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.

Yes they did, thinness has been celebrated well before the boomers. The silent gen also celebrated this, they had advertising too, albeit written,

Erm, congratulations…?

It’s implicit in naming a generational group. People can understand the shorthand.

First-well done on weight loss,for whtever reasons that motivated you..
next- Why cant you accept the compliment?
Surely it came from a good place?

ToothHurtyAppointment · Today 20:17

Growing up, mum was pretty big (size 18-20). But that never stopped her commenting on everyone’s bodies. I was about 7 and we drove by a park and my friends were playing. One of my friends had a little puppy fat, but was still super tiny, and my mum went on for years and years about that friend being a ‘blimp’, and would only ever refer to her as ‘blimp’.

Funny you should say this. My DH has a cousin 'Lynne' (15 years older than him) who he reconnected with after not seeing her for 25 years - via Genes Reunited.) They weren't close but she contacted him on there... Last saw her when he was 10 and she was 25. (So met again when he was 35 and she was 50.)

Our older DD was a bit of an overweight child for several years, (like 3 stone,) and the younger one had a bit of puppy fat (they were bordering puberty when she first saw them.) All she did constantly, every fucking time we saw her, was bang on about our older daughter's weight, and make jibes and comments. (Some of them she heard ...) Even our younger daughter wasn't spared. She jabbed at her too, and said 'don't eat any more cake, you'll end up like your sister.'

She even had a pop at me every time we saw her - I was 2-3 stone overweight. She said 'oh my you are a size now aren't you, compared to when you got married? Look how tiny you were then!' And similar spiteful comments.

'Lynne' at 5 ft 9 was around 22 stone. And a size 28 in clothes. Just unbelievable that she kept jabbing at both DDs weight and eating (and mine!) when she was fucking HUGE. Twice the size of either DD, or me.

By the way, we saw her around 7 times over some 10 months, and on the last meet-up, she called my older DD a little piggy when she had a cupcake, and said 'you'll get much fatter.' I said 'yeah you don't wanna look like LYNNE do ya?!! She's the size of a sherman tank!' I couldn't stop myself. DH was like and then 😆 I said 'well, if the shoe fits!!' She got up and walked off. Never even said goodbye. Stupid cow. So no-one else is allowed to be a cunt then, and make shitty comments about someone's weight?! Only her!

Then we just stopped contacting her. I told DH I was not having that horrible toxic woman in my family's life. (And he agreed she was horrible.) He said he couldn't remember her being like this, but he didn't know her that well really. A casual comment about someone's weight is one thing, but she was fucking obsessed. Made at least 5 or 6 comments every time we saw her! We made no more contact and she never contacted us again. We moved house 6 months after the last contact, and never gave her our forwarding address.

Your mum sounds horrific by the way, (like Lynne!) and your dad sounds no better. Everyone makes rude and unkind comments now and again, but they sound fucking batshit obsessed if your post is anything to go by... Again, like LYNNE!

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It’s simply shorthand for ‘baby boomer’. The same as ‘gen z’ is shorthand too.

Your congratulations are entirely unnecessary @ToothHurtyAppointment . It is my choice.

What a bloody ridiculous question but I’ll bite. I’d be upset if they went to either extreme. Anorexia kills people.

I’m sure you’ll respond with a new ‘gotcha’ though.

😂

Bloody good on ya for saying that to Lynne! Made me laugh! Well done!

You sound like such a peach!

It’s also your choice to share your body statistics, which is embarrassing and weird. How did you choose to be 68? How did you choose to be 5’5?

I genuinely would love your help because I’m 39, 5’6 and 57kg, but I’m trying to be 24 and 5’9”. Any tips you can share?

😆 I am not normally rude or nasty, but she set me off. Fucking bitch. I genuinely didn't care if I upset her, after the amount of nasty, snide comments aimed at me and my 2 DD about our weight. She never said anything to DH though - even though he was a good 2-3 stone overweight too. Funny that!

