I'm NOT fat

[TheJollyPostmansWife]

Name change as about to give all details as too late to text friends for advice. Visiting DHs family today, out for lunch where I had a prawn salad. After I finished I reached over to nick a bit of my dds bread and as I did so My DHs grandmother piped up 'not watching your figure then?'. This is not the first time she has been rude about my weight and to be honest I am really pissed off. We see them very rarely and I don't think she has any right to make personal comments at all - last time she said something she suggested I would lose my looks and therefore my husband if I carried on the way I was. I don't think it's important as I don't think anyone should comment on others appearance but for context I go to the gym 3-5 times a week, walk the dog at least an hour every day and see a personal trainer weekly. I am five foot one, 9 stone 3 and size 8. I'm not normally so sensitive but I don't want to see the woman again, she is elderly and not in good health and adores my dds. Aibu to refuse to see her? I would never stop the dds but we live the other side of the country which is obviously limiting.

I'm totes fine, I have been very lucky to have had good doctors/surgeons etc & also had a load of psych help too.

Just the fat to shift now - but have been hampered by a broken wrist too (rubbish!).

Thanks

Weight & size has been firmly on the back burner for ages now, and it was the right thing to do - I'd have tipped right over the edge mentally if I'd been worrying about that too tbh.

Im glad you are better Mango.

In my case if i had to lose weight again i would be doing it for the third time. I lost 10 stone the first time and 4 stone the second time (the 4 stone was a regain so i lost the last 4 stone twice.

I really couldnt cope psychologically with having to do it again so i have to keep my fingers crossed i dont get ill.

The 4 stone loss has taken nearly 3 years. I couldnt cope with having to do it again I just couldnt.

Ive done what the NHS wanted. I would not be happy to gain weight just to suit the cheaper treatments they would want to use.

They are goalpost movers too.

Hope you stay well Helena, it's not until you lose it that you take health for granted.
I'm on long term immuno suppressants now (for next 10 yrs), as the consultant agreed that I'm not suitable for steroids - hopefully they'll do the trick.

Mango im glad you are better and wish you good health too.

There are some great people who work in the NHS The family planning clinic didnt recommend Depo Provera for me because of past weight history. They gave me the Mini Pill instead because if it affected me i could just stop taking it. Which i did when it caused bloating. They were right.

Have you tried the copper iud Helena? I get bloating (badly, up to 6lbs plus a week before my period) but it's quite obvious what it is and goes away quickly.

Thanks fit fatty

Am currently not having sex so dont have to worry at the moment. Will probably just wait for the menopause now

I reiterate that there are lots of lovely people on this thread. Including you, Proteus, I am certain. We all make Joe Hunts of ourselves in AIBU from time to time. It's our prerogative.

Helena I can't take hormones either, have tried all sorts over the years - I turn into a raging harridan and pile on weight!

I got the old style copper coil in the end at 24 (like Fit just suggested), took it out for having kids then went back to it after - only side effect for me was very heavy periods.

I'm not sure why some of the people on these threads are so damned defensive and adamant about what measurements / clothes sizes are possible at relatively healthy weights (I mean no-one's popped up claiming they're a size 8 at 6' and 20 stone have they? ).

I am a 30 / 32 FF, BMI around 25. At my heaviest (BMI 32), I was erm, a 30 / 32 FF (damned steroids). At my lightest fully grown adult weight (about BMI 21), a 30 / 32 F. Big difference there then.....

I'm also broad shouldered, gain muscle relatively easily and hourglass shaped. I am not as in shape as I'd like to be right now, but surely it stands to bloody reason that I would carry a certain weight differently from someone who's the same height, but narrow with small boobs and doesn't exercise? Or that even at 5', BMI 21, I struggled to fasten some many size 8 jackets? I mean, that's not controversial surely? Otherwise every in shape 5' 10" woman would have a swimsuit / catwalk / select your aethetic preference figure and we know that's now true.

No one should be telling anyone what they should look like.

I can understand a GP talking to a patient about weight if it was directly related to their health (big/small/overexercising/underexercising) but no one else should be discussing it.

If you are going to criticise someone's weight or food you have an unhealthy obsession with either food/weight or looks. A person happy with their own self in a relaxed way just wouldn't make those comments.

An elderly relative regularly commented on the weight of girls in her family around 18-23ish when we started to round out a bit (naturally). Most of us suffered eating disorders of one kind or another. Not saying she was to blame entirely, but she did have a very negative impact and I believe she knew it. She hadn't been 'slim' since her late 20s when she'd started having children. She might have been trying to help in her own way, she may have been jealous of our youthfulness. But she was very unemphatic and dysfunctional in the sense that she was happy to comment on our weight but never asked us how we were etc etc.

