AIBU to rethink a friendship after comments about weight being a choice?

[MyCherryPiee]

I met with a friend last night and she has said something which is can’t stop thinking about and is making me quite mad.

She said being fat is a choice most of the time. She agreed that in certain cases like PCOS and medical conditions it isn’t a choice but in most cases it is a choice.

Friend is very health conscious, fit and active. She is usually quite upfront with her words but not hateful with it. I’ve never witnessed her say anything like this before. I am just appalled at this thinking from a full grown woman.

AIBU to think the comment is more complicated than she says and also in thinking I don’t want to be friends anymore?

I think most people don’t feel like that naturally, certainly not the ones I know. I could mindlessly eat lots of foods like crisps by the multi pack or sweets etc so I don’t keep them in the house.

I am overweight. I don't have a health condition so bad that stops me making the right choices. My problem is biscuits, and not just any biscuits. These are Talking Biscuits. They whisper from the cupboard "eat me" every time I make a cup of tea!

I heard something a while ago that I thought described me perfectly, a little bit lazy and a little bit greedy. Almost all of us could walk more, eat less and eat healthier, but we would rather make excuses why we can't.

Anyway I’m going to bow out of this thread as it’s going round in circles. Good luck everyone who struggles with their weight. It’s a difficult journey I know.

I agree but I don't think it's just cost.

If you're skint you often don't have much to enjoy or look forward to. Food is a really cheap, easily available and legal hit of dopamine.

She isn’t wrong

I put on weight.very suddenly due to illness, I never was over weight before even though I comfort ate. But though I may have to work harder than some to loose weight I was never really prepared too long term it was too much hard work

Then came along wonder drug Mounjaro

We do indulge over wight people I was constantly told I wasn’t fat I was curvy when at times more honesty is needed and this needs to stay away from how we look. Being obese is unhealthy it’s that simple

Yes ..that's true as well ..I've definitely done that myself

It is a choice to pick up food and eat it, but for some people that choice happens under relentless biological pressure that many people will never experience.

When hormones, neurology, genetics, trauma history and medication side effects are all pushing in the same direction, that “choice” isn’t a calm, neutral moment. Its a decision made while your body is shouting at you. Sustained 24/7 pressure like that doesn’t remove responsibility, but it absolutely changes the difficulty of exercising it. That is why qualified experts classify it as a chronic disease.

I’m not a stone overweight. I have said several times I am not over weight.

Absolutely, no one said it was easy. No one said there wasn’t drivers behind it. But it is still a choice.

Obesity is also a complex disease with multiple causes including genetics. Anyone who still doesn't understand would be viewed as rather uneducated.

Vast vast majority of people who are or were overweight it’s down to poor diet choices and over eating the wrong foods

lets not pretend this isn’t the case it really doesn’t not help

I think everyone understands this, or should do. Still doesn’t mean it’s not a choice just because it’s complex or hard.

Such outdated thinking. These kinds of posts make others cringe with embarrassment for the poster.

See above.

To be fair it is often due to ooor diet choices or over eating, I don’t think lashing out about that helps.

I think your friend is judgemental and shouldn't comment on anyone's size , so I'd definitely step back a little from her. Not everyone who is fat is because they eat lots . There is lots of reasons.

I disagree strongly that most or all overweight people choose to be overweight by eating too much. My daughter was a normal size child up to age 6 when she suddenly started to put on weight. Absolutely nothing to do with what she was eating. She continued to put on more weight and she was becoming aware of it herself and a bit upset about it. I suggested she stop eating sweets, biscuits, puddings, sugary drinks etc which she agreed to and stuck to it but this made no difference. She didn’t even have a big appetite. Took her to the GP who referred her to a dietician. But I was already cutting out the fattening foods that she suggested so continued on that path. Basically nothing stopped my daughter gaining weight and she has carried this extra weight all her life. She is now in her forties and eats normally but is overweight. I on the other hand have always been thin. A skinny child, lanky teenager, and still slim in my 70s. I have always had a good appetite and eaten big helpings, puddings , chocolate, sweeties, etc. Some people are born to be either overweight or thin and just can’t help it!

You're digging yourself an ever deeper hole.

by saying “it’s a choice” nobody is saying it’s an easy choice. Or that everybody is making choices in the same circumstances. For some people, it’s gonna be really easy to not eat something, for others it’s tremendously difficult - and that can because of habit or addiction or hormones or life circumstances. And plenty of people need and deserve support to make the choices that would lead to weight loss.

I personally don’t choose to do things that would mean I lose weight because my chronic illnesses mean that even at 9 stone I didn’t feel healthy. For me, plenty of things taste better than skinny feels.

Because nobody is disputing that hormones etc play a part. Hormones may make you feel like you want to eat…they do not move your hand to a piece of cake and then to your mouth. You still have a choice. That choice may be made more difficult by hormones. But it is still a choice.

I’m fat and she isn’t wrong.

Her opinion wouldn’t bother me. However if she was subtly trying to put me down that would piss me off. Not the opinion but the need to put someone down.

it might not be politically correct when we have to tip top around the terminally offended, but it's still true.

No one is cringing about that poster

I am not sure you are trying to achieve here? Denying facts and convince yourself that some people are "victims" of lord knows what, as opposed to accept that you are making a choice?

I’m not in a hole. There is no way round the fact it’s a choice. It is not involuntary behaviour.

so far we have heard about hormones, poverty, education, about being in a trance, ocd , but the fact remains it is not easy, there are many different reasons, different drivers, why we chose to eat what we do, rather than sit with th4 misery of hunger and cravings, but thay doesn’t mean it’s not a choice.

and it’s very wrong and unhelpful to pretend it is some form of involuntary act that we have no control over. That is not true. We do.

@MyCherryPiee she is being honest. I've had to reduce my weight to within normal range for medical reasons and I've done it and am now into maintaining normal weight. It requires me to make conscious choices regarding my food intake everyday and to weigh myself refquently. It's definitely for almost every one of us a matter of choice.