I fat shamed my colleague

[Notmyname2018]

I fat shamed a colleague and I feel bad about it.

She was loudly talking over lunch last week about how she loves being curvy and would much rather be curvey than skinny. I said that I liked being curvy too - she then laughed at me and said you aren’t curvy you’re a ‘skinny thing’. I replied and said I am curvy, I’m a healthy weight, that doesn’t mean I’m not curvy. Curves are about boobs and bum being shapely with a small waist. She then finished her lunch and walked out the lunch room.

To put it in context I’m a size 10, and I work hard in the gym for my curves. She’s a size 18/20 and is constantly eating at her desk, I’d say on average she eats something every 5 minutes (it’s really irritating I admit).

I feel bad because I have upset her but it was a moment of annoyance because she called me a ‘skinny thing’ (in a horrible tone).

Should I apologise or just leave it and try not to engage in this sort of discussion again?

Ps I’ve namechanged.

I've never ever thin shamed anyone. I have been fat shamed many, many times. Even by family. I have also, when known to be successfully losing weight, aggressively offered fattening food, despite repeated denials, by thin friends who often stealth boast about their slimness while making their disgust about overweight people patently obvious (and I have seen these attitudes transmitted down through a family, from the oldest to the youngest).

@ItsASairFrecht I can believe that. It’s not unknown for people to feel threatened when a friend or colleague who has always been obese suddenly becomes slim and attractive. It can change the dynamic in a group of friends if one of them is suddenly no longer “the fat one”. Sad but true.

I've just been reading on Facebook..Some poor lady who was abroad for a small break..in a restaurant..got up to go to the toilet and BRITISH people, men, shouted across the restaurant "that dress isn't doing you any favours love..you might want to go and get changed" (ie: you're too big to wear that).. cue desperately upset lady. What is it with people that they think it's ok to do something like that?

Good for you OP, she was being rude and you threw it right back at her by sticking up for yourself.

ItsASairFecht
The type of lairy sexist men who would do that are the type of sexist pigs who think they have rights to comment on any element of any woman's figure.

That's a dickhead issue, not a size one

They commented because she was overweight Maisy, and wearing a fitted dress. They were making fun of her size. It was fat shaming. Oh, and they had a woman with them, who didn't stop them.. plus it was said in front of the poor ladies husband. They may have been dickheads, but they weren't expressing a terribly different attitude to size than some posters on MN often do.

Can you really be shamed for something you’re not ashamed of? The OP is proud of her lovely slim figure. She doesn’t seem to be underweight and having a hard time or anything.
If you’re beautiful and know you’re beautiful it’s hard to be shamed by someone calling you out on it.
I’m tiny ( in height not belly) and have to hear about it ALL the time especially from men, as if I don’t know. It can be tedious. It’s a pain buying trousers etc but I like being short. So no matter what people say, I can’t be shamed.

Can you really be shamed for something you’re not ashamed of? The OP is proud of her lovely slim figure. She doesn’t seem to be underweight and having a hard time or anything

Good point.

I think, if we’re going to get all deep about it, then there probably are some things which you might be shamed over which you aren’t actually ashamed of yourself.

I just don’t think this is one of those occasions. I don’t think a “curvy” size 10, (unless she’s 7 foot tall or something), can honestly feel that she was being “skinny shamed” or picked on for being anything shameful. If anything, it was just a silly comment for the colleague to make, as the op sounds clearly fine weight-wise. If she was teetering on very underweight and struggling, that would be completely different and definitely not nice at all to be called a “skinny thing” or whatever it was in those circumstances. A lot of people on here have made the comparison; “you should have called her a fat thing”. So, if, when I was a 5’8”, size 10-12 for example, (not skinny, not fat, but a healthy weight), someone called me a “fat thing” I’d probably laugh and think “well that’s ridiculous - I’m a perfectly healthy weight”.

The colleague sounds quite overweight so it’s a bit too close to the bone to call her fat. Just like if the op was genuinely too thin, it would be potentially very hurtful to call her a skinny thing. It’s not nice or polite to call anyone a skinny or fat thing, but it’s potentially very hurtful if you say it to someone who is genuinely over or underweight.

The op said herself she wasn’t at all offended, nor should she be. She sounds like she has a fab figure!

Not saying the colleague has free reign to say what she likes to the op btw; I do think the colleague was a little rude and definitely trying to get a dig in with all the Tindr stuff and how “men prefer x, y or z”.

My point being that no, you bloody shouldn’t have turned round and called her a fat thing. It’s completely different to the normal weight op being called skinny.

You stood up for yourself and she didn't like it.

Her problem.

Don't apologize. Unless you like being a doormat.