Just discovered girls I thought were friends are laughing at me

[ofcoursetheyrelaughing]

Sitting together, happened to look at friend’s phone screen. They’re sending messages to each other about how fat I am. I’m devastated. I can’t leave due to where we are (uni) and I haven’t got any other friends. I don’t know what to do. I’m aware I’m fat, it’s a sore point for me, but I’m beyond upset. I don’t want to be here. They keep asking me what’s wrong and I haven’t got the confidence to say what I’ve seen.

im a grown adult of 33 but this has brought me back to being 16.

Thankyou, will look her up!

Only mean people act like this and you clearly aren’t one of them. I had a ‘friend’ who would purposely not invite me to group things, would just belittle me and generally make me feel shit. I was early 20s and never really had a group of girlfriends before so I was so happy. But she soon decided she didn’t like me anymore and made my life hell, and we worked together to boot.
Whatever you do please don’t let the actions of some cruel, mean girls ruin your confidence and self esteem. You need to ditch them ASAP and move on with your life.

I'll be your friend, I'm fat too quite like it 🫶

If they're being horrible about you - you don't need them as "friends", because they are bullies. But it also sounds like you're unhappy with your weight. My advice to anyone who wants to lose weight is find a daily diet you love - one where you can eat 2000 calories every day or 14,000 calories a week. One that incudes all the things you "want" to eat. A diet you can live on happily for the rest of your life. When you've found your tailored-to-you perfect "forever diet" normal eating, and found that acceptable for 6 months, only then, look at something like walking an extra mile a day (20min) to lose weight and build up fitness. "Dieting" is a waste of time if you can't work out how to eat happily forever within calorie guidelines.

OP hasn't been back. I hope she's okay 🙁

This isn’t about your weight. As others have said it’s about their insecurities. I’ve seen this before about what people wear, their hair, face, their hobbies. Stop hanging around with them and you might find others want to make friends. It’s possible that some people have avoided making friends with you if they know what these girls are like, they might have assumed you’re the same. Congratulations on seeing through their fake facade!

That’s so bloody unkind of them OP. It’s bullying behaviour, no wonder it’s taken you back to when you were 16. Sending hugs.

This is a really good point.

Oh my lovely, being fat does not mean you are not nice to look at, not at all. If you can, please try to take some time to really work on loving and accepting yourself, just the way you are. You may well want to lose weight, I understand how it feels to not like your appearance, but it takes time and in the meantime you need to be your own friend, and that starts with accepting you are beautiful right now. I’m ND too, and I completely understand the trauma of past bullying and not having friends. Your first step could be really being your own friend, never being mean to yourself - because you are being a bit mean to yourself in the way you describe you. These mean girls are nothing, just the scum of the earth really. You do not need them. But you do need to have your own best interests at heart and a good place to start is treating yourself with kindness and refusing to associate with arseholes. One way I have found helps me when I start to talk to myself negatively in my head, is to talk to myself out loud and say kind things instead, like you would to a much cherished friend. Please try it x

I'm so sorry OP you had to go through that. It must hurt so much. Being left out and being the object of ridicule is devaasting. You are not the problem - it is them. Sadly some people never grow out of bullying behaviour. I suspect they only feel good about themselves when they put others down.

It is tough to call them out and if you don't feel like you can do this (which is perfectly understandable and OK), then 'greyrock' them. Be civil and polite but do not spend any time with them. The thing about toxic groups like that, is once the scapegoat leaves, they will turn on each other and effectively will eat each other up. Take yourself out of the game. I promise in time, you will eventually find nicer people and won't give them a second thought.

You are worth much more than they are. Having one kind friend is worth so much more than have 40 fake friends.

@ofcoursetheyrelaughing you have had loads of support and good advice on this thread. It’s wonderful to see Mumsnet being so kind and helpful. Somehow you have attracted some of the nicest people on this thread. So, believe in yourself. You will attract some lovely people in your life. Forget about those nasty bitches.

There will always be nasty bullies of all ages in the world. The only thing that really changes as we get older is that we get better at recognising them earlier and we get better at dealing with them.

@ofcoursetheyrelaughing oh my god :( I’m so sorry to read this. This is bound to hurt you. You have to be strong and call them out- the worst that can happen is they fall out with you but let’s face it- you don’t need enemies with friends like them! You deserve so much better, don’t ever let anyone make you feel unworthy, and don’t let their comments encourage you to dislike yourself, they are the ones with the problem as they have very ugly personalities to do that to someone let alone a friend!

hope you are ok! Tell them you saw the message and you no longer wish to be friends with them. X

@ImustLearn2Cook well said. Horrible bullies!

This is mostly me now.

So sorry this has happened to you, OP.

Sorry you had to deal with this OP.

At university I came across this and you don't expect it really as you'd think people grow out of such behaviour by that age. It's good to recognise toxic behaviour straight away and separate yourself from it.

