Apparently I'm beautiful NOW

[BlueSilverCats]

I have very slowly been losing weight. Mum has been making comments but I mostly downplayed it, not looking for compliments or mentioning it or anything.

Today she told me I'm actually beautiful now. Jeese... thanks mum. Only took 30 something years.

Every time she moaned at me for being fat it was always followed by "of course it's mainly about health". No , it's not. At least not to her.

Im glad you caught on and responded so quickly, you’re a good example of why outside comments shouldn’t touch us. A lot of girls/women don’t bite back because they’re in such shock. Wish I’d spat back with expert timing when comments were thrown at me.

Something about that generation! My mam has always been positive, even when I was a size 24! My MIL! Jesus Christ! I'm a size 10 now and I'm too skinny, skeleton, gaunt, look like I have aids, ill and anorexic. I've been a size 10 since October! She is a size 8, always has been. Maybe she's feeling threatened about me being slimmer than her?
Congrats on your weight loss. It's not easy, but you did it. You! Be proud of yourself and enjoy your new found beauty 😂

I had exactly same with my 94 yr old mum, she was very fattist, ( sorry must be another word) always on to me about weight, nothing good said when 9 stone, but constantly saying about weight when I was over 10, I eventually got to nearly 14 stone ( I blame giving up smoking lol) then lost 3.5, only to be asked if I was going to lose more when I had got to practically got to ideal weight. She always looked after her weight , and was still careful of what she ate, up until her last 2-3 months

Yes! My father in law has made comments that have made me mad! A lot just don’t get what damage it does.

My mum once told me that I’d put on too much weight. I kind of knew it had crept up but My did it sting. To those who say it is a boomer thing I disagree 100%. Young people today are under just as much pressure to be slim as those who grew up in the postwar era. Not only are we more knowledgeable about stuff like BMIs and exercise we are also living in a society where fashion dictates that women bare their bodies and be tanned and toned. Skin cancer rates are on the increase because young women are using sunbeds more. Women are getting surgical procedures done (butt lifts, lip fills, botox). Occasionally you see a token size 14 or 16 model but they are not the norm.

I’m sure your mum doesn’t just value you based on your weight. I’m sure she doesn’t. The fact is you probably do look healthy and lovely as a result of shedding some pounds and she’s probably happy on your behalf. As someone else has pointed out, our society generally finds slim people beautiful. A few hundred years ago it was considered to be beautiful to be round and voluptuous. Try as we do to fight it, beauty is a culturally imposed norm.

Keeping weight down in our culture with availability of loads of cheap and addictive food is a nightmare.

Talking about someone’s weight is an incredibly delicate subject. Most overweight people know they are overweight but sometimes it’s really hard to do something about it - comfort eating, anxiety, poor food choices, stress. Telling them they are overweight is really hurtful. Ironically it’s clearly hurtful to go on too much if someone has lost weight. It’s a minefield!

well, they certainly manage to turn everything around to your weight. I'm 5.6" and about a size 16, and every bloody appointment becomes about me being fat. I always say, if I went in with a bone sticking out of a break, they'd tell me to lose weight about it.
I have lots of joint and muscle pains and fatigue that went undiagnosed for years. every time I brought it up I was told it was because I was overweight. and I know I'm chubby, but not so huge I should be leaning on a trolley nearly throwing up from the pain when I go to the supermarket.
during lockdown, I got practically bullied into getting another appointment about it. as it was a phone appointment, the doctor couldn't see how fat I am, and decided I was too young for that to be normal wear and tear, and she wanted me to have a blood test to look at my vitamin D levels.
turns out I barely absorb it at all. I'm now on prescription full dose supplements, and I still get aches and pains, but nothing like I used to.
obviously part of a doctors job is to recommend things to be healthier, but blaming everything on you being overweight is very common and means a lot of things don't get diagnosed, because your diagnosis is : Fat.

I find weight an exhausting and boring conversation with my mother - my weight is the least interesting thing about me. I’m about to achieve a huge professional milestone that I’ve worked for for the past 6 years, yet I know what would make her happiest/have the most pride is if I was as slim as I was at 18.

Always shielded as a “it’s not about looks, it’s about health”. As another poster said upthread, do you think I don’t know? Ofc I know, but said professional milestone has been the priority. I am doing my best! And decades of anti-fat jibes at people while out and about (“she’s a big girl” etc) and my Mum saying my partner won’t find me attractive if I gain weight. As if that’s all I am!!

I hate it, and have tried to politely request it is a topic that’s off limits, but then I get snide comments about having boundaries and that I “don’t want to talk about it”. Yes! Because the way it is done is hurtful! So let’s not!

Boomer here , only just .
nope not me , more like my mum’s generation who would say absolutely stupid stuff like “ don’t let yourself get over 7 and a half stone “
” oh suck that stomach in “
“ oh look at that you next to so and so you look chubby “
I have never been overweight in my entire life , often I was lower end of the normal BMI range 🙄 at heaviest I had a bmi of 23

I agree. It’s incredibly upsetting to see your child grow into an adult who is destined for health problems.

To the poster who said they’d be as upset if their kids were obese as if they started smoking, I really hope you are careful what you say to your kids.

I work with kids, we have 3 year olds bringing packed lunches with no carbs at all in them, also same kids telling us chocolate makes people fat. It’s scary. Eating disorder waiting to happen.

Here we go again...

