I know this thread is a week or so old, but I have just got back from my holiday and couldn't resist replying to this, as I do have some experience of it.
I was a nanny until recently, as I had to leave to begin teacher training in September. All my life I've been the biggest, tallest, most developed child. Never fat until 18 months ago when I nearly died from pneumonia, followed by a severe bout of mental illness where I was admitted. I have been on so many meds and seen counsellors, hypnotherapists, all sorts. Finally, at around xmas, 6 months after finishing my degree, I felt ready for full time work again. I had postponed the start of my ITT for a year and so found work as a full time nanny, which helped me regain routine and activity, although all their food (which was there for me too) was full fat. The only thing it did do was help my fitness - despite gymming and swimming, my fitness was not getting back to what it was before (and it was very good), but it was because I wasn't working. The kids were never nasty but when I first started working there, the middle one was obsessed with my tummy and the baby inside it and when it was coming out; the oldest one always used to say 'don't get any fatter will you?', and they all used to poke my tummy and make comments. But I didn't take offence really, because I know I am very fat since being ill, I know I have been through a lot and I know children mean no malice - they just say what they see, inncoently!
I do take offence at other grown-ups and teens saying stuff under their breath to each other, laughing, staring, treating me as if I am thick. I got a top level degree, top grade A levels and top grade GCSEs and have always been considered very intelligent. None of these people know who we are or how we got to where we are, and so they have no right to make judgements; but as humans, that is what we do all the time. Fat people are seen as lazy sloths, which for me is nothing further than the truth. I am always active with horses, swimming, cycling, all sorts. But during my teens I was bulimic, and since then have been ill - while I was ill I was housebound and was so unfit that at my then age of 22, I could bearly walk through pain and lack of breath!
Anyway, I've recently had hypnotherapy and it has changed my attitude to food: I no longer snack and I eat when I am hungry, not at meal times if I don't want to. I eat what I want but only when I need to. I have continued my activity, and last week we went on holiday to Gran Canaria, with my mum. The two journeys there and back involved lots of walking (gatwick!!!), and we had to drink lots of water out there, plus, instead of doing lengths for 45 minutes, I was in the pool practically all day every day, and then would also swim in the sea. And being a fast, strong swimmer, I did quite a lot of swimming. I ate what I wanted - in the Italian I had carbonara twice (plates stacked high), I had egg fried rice and sweet and sour chicken in the chinese and we even had a mexican. I always ha puddings and a baileys or two with my meal, and sometimes even had a starter - garlic bread or prawn crackers; I drank sangria/champagne, shandies, cooked breakfasts, baguettes and crisps for lunch. But I also ate plenty of fruit and drank plenty of juice as well as water. I've come back and clothes that were digging in before I went away, are falling down. We went to the solicitor's office yesterday, and my smart skirt (the only one I own yet), which was digging in round the tummy before, was falling down when I walked!
So my message is: forget fads (and believe me, I am the queen of fads having had bulimia!), just go for eating what you want when you want, stopping when full and plenty of fruit, veg and water into the mix. Try to eat healthily most of the time but don't deny yourself a treat. Just really up the activity if you can. I have always been active and thought I did plenty, but seeing the effects of the activity I did last week, has really made me see I need to vary the intensity and length of my workouts and do more, like hikes at weekends, swim