To think I am not too skinny?

[WhatALovelySingingVoice]

I used to be quite overweight - at my heaviest I was around 13 stone at 5'2 but over the last year I've been trying really hard to lose weight and I'm now 9 stone.

I really don't think 9 stone at 5'2 is anywhere near too skinny but ever since I've reached this weight a couple of months ago I've been getting comments non-stop about how "skinny" I am.

Last week both my mum and my sister pulled me aside to tell me they were very concerned as I am "wasting away" and they really think I should say a doctor as it's not healthy being "this thin". Then later on that day my sister sent me an e-mail with links to various websites with information about eating disorders, anorexia and the health risks of being underweight with a message saying I really should get checked out . Then yesterday my mum gave me a huge half hour lecture about being too skinny and went on about a TV show she'd seen about people who were too skinny and the effects on their health it was having .

I've also had other comments from other people about how they think I've lost a bit too much, how I looked better this time last year, etc.

But really...I'm not too skinny am I?

Am I being unreasonable or are they?

Because you said there was "no societal pressure to be slim" which I just find baffling.

Societal pressure to be slim, and not just slim but extremely slim indeed, is absolutely everywhere.

yes very slim is promoted as the ideal but most people are overweight, therefore it seems logical to say that the pressure (ie forces acting on us) to be fat outweigh the pressures to be underweight?

No one wants us to be fat though! Not even Coca Cola. They want us to be thin and drink lots of coke (like that's possible). I don't understand this societal pressure to be fat that you describe.

We are fat but not because we are encouraged to be fat.

We are lazy and eat too much (sometimes not massively too much as I've already said).

And our weight goes up quite considerably if we fail on a diet.

Why do all anorexics start off with trying to lose a bit of weight then? Can you explain that to me?

they don't

ALRIGHT THEN!

most

I got called gaunt yesterday. Its annoyed me though, especially as this lady was quite large but I didn't call her chubby. Im 5'10 and 10st2. Yes you can see my cheek bones but I have flesh covering them.

no one wants us to want to be fat, slim is advertised as the ideal but advertisements are not the only pressures acting on us.
Coca cola and all other business just want us to keep giving them our money so they design food and drink products which are highly palatable and disrupt the mechanisms which we have evolved over time to make up stop eating when we have consumed enough

it is common, obviously, especially these days for anorexia to be bound up with mainstream dieting and the desire to lose weight but not historically and certainly not for everyone who has ever been diagnosed with it

Like several others on this thread I am 5ft 7 & am 8stone 7lbs
BMI still in healthy range. I am slim & muscular but def not skinny.
Op ignore the comments you have done so well to loose the weight!
You are fine

As Mitchy1inge says, 'all anorexics' do no such thing. You cannot lump all people with anorexia together in that way. Yes, severe weight loss is one symptom, and it is usually the one which leads to them getting professional help, but for many it is far more complicated then that and gaining weight does not equal cured/fully recovered.

To a degree Mintyy is right about society giving out more anti obese and 'low fat' messages (because that is what sells) than emphesis on healthy diet and lifestyles needing to be tailored to different people's circumstances.

My anorexic DD started with trying to kill herself. Anorexia was, at one stage, a tool to help her do this. Far more complex than looking at a magazine of a skinny model and wanting to become them. It was more that the skinny model normalised her life.

OP, I've not read the whole thread (sorry, no time!) but this really resonates with me.

I've not even lost loads of weight, just the approx 3/4 stone post-baby weight I couldn't shift after dc3.

My parents always commented that I was looking a little 'chubby', yet as soon as I got back to my 'normal' (life-long) weight I started getting the 'too thin/too skinny' comments.

My dsis gets the same. She's incredibly fit and healthy with the most amazing body. Definitely not 'too skinny'.

What it boils down to in our case is that our DM has been losing the struggle with her weight for many years, and I think finds it quite difficult to watch both of us find our own ways to tackle that. Both dsis and I have been very open with each other that we're both determined to find a way to maintain a healthy weight as we get older without any of the yo-yo/fad dieting we watched out DM go through on a constant basis throughout our childhood and early adult years.

In my case (dsis doesn't have dcs yet) my experience has left me so sensitive to weight comments that I won't let anyone comment on my weight ("you're looking amazing, so skinny...etc") in front of my dcs. DD1 is 6 and already comments on her fat tummy (she's tall and so slim she still wears age 2-3 skirts....).

I wouldn't say I've been pressured as such into overeating but I've certainly been judged/criticised for not doing it.

When out shopping with friends/family, they've actually got shitty with me because I haven't wanted a McDonalds. "Oh come on, I'm starving." "OK, I'll have a coffee." "What? Why? You can't sit there and watch me eating, just have a burger or some nuggets." "I'm not hungry, I've already had lunch." "Yes but surely you can manage a few nuggets, or how about just a small cheese burger?"