It could be any reason for bullying, it's just a way for sad pathetic and nasty people to get their kicks.

This is awful. When people show you who they are believe them. Don't let them show you a second time. That is disgusting behaviour. I think girls like this have a lot of issues and do these kind of things because they want to feel they are better than others when in reality that is not what they believe at all. They may well know that your confidence is not where you want it to be and so may well accept this behaviour. Don't accept it. Look at the uni social groups see if you can find anything of interest and try and go along. I'm sure you will meet some nice genuine people. Mean girls do not deserve your time. Wish I could give you a hug and give them the finger on your behalf. Big hugs 😊

They aren’t kind friends or people, as you have found out. So it would not be a good idea to remain in their group. It is not going to get better. That’s the first step for you to take mentally.

You are 33. You don’t really need to be part of a group, in my opinion but that takes confidence and belief in yourself.

Feel the fear and do it anyway. Start looking for new people to befriend and stand up and away from this unpleasant group.

Thanks so, so, so much. Reading this has hugely, hugely helped.

i haven’t told them I’ve seen it. I have spoken to uni - both to chaplaincy and to my pastoral tutor. Chaplaincy were lovely.

Pastoral tutor said it’s up to me what I do; I’ve said I’d rather deal with it quietly and discreetly and not confront them if possible. I think that to tell them that I saw could make life much harder for me over the next few weeks, again this is probably 16 year old self reacting but I remember what happened when (rightly so) those involved were pulled up on it back then - it just made life 100 times worse. I don’t want to turn it into a situation where I’m too anxious of coming into seminars etc. Tutor did say if it becomes more of a problem they may decide they have to deal with it but right now I’m OK to try and manage it.

So in the short time we have to tolerate each other I’m going to be polite, civil but hold back as much as possible; and be exceptionally careful what I say and do. That’s not much fun but it’s the only way I’m going to get through this.

It just hurts, you go back over conversations and wonder how much of it was actually laughed at without me knowing. It’s such a horrible way to treat someone.

On the plus side I did get involved with something else yesterday and the persons I met there were so wonderfully lovely - the total opposite in every way. So I have to focus on that.

Well done! Great attitude!

I think it’s totally fine to not confront them. I don’t think I would. Just withdraw mentally from them as they have lost your trust.

You are in control of your own reactions. You don’t need to do or be anything you don’t want to do or be.

Agreed. If it wasn't your weight it would be your hair / your clothes / your accent
They are just spiteful sad little ghouls.
Block, Ignore, Avoid.
There must be other places to meet people at Uni.
If not, you are better in your own company.

(I had this via MN - a small group who became friends outside of the site. I wasn't available as much to chat about men / make up / clothes & they decided I was snooty & everyone else left the chat but not after LOTS of bullying. I was astonished that grown adults would still behave that way, but they do. No loss!)

Really pleased you've met some wonderful lovely people. Yay.

You've got the right attitude.

If you find feelings and fears creeping back or have negative experience with the unkind group - is there a wellbeing/support service you can call and discuss your feelings. This is better at times then letting them dwell. Nothing has to happen but your voice your feelings and they are being heard. If there isn't then write it down and burn it afterwards.

Good luck. XX.

Well done on the outcome and glad you've processed it in this way. It really is them not you!

I remember when I distanced myself from work friends/colleagues who bullied me but I saw some emails about this... calling me 'lardy arse' and other things. After therapy (CBT, highly recommend it), I had an exercise where you have a pen (like for sheep, in a field) and paper in your mind and you have control of the gate in the pen, so you can open and close the pen and open and shut who you allow into your life, like these people. This really helped me in the final 1-2 years of my time there before I left and got another job. My colleagues were foxed because they expected me to crumble, cry (sort of what I'd done a bit before) but I breezed through the office, being civil, friendly if need be but acting a part.

This is absolutely about them, not about you, but I get completely why this is so hurtful and is eating away at your confidence. You can guarantee they are also taking about each other behind each other’s backs because that’s what those type of people do. You should be super proud of yourself for what you are achieving not dwelling on being friends with people who don’t approve of your physical appearance, you don’t need to change for anyone to meet their ‘standards’.

I don't know what motivates grown women like this; they must have very small lives.

This is awful - and so very hurtful and damaging. But unfortunately it happens at every age. I’ve seen my teenage daughter being put through it - I’ve had to call it out at the school - ( this was Black on White racism in a Faith school 🤷‍♀️).

I’ve had my own Mother in Law do it to me - hitting my number on whatsapp voicemail accidentally whilst she lambasted me down the landline. She did it repeatedly - O stopped being hurt by it after the first time when I realised that she does it to everyone. Now I just don’t speak to her. At all.

It is ALL based on a combination of ignorance- insecurity-jealousy - lack of any empathy and an unfortunate dis ingenuity. There are better people out there. I would call them out publicly and directly on what you saw. Ask them to share and explain. Be brave and make them squirm. Then walk away. Leave them with all that toxicity.