Do you think you're fat?

[ThingsThatGoHumpInTheNight]

I do. And I'm wrong. I know rationally I am not fat. I am 5'5 weigh 9st7ish, dress size 8-10, body fat 18-22%, you can see my ribs from behind and my abs in front....so why oh why do I constantly feel crap about myself?

I do eat more crap than I probably should do (chocolate 5 times a week ) and I do carry weight up top (32FF boobs)...but I am not fat. So why do I feel like I am? Constantly worry that I am. People I don't know well (new work colleagues, random people at parties) make offhand comments 'healthy breakfast again eh?' this morning as I ate a croissant and fruit at my desk and it makes me feel awful.

Are other people like this? Why????

Sorry to anyone this offends...I feel for people with weight issues, I really do, but been thinking about this today (sparked by comment this morning) and wondering if I am the only one?

Agree with Ronald that (for some people, and I'm one) any artificial eating plan isn't going to work in the long term. I've lost 7lb over the past couple of months - so not loads, but enough to make me no longer overweight - and am still losing, eating exactly what I was before. All I'm doing is not drinking alcohol on a school night and walking an hour every day.

And that^^^is why I shall never again moan about how much I weigh or obsess about the food I put in my mouth.

By that I meant mothers post-so to see women beating them selves up about their bodies.

I have also just lost nearly a stone just walking a bit more and being a bit more mindful..if I finish DD's dinner I dont then eat all my own..just doing what I did to put weight on,but in reverse.

But this thread really makes me sad, so many women really loathing themselves if they carry a wee bit if extra weight..we are so much more than the size of our arses...I bet you are all lovely people and mums, be kind to yourselves :(

I'm not like that all the time it's just the kind of mass energy of threads like this.

I am, incidentally, a bright informed feminist who writes about health (NOT guilt-inducing dieting) for a living. But it is very easy to make girls feel crap about their bodies and very hard to ditch that crap in a culture that tells you that if you are over a size 12 you are obese.

Hmmm, there must be two threads here.

Nobody should ever "loathe themselves" for being as they are.
They can be annoyed that they deal with stress by eating rather than another displacement activity.
They can be peed off that commercial diets have not worked (as Mr Peretti so rightly said, they only make money if you fail)
They can want to thump their Mothers for being shitty for so many years.

BUT
WE have the power.
WE have the strength
WE have the inner beauty

Be who you want to be and bollocks to the naysayers.
But who you want to be should include providing for those you have brought onto this earth (no matter how irritating they are)
and their children

And life is more fun if you are fit and healthy

Firstly 7 lbs in a few months is excellent and you should think you are a genius. An amazing genius.
I don't understand how we think we will change a lifetime of plump or fat or obese in a few weeks...it's doomed. 7lbs in a few months sounds great

I think that everyone forgets that pound a week would equal almost 4 stones over a year.
A pound weight loss a week is mostly good choices over bad and a good walk every day.

Mad diets equal people falling off their impossible plan and blaming themselves and telling themselves they are losers

I think meant or otherwise some posters are coming across as offensive, it is highly likely overweight ppl will be unhealthy.

It is not certain though, I am more healthy than my skinnier friends atm, I am aware youth is currently on my side it may not always be.

I think people who bang on and on about how much exercise they do/how little/well they eat are desperately dull, and when that's combined with a kind of evangelical 'I was too fat and so are you' it's just a bit charmless and joy-sapping. People who have lost a lot of weight or who have learned to enjoy exercise sometimes can't settle for their own sense of private satisfaction, and have to deride others who remind them of their former selves.

Well surely "banging on" about anything at all is charmless and joy-sapping? Isn't that the essence of "banging on"?

Being thin does not always=being healthy though talkin-why are you failing to grasp that. And I have plenty of fun,socialise a lot,do moderate excerise and enjoy my life-even as a size 16

I also don't bore my friends to death with tales of faddy eating-because that's why 5.2 is,just another fad or by being gym obsessed. Honestly former chubsters are worse than former smokers!

The thread title was "Do you think you're fat?" my answer was "no"

Amen to that madmomma

And my answer was Yes a wee bit but I don't give a shit! Your point?

Honestly just because you were unhappy when you were a bit fat why do you presume other people are? I am far more than the size label in my clothes. My self confidence is not defined by the size I am-I like me,I like my shape-being a size 10 will NOT make me a better person and really quite truthfully your smugness is beginning to grate

Oh yes, 5:2 is this year's low-carbing. Next year we'll be writing about something else.

No, being very fat is not good for you. Nor is being very thin. Obsessing about food is definitely not good for you.

Looking at scales and in my rational mind I know I'm not but when I look at myself I sometimes feel it

God save us from diet evangelists, who are all seeing and all knowing.....who would want to know one? They're about as popular as the Jehovah witnesses at your door and I can imagine the reformed type are the most annoying passionate.

I lost weight and still feel fat. I known it's irrational.

You're a healthy weight and better to stay at that than try to lose and put more one but for that height you could also be 8 stone 7 or even just over 8 stone and still be within healthy range (no lower, mind you) so by all means lose a stone and then you might not feel fat or just change your thoughts. You need a way of eating healthily for life.

RonaldMcdonald thank you! I was just beating myself up for having only lost 1 stone since April and feeling rubbish for not trying harder now my holiday is approaching. Then I read your comment and you are right I am a whole stone lighter than I was then and if I keep going at a steady rate I WILL get to where I want to be! I am going to be more positive about my achievements from now on!!!!

Afternoon. We're going to move this thread to Other Subjects now (we've spoken to the OP about this) as we'd hate for this really fascinating discussion to get lost, and Chat threads do auto-delete after 90 days.

'I was just beating myself up for having only lost 1 stone since April'

Whoknows, I think 1 stone since April is quite alot!

My understanding is that slow steady weight loss is far better for your health and easier to maintain in the long run.
It's as if the body doesnt 'like' sudden changes, preferring a gradual shift in body composition so that it can adjust to a new 'set point'

We learned at science centre that a sumo wrestler has less visceral fat than the average person.

I'm the same as you, ThreeTomatoes. During episodes of depression and high anxiety, I have been very thin. When I had an eating disorder, I was very thin. Ergo, for me, a few extra pounds, if they mean anything, mean I'm doing OK. Obsessing about weight is an insidious thing that gets hold of you and is very hard to shake off. Just be sensible, be healthy.

A few posters upthread said they couldn't imagine life being made richer by certain delicious foods (as I said mine was). Read Marcel Proust. He made his whole career out of the taste of one Madeleine.