It drives me up the wall. Like the time I went to a Chinese buffet with DH's workmates and their wives. All fucking night long the women banged on about me 'being good', 'watching my weight', 'only taking one trip to the buffet', 'why was I only having a bit of chilli beef, ribs and noodles'. By the time the dessert trolly came along I was actually considering something and just pushing it around the plate to shut them up.

I ate what I wanted and how much I wanted. It had fuck all to do with 'being good' or 'watching my weight'.

Never again will I be going out to eat with them. I wouldn't dream of commenting on how many trips they took to the buffet, what they chose or how much they ate.

Ignore them, they are just jealous of what you have achieved! Only you know the weight you are happy at.

Worral, I'd class those people who try to push food (though I don't think I've been on the receiving end of that behaviour myself) as the same ones that will try and get someone to have a drink even if they don't want one/don't drink. They are life's 'Mrs Doyles'.

I've more or less given up sugar. That horrifies people!

I didn't see them as Mrs Doyle types because I love her Mrs Doyle genuinely thought she was doing the right thing by forcing a 'nice cup of tea' onto people, thinking they would enjoy it.

These women couldn't have cared less about my enjoyment, they just seemed to see my 'lack of food', as some sort of criticism of what/how much they were eating.

I wouldn't mind but I couldn't give a shite if they'd cleared the whole buffet out. It was none of my business.

Okay. Maybe not as funny and jolly as Mrs Doyle then.

And, especially with drinking, you are very much seen as a party pooper if you don't indulge in a drink or 9.

I still don't feel any pressure to over eat. The only person who has made me over eat is myself (though I do realise that is my personal experience and not everyone else's). I didn't over eat when I lived with my parents. We weren't a family of excess or of dieting either. But once I left home to go to uni it was like a whole world of food opened up and I could eat and buy what I liked. So I made a lot of bad choices for 25 years. I have weaned myself off the doughnuts, my blood pressure has come down to normal and I've discovered I quite like exercising (on my terms). School ruined exercise for me. I hated team sports.

The only sports I enjoy are pool and darts

Can't see that giving me a good workout though sadly

Why do all anorexics start off with trying to lose a bit of weight then? Can you explain that to me?

They don't.

I dont get why they feel the need to say things like that.

No one wants us to be fat though! Not even Coca Cola. They want us to be thin and drink lots of coke (like that's possible). I don't understand this societal pressure to be fat that you describe.

We are fat but not because we are encouraged to be fat.

We are lazy and eat too much (sometimes not massively too much as I've already said).

And our weight goes up quite considerably if we fail on a diet.

You are fat because you are encouraged to be fat. You are pushed towards regarding certain types of food and drink as 'treats'. The cheaper food is packed full of disgusting stuff (such as trans fats and that corn syrup stuff) and so is the 'luxury food' (possibly not corn syrup there though). And booze is a serious problem in this country, which has an impact on weight too. People make money out of making you fat. They then make money out of telling you you are fat and selling you 'diets' that don't work because healthy eating is for life not for x weeks. And if you go on a 'diet' for a while then go back to eating and drinking all the crap that made you fat in the first place, surprise surprise, you get fat again. You may be lazy too but if you are, then they can sell you stuff to keep you entertained without exerting yourself, or sell you overpriced gym memberships if they can guilt you into them.

Basically, there are significant vested interests in people in this country continuing all the activities that made them fat in the first place, and in future generations doing the same things. And, as has been noted, the societal pressure (the pressure coming from the majority) is to push those who don't conform to change their ways. Hence the behaviour the OP has experienced.

"You are fat because you are encouraged to be fat. You are pushed towards regarding certain types of food and drink as 'treats'. The cheaper food is packed full of disgusting stuff (such as trans fats and that corn syrup stuff) and so is the 'luxury food' (possibly not corn syrup there though)."

No I'm not, I don't eat junk food. I'm one of the 47 calories too many a day brigade.

or you might be fat because you are poor, like the obese children during the Great Depression (about as far as I got through 'Why We Get Fat')

I'm not poor either!

I'm terribly lazy though and have given up smoking 7 times.

Yep, the cheapest food is often (not always) the most disgusting in terms of the crap they put into it.

Of course, healthy food can be disgusting too (Kale is a case in point). It's not just your obvious junk food that is filled with crap though, that's why the problem is so widespread. If, for example, you dare to criticise cheese, you get hordes of people telling you how wonderful cheese is and how healthy it is etc. Big Dairy is a key contributor to the obesity epidemic, but as a society we bought their narrative hook line and sinker and now we are reaping their whirlwind.