Thanks Tara. It just gets a little wearying, the constant - almost daily - comments one reads on the Internet and hears in real life about smaller women having no curves, no tits, not being 'real women'. I have curves, I have tits, they aren't huge but they aren't non existent either. I'm in proportion, built to the scale that matches my frame. I can't get bras my size on the high street but that doesn't mean I don't have (a bit saggy after 3 kids all of whom breastfed for 15 months or more) tits. I do. I'm not proud of them, they aren't anything special, but they do exist. And I am a real woman (I know you didn't imply I and people like me am/are not real, but God knows enough people do).

Garlic - Tara didn't say 'I have large breasts'. She said 'I have breasts'. There's a big difference between the two statements. Her statement could reasonably be read to mean that anyone with breasts would need a top that size. Not someone with large breasts. I understand she didn't mean it like that and she has been really lovely in subsequent posts. But you can't have it both ways. If big people are allowed to be poised off at slightly thoughtless comments and statements and medium people are allowed to be pissed off at slightly thoughtless comments and statements then small people are allowed to be pissed off at slightly thoughtless comments and statements too. You might not like that but it's the case. I'm amazed I'm having to spell it out but there you go. Life can be surprising.

Uhtred - actually now I've read your comments I can understand. I am as I said, broad, busty, verging on overweight and hourglass shaped, but I do not think I am the definition of a woman.

Women are women. Tall, short, fat, thin etc. So I can see why you get pissed off. I don't think I'm any more womanly than an A cup, but we'd probably both find it difficult to find clothes, albeit for different reasons.

Uhtred - I kind of agree with you, but the fashionable ideal has always been slender to thin. I agree that thin people shouldn't be subjected to comments the same way fat people are, but I'm sorry, it's a lot worse to be on the receiving end if you're fat. You're constantly bombarded with advertising and articles about losing weight and how being thinner is better. YouTube videos about how to contour away your fat bits. You constantly have well meaning family members making comments like the one OP suffered. Obviously I use well meaning sarcastically.

It's not right, but it's also not quite the same.

And before anyone jumps on me, I'm obviously not talking about cruel abusive comments, I'm talking the general 'you're a big girl' 'aren't you on a diet before you're wedding' 'what another piece of cake?!' type comments.

Actually I don't think it is worse to be fat these days. In the past yes. When I was a teen yes. But now? I'm not so sure. I have many large friends (and a very large husband, built like a brick shithouse so he is) and my sister (who is smoker than me) and I cop far more comments about how small we are and how we can't reach things and how can we survive eating only lettuce (neither of us eats lettuce AT ALL my sister lives on cake I mainline toast like it's going out of fashion) and how silly we look in certain types of clothes and how we aren't real women and how we are only cold because we are too thin (no, if we are cold it's because it IS cold) than any of our larger friends get. People are generally speaking very polite and considerate to larger people - especially face to face, maybe not so much online. People have no problem being rude to smaller people though either online to face to face. I have stopped going to work dinners (and in my line of work there are a lot of these) because I don't trust myself any more to not tell people to FOTTFSOF when they pass comment about what I eat and my size. None of my larger colleagues has felt hounded out of these dinners. Obviuously we all have different experiences but I think it's a bit simplistic to assume it's easier being small. Maybe it's equally tough for all of us because there are certain types of people (man and women) who just want to tear down any woman and whatever they think will work for them, they use.

My sister is SMALLER than me. Not smoker than me. She doesn't smoke.

I bet I've had more 'you're really small' comments than you've had 'you're a big girl' comments. The thing that really pisses me off about them is that I know I'm the biggest person in my family. I know damn well I'm not as small as it's possible to be and still be a functional adult. So I wish they would just can it. But they don't.

Hahaha to the posters that say she can't be an 8. I'm 5ft3 9 stone 3 and a size 8. Sometimes a 10 in somethings but mostly an 8. It's my body shaped that has changed due to having 2 babies in 2 years. What a way to put you in your place 🙈

Well I've had a milk shake thrown at me out of a moving cat accompanied by 'fat cunt' and as I mentioned in a previous post my grandmother has made nasty comments about my weight for 15 years.

I'm sorry you get comments and they obviously upset you, but it still stands that advertising, clothing, everything is geared towards slimmer people giving the perpetual impression that thinner is better.

hello they won't believe you

I HATE the phrase real women. We are all real women FGS None of us are made of fibreglass

I got a LOT of abuse in the street when i was bigger. Things have got worse for bigger people IMO. There was "fat shaming" week on twitter a few years back by a group of MRAs They were only aiming their vitriol at women though.

There was a bloke a while back filming women eating on the Tube and uploading pics online.

Then theres this and its not that long ago.

www.standard.co.uk/news/protect-us-from-abuse-says-woman-beaten-for-being-fat-6761724.html

I've just spent ages finding a post my cousin put on Facebook a while ago, she is naturally very very slim but has recently gained some weight. For some reason it won't let me cut and paste so I'll upload photos.

Again, I'm not saying that comments to slim people are right, just that they're in a different league. And my cousin explains it far better than I do!

.

.

Last one