Fleeting comments that still sting years later

[HoorayFriday]

I was early 30's and single. Dating, but having zero luck and wondering if I'd die alone at the bottom of the stairs with my cat eating my big toe.

I confided in my best friend at the time, I was feeling low about myself and sad. Fed up of the dating world.

She said, her partner had told her that "if I lost a bit of weight I could have anyone I wanted".

Was it a back handed compliment? Meant to hurt me? Meant to make me feel better? Why would she say that? I had no idea.

Years later, it still pops up in my head like that unexpected morning pimple.

I've always carried a few extra pounds, I love my food! But, I was by no means what you'd describe as "big".

Anyway, it stung. A lot. And certainly didn't make me feel better.

It made me wonder if anyone else had a carefree passing comment, that probably meant nothing to the person who said it, yet hit you to the core and stayed with you years later?

I once went to the GP when I was about 11 and he commented on my weight and that it wasn't good that I weighed twice as much as my younger brother. My younger brother who was 8 and small compared to me being nearly 5'6" at that age.

I'm certain that was a catalyst for my life long problems with my image and food.

Your poor friend living with her as an M?

A project manager told me he had employed me because he didn't fancy me (he had a reputation for shagging his assistants, despite being married). It didn't stop him coming on to me sober at a conference in Nottingham.

When DS was about 2yo, we were in a playground, and he was trying to climb on equipment intended for bigger kids. I said to him, no you can't go on there, it's too big for you. Another mum, complete stranger, looked me straight in the face and said "there's no such word as can't". Ridiculously, 21 years later, that still stings. These days I would have a response instead of just walking away.

FIL - "your face has a permanent sneer." It doesn't, it's just how I look when that CF is in the same room.

Not a comment directed at me, but on my DD's first day at pre-school, I was invited to stay for the first hour. They were playing outside having a lovely time when a boy older than her came right up to her face and said "I hate you!" out of nowhere. She looked so happy and carefree before then so shocked and taken aback. I know he was probably only about 2 or 3 but it was so toxic and so unexpected, and had the potential to completely throw her. It didn't thank goodness only in a small way and for a short time.

What? Firstly such a weird comment. Secondly why was she feeling your spine during your smear? I hope you ignored her and I also hope you feel comfortable going for smears in the future.

As a teenager I had mild acne. My grandmother said "it's your own fault, you're always hugging the cat".

When I was 9 my DM called me a "spoiled little cow" as she went into her room. Still not sure why she said that but I remember telling my friends at school about it.

So many, mainly from my mother, but the worst was from a teacher. I was being horribly bullied due to a disability - a group of girls formed a circle around me and started chanting. I went to this teacher who dismissed me saying 'Sticks and stones may break my bones...'
I will never ever forget the name of the ringleader either. How I'd love to meet her now

"Because you're easy".

Said to me by a guy I was so in love with. We had been together for a few months when we were 17/18.
Met up again randomly in early 20s and started seeing each other again. I was totally in love with him and thought this was it, we were meant to be.

We'd been texting about something and he was getting sharp with me and told me I was so annoying so I asked "if I bother you so much why are you even talkin to me?"..and he immediately typed back "because you're easy".

Still makes me feel sick and dirty when I think of it.

Wow that is beyond rude. She must be so very jealous of you to even think up a comment like that, let alone say it out loud.

A friend's boyfriend in school thought it would be hilarious to tell me that when my friend's step dad saw the class photo, he saw me and said 'fucking hell she's got a big nose'. After years of horrendous bullying about it, I was fully aware of this fact, I didn't need so called friends reminding me of this fact :)

Sooo many:
-You're pretty enough, but your mother was beautiful (grandmother several times)
-My goodness, what tiny eyes you have (older girl doing makeup)
-why would he be with her, she's ugly and has a huge nose (dickhead)
-I'm just going to call you 'weird hair' (can't remember and don't care)

The thing is, in my head I'm gorgeous. Proper gorgeous. Shame that cameras and mirrors don't reflect that.

While I was working my notice in a job I hated and didn't have anything lined up, team leader colleague said to another colleague, in front of me, that "Oome is leaving to become a prostitute". I didn't know how to respond to that. So very rude and unkind.

My school best friend told me I didn’t have the legs to wear short skirts. I have always had what I consider to be big thighs. The rest of me is quite slim. I’m only a size 8, but my legs are short and my thighs are muscular. Probably a bit of puppy fat when I was younger. Anyway I would do anything to have smaller thighs. Still! We’re still friends, albeit long distance, and I bet she’d be mortified to be reminded what she said and the effect it had on me.

My DM wasn’t great either. It wasn’t intentional but she was very thin as a child and slim as an adult and would constantly point at “fat women” and tell me in a staged whisper how disgusting they were. Pointing out bits of them she thought were horrible. She was a lovely person usually. But in the 80s and 90s women were not kind about each other!!. It’s no wonder I had an ED for many years.

Once when she was a bit pissed I overheard her talking to my friend at my DD’s christening. “Busty has always been very thick around the middle” 😳 I’m really not! I never have been particularly (it’s the thighs, not the middle which is the problem! lol!!!) Anyway thankfully I was able to roll my eyes and laugh. It didn’t sting. But what a ridiculous and potentially hurtful thing to say!

"My mum said you ruined the photo" - from a boy in my class at comprehensive school, about the yearly class photo.