Because everyone of a 'generation' is the same, aren't they?

Boomer. Generation X. Millennials. Etc etc.

So sick of this one-way generalisation

I have life long issues from my mother’s obsession with my weight. I was a chubby child , eating what she provided, and was taken to the doctor at age 11 because I was “fat”. I’m 64 now and can still feel hurt remembering some of the comments. Even as an adult I remember her praising my cousin (tall, size 8 with eating issues) and following immediately by asking me if I was still going to Weight Watchers.
I decided never ever to mention weight/body size in a derogatory way to my daughters. They’re now 33 and when I asked a few months ago they confirmed that they’d never felt under pressure from me. But equally they cannot understand my issues at all.

ODFOD

Not many big people?

Oh yes there were. Not morbidly obese perhaps. But big yes

That there are healthy weight limits and being overweight brings problems?

My mother (born 1947) is exactly like this!!! She was a size 6 before being pregnant with me (apparently). Take her out for lunch and she’s always taking about how ‘gluttonous’ other people in the restaurant are. Constantly talks of fat people gorging their way to diabetes. So I don’t take her out to lunch any more. You start eating a cake and she says how she could never eat that cause what about all the calories. Cheers mum, I’ll enjoy it! Her one regret in life was that (despite her best efforts) I never developed an eating disorder. My BMI is 21. No issues with food at all.

And although this current generation is fairly looks-obsessed, they don’t have the barefaced scathing judgy rudeness about others that my mothers generation have.

Yes this exactly. Though will edit to say it's not necessarily a named generation exactly, but I do think people are reflective of the time they grew up.

It's a bit like 80 year olds saying horribly racist things. It's not okay, would never condone it, they should absolutely be called out on it/educated. But I also understand it's reflective of their upbringing/the society they lived in.

To mum appearance has always been completely linked to success, self worth and how others will see you and if they take you seriously. Echoes of years gone by when to be taken seriously in the workplace women had to present themselves in a certain way, and how you looked made real statements about you (could give examples but some of them i don't even want to give air time to!). Still frickin burns when she turns it on me, even though I have (thank goodness) realised who I am inside doesn't change regardless of what my clothing labels say or if I've dyed my hair and shaved my legs.

Your mother’s attitude is wrong. But disagree with the generalisation that the boomer generation is screwed up about weight. I’m a boomer and the first thing when I had my daughter was ban bathroom scales from ever coming into my home. She’s 41 now with 3 girls of her own..and never has had scales in her home

one of my mums (who is very slim and has struggled with eating issues all her life thanks to being forced to finish everything on her plate) favourite pictures of me, is one of my husbands least favourites. it was a little while before we met. I was a very thin child, naturally, and as a teenager, I got curves, but I was still very thin. I think I was about 17 in the picture, and he says he doesn't like it because I look far too thin. I was always slim, until I hit 30, then I got a bit chubby. and, in fairness, to me I look painfully thin in that picture, even though I wasn't dieting or anything at the time (never have been) and probably ate far more than I do now. I was just naturally a bit scrawny at that age.
in my 40s I actually have appetite issues, and struggle to eat a lot of days. today I've had a handful of pistachios, and a few bites of my husbands omelette on toast. and I feel full. but I'm naturally chubby now.
weight is weird. it's not as simple as a lot of people think. a few weeks back, I went a week hardly eating anything. and I never felt hungry. it was only when I started feeling really weak and lightheaded that I managed to make myself eat something.

I know that's something wrong in my brain. I don't really recognise the feeling of being hungry like I used to. and if I eat more than I feel like eating, I feel sick. so I can't just make myself eat, or it's coming back up again.

and I'm still a fatty. when I was thin, I used to think people were lying if they were overweight and said they didn't eat much. now I know it's really not that simple.

bodies are weird.

Interestingly my mother never had scales in the house either. But if her trousers got too tight she'd be on a three day cottage cheese fad diet before you could say weight watchers. Think I was about 15 the first time she told me I was getting too old for puppy fat, so the message got across all the same.

It isn't fair to completely sweep an entire generation together though you're right. I apologise for my part in that, will try to be better in future. Though saying that nearly every time there's a BuzzFeed article about millennials it could have been written based on me so there has to be a tiny something to the stereotypes😂

Reading this post I would assume that all posters have never said ANYTHING tactless, or upset anyone in their lives....

Is it possible that the OP's mum may have always thought she was beautiful? My parents didn't believe in giving children "too big an opinion of themselves". And I've never heard my MIL complement my SIL to her face, but she praises SIL to the high-heavens behind her back!
Is it possible that the OP's mum was just complementing her daughter and phased it unfortunately? And as PP have said, it seems impossible now to say the correct thing when it comes to weight...

Oh gosh I definitely have. My foot has spent at least 75% of its life in my mouth (not in a gross fetishy way).

There are some very weird ideas about “Boomers” on this thread - they’re not the ones who dieted to obsession - in their teens and 20’s.

I’m sure your mum doesn’t just value you based on your weight. I’m sure she doesn’t.

How can you be so sure? You don't know me, or her.

You probably haven't read all my comments either for you to be so "sure".

Here's another example. In her defence, she has called me pretty before (not often). "Pretty head, shame about the body" was a common refrain throughout my teens.

But if you're sure...

Another one having a go at so called "Boomers" good grief. The OP has always been beautiful, her size has nothing to do with it. Now go and sit on the naugthy step and think about what you have posted...