she’ll save 800 calories a day (or whatever figure it is).

Supporting her to overcome her low emotion is key, but a small amount of weight loss, or even just managing to keep up with a few tiny changes, can build self-esteem and make things easier to continue with.

Replacing food treats with non-food treats can help too. This can be tailored to what she personally needs, so, for example, it can be something simple like “If I manage to make these small changes to my snacks for two weeks, I’ll buy myself X cosmetic/accessory/whatever”. Then set another target. After a while, it becomes easier.

My daughter has confided in me she is worried about putting on weight - when I agreed she has put on some weight (no judgement from me, I'm a size 16 myself) she got annoyed and said I was being unkind.

It's a minefield - it seems people don't always appreciate honesty on the issue of weight, even when they ask for your opinion.

I try not to mention weight now and be vague if she raises it. What I do though is give her lots of support when she is dieting and tell her she's looking great and empathise with how hard it is to avoid tasty snacks.

You do know that women, regardless of size or shape, can wear whatever the hell they like whether the wider world thinks it’s flattering or not don’t you?
We aren’t here to decorate the world for the gaze of others.

You can disagree all you want, it’s mine and millions of other people’s lived experiences.

if they’d said when I was 18 that I was too large, my life might look different.

I’ve started using this and if you stick with it, the food noise really does reduce.

I believe there’s a suggestion it’s going to be offered on the nhs soon?

@ffsarewedoingthis i’ve just started on WLIs and the food noise just seems to…stop. I really like that about it. It’s early days, I still get a bit hungry but have much less interest in food, it just doesn’t seem to matter so much so I am very hopeful.
Also I read that Mounjaro etc is about he be available in tablet form so that will be easier than the weekly injections. (These are OK for me, I don’t have a problem with needles but not everyone may be able to do them. )

No, sorry I don’t agree with this at all.

Even as an 18 yr old it’s not your parents’ responsibility to manage your weight. Can you imagine if someone posted in here about their 18 yr olds weight - they’d be swiftly told very correctly that it’s none of their business.

It’s your parents job to make you feel loved and secure, and it sounds as if they did a good job. If they’d been brutal with you about your weight when you were 18, you’d be here complaining about how you’d be affected emotionally and not believing that you were good enough.

I really can’t abide people trying to blame others for choices they made. And I say this as an overweight 50 yr old who was brought up with an appalling diet devoid of fruit and vegetables and loaded with sugar. As an adult I have the choice to eat differently - the fact I continue to eat too much sugar is a decision I make. No one else is to blame.

I do think it’s your parents’ job to support you if you ask for help, but that’s a different matter entirely.

I don’t think you said anything wrong here.

Slimpod is a load of rubbish. It doesn’t work.

Could I suggest you look at Slimpod Living. It is a set of tracks you listen too that help you loose the food noise (honestly many say this works, and it works for me) and a weekly short video designed to life enhance and distract from always being on a diet, some nutritional content too. But not a shaming diet.

Are you sure that they don't know, do they supress it or mask it or just bully themselves to carry on.
With all the media and news about clothes and fitness. Surely they know.
Which makes it really difficult to get them to face the facts and deal with it. As the OP has said.
I am not concerned about 'looks' of people but I get quite worried about health problems.

‘I’m your mum so to me you always look lovely but I think you’re asking because you’re fed up with having put on weight.’ This needs to be framed as a ‘her’ thing, not a ‘you’ thing.
Follow up -give support but agency ‘is there anything I can do to help? You know I’ll help you with anything you need.’