Oh crikey where do I start with this one? My dad said I was "mildly overweight", had difficulties communicating with family (bit rich coming from him), looked at my CV and said I had the typical underachiever's CV and said it was my fault I was in an abusive relationship.

My mum said I had a face only a mother could love.

One time I passed by some builders and one said very loudly "what are you looking at her for? She's got a wobbly arse."

‘There’s a pretty one is everyone family and in your one it’s your sister’

I was about 8.

I would have been absolutely mortified at this and was picked on myself at that age, but now, with the benefit of wisdom, I bet it was something he'd heard his older brother say, or read it as a joke somewhere, and he couldn't wait to try it out. Also, not just saying this but I'll bet it was a contrary thing where he picked your friend as the dreamboat when actually it would have been you - because it's too obvious to pick the actual dreamboat as the dreamboat.

I got told (at least 20 years ago) by a very senior member of the organisation I was working in that I'd been 'too frivolous' in a meeting 😂I still think of it, but use it more to consider if I should be more so - at least it got me noticed!

One which I'm sure was never intended: my little sister was a very cute, petite toddler with masses of ringlets. She was so striking that people would stop my mum to comment on what a beautiful child she was - while I, a couple of years older, tall and gangly, and straight-haired, was standing right there. This happened all the time. I got it into my head that I must be ugly or weird-looking. It's still strange to look back at photos and see a perfectly nice-looking little girl.

I continued to be tall and went into puberty quite early. When I was 12 my classmates and I were walking along in front of some boys in our year, who all decided to discuss the size of my bum (in Tammy Girl jeans) compared to the others'. One of them said "It looks like if you stuck a spoon in it, jelly would come out," which strikes me now as such a weird thing to say... but at the time I was mortified. For the next several years I corseted myself in support tights and very tight jeans for fear anyone would see my bum wobble. It was the 90s and the era of Kate Moss etc...

There was also the time a police officer came into school to teach us self-defence and called on me as a volunteer, saying "You look like a big bruiser". It took me a DECADE to realise that, as a tall adult man to whom all teenage girls likely looked quite small, he was joking: he probably didn't think for a second I would take this literally. (Still can't believe he said it.) I still have difficulty not thinking of myself as huge, ungainly and taking up too much space.

I’ll preface this by saying that although I have a good relationship with my mum, this is only because I’ve learned to stand up to her and tell her to stfu. She doesn’t intend to make people feel like shit, she just doesn’t understand how people can be offended by what she sees as factual/just being honest. I’m 99% certain she’s autistic to be honest.
She’s also never worked (housewife) and has no hobbies, so her greatest achievement and pride in life is that she’s the same weight and dress size (4-6) now at 62 as she was at 15 when she left school. I feel quite sorry for her to be honest.
At 14 she said to me “you’ll never fit your big arse in that skirt”, and similar at 21 when I had a six month only baby, “you’ll never fit your thighs in skinny jeans again”. I was a size 8 and 10 respectively.

My HoD in my first job tried to get me fired out of the blue at the end of my probation period, after professing satisfaction with my work all along -- he just came out with something he had literally never mentioned as an issue at an extremely formal meeting that usually operated as a mechanism for confirming someone in post. It was pure spite, as I discovered later he hadn't wanted me, he'd had another candidate in mind.

That’s horrible, @NotestoSelf I hope you got the job anyway, made yourself indispensable and then dumped them for something much better.

I had something similar once, with a boss who had taken an instant dislike to me, for no reason that I could ever fathom. But I bet there are already entire Mumsnet threads on that subject!

When I was a late teen I was clothes shopping with my DM and Dsis and when we tried on an outfit my DM commented to the shop assistant that my Dsis was beautiful and that she could wear a bin bag and still look stunning, and then proceeded to just look at me and ask if I wanted her to fetch the next size up. I was only a size 10!! I still suffer feeling large and unattractive 20+ years later. It wasn't said with any malice and she'd be heartbroken if I ever told her but it still hurts.

I remember being around 9 or 10 at school, and a few kids were talking in class when we shouldn’t have been. The teacher did tell us all to be quiet, but also singled me out in front of everyone and said “Kanojo! You have a deep voice and you should use it carefully”. Over the years I came to remember it as “you have a deep voice for a girl” but I can’t be certain that’s what she said. I had never thought of it before, but for years afterwards I was conscious of my voice and that it sounded masculine for a girl. I stopped putting my hand up in lessons and was much quieter. I was always a good student at school, but this teacher just never seemed to like me and embarrassed me like that more than once.

The other one wasn’t directly at me, but I bet a lot of people who have been overweight can relate. I was with a group of friends from my halls at university and Guy A was telling a story about a night out with his course friends, including “Amy”. Guy B couldn’t remember who Amy was so asked, and A puffed up his cheeks and held his arms out to indicate a fat person. “You know, Amy”, “oh yeah the big girl”. I knew Amy was the same kind of shape as me at that time, short and size 16-18. These guys who were my friends, and Amy’s friends, thought of people like us like that. I wasn’t angry with them, but I’ve always thought that I just have to accept that this is how people will always see me as a bigger person, even though I have lost weight now. I’ll always feel like someone might describe me by puffing up their cheeks and holding their arms out.

@bravotango

What a hideous, vicious, nasty man that person was.

I'm sure you won't have been the only poor soul to have had his wrath. Someone that awful will have sadly shared his joy widely,

Let's hope he got a taste of his own medicine at some point xx