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@amiefam , I can't remember any such awkward encounters. Ever, in 68 years. You see, while I might look and judge, I would always congratulate the fat person on something else, like a promotion at work. You would not know my views, because I do not share anything critical, ever, not publicly. But behind my veil....

There’s a thread every other day on MN about how Covid has shaped our children’s behaviour, or how more widespread use of childcare has shaped attachment styles, or how the increasing normality of the full-time-working mother is shaping a generation of behaviour.

That is completely readily accepted here. No one calls out ageism when talking about how a generational experience is shaping the behaviour of the very young – yet it is.

This is why I'm happier at a size 14 than a size 10.

I lost a lot of weight at one point, from much bigger than a 14 down over a couple of years to a ten, maintained for a year then went up a bit again.

Women and men I've known well for years and years are nicer to me at about a 14-16. Men I don't know at all or know just slightly from work or the local area or some of my children's friends dads 🤢 are creepy nice when I'm a 12 or especially a 10.

Tbh they can keep that uncomfortable niceness and I'll have an extra biscuit. I really don't want or like it. I'm not even young - I think creepy men just see a shape or something 🤢

My mum ( in her 80s) and my nan ( who would be about 105 if she was still alive ) is/was exactly the same.
My mum has issues around food even now.
My friends mum is the same with her.

Agreed. The first thing anyone comments on when I visit is my weight - whether they think it's increased or decreased. I ignore it now.

Really sorry you experienced that OP

Who the hell are you visiting?

Yep, boomer parents similar, my parents love me I know, but they love me more when i’m slim and pretty, not as I am now, being overweight

Oh of course, it’s only ever the women’s and girl’s bodies. You know, because men are hard workers and strapping young lands.

My in laws are just the same as Lynne and my parents too. When I first got pregnant, my MIL said to me at my birthday dinner, in front of about 25 people; “you’re putting on weight”. “Erm, yes….im pregnant, remember”. She had the audacity to eye roll! Haha. She thought it’d knock me down a peg or two I think.

She has two sons. My husband is married to “the slim wife” and my BIL is married to the “fat one”. Just gross. My BIL’s wife is literally a size 12, so not even remotely fat. My MIL on the other hand is a size 16-18, not that it matters, but just for the purpose of this conversation as perspective. Her own daughter (my other SIL) is a size 22, yet she still only refers to my BIL’s wife who is a size 12 as the fat one, or “porkie”… it’s so messed up

My family 😣

Well said.

It’s ignorance, often.

I initially looked at this thread and assumed by now others would have expressed my views. Then I rethought and thought, sod it, I want to reiterate what has already been said and state my views.

Firstly, I think it is way beyond beyond time Mumsnet clamped down on the rampant ageism on this site. I'm absolutely sick of everyone over a certain age being described as a boomer, post-menopausal or having dementia.

Apparently we 'accepted' certain things because that was then.... Who the fuck fought for all the rights you all take for granted, and some of you just chuck away, now?

I've worked in schools for many years. I drive past girls going into schools every day. These girls are nothing like like the girls I went to school with, they were girls in a range of shapes of sizes. Now I see girls at the edge of two extremes. Incredibly slim and, a few, a bit more generously proportioned. I don't think that is the result of evolution. Whilst I would fight for any woman's right to wear anything you she wants, I don't think that all these identikit girls going to school with their skirts barely covering their arses has much to do with any of the things we fought for. And yes, I hear the 'we rolled our skirts up' brigade, but we now seem to living in a world where it is acceptable in schools that the only way a girl can avoid showing her underwear is to remain bolt upright.

If you think that the 'boomers' and 'genX' was responsible for the body shaming that goes on now, I'd suggest you watch a programme from the 80s with an audience, like Top of the Pops, and see what body types you see.

And, just because you knew one person who did something unkind, there is no reason to condemn an entire generation - particularly one who, as a whole, did so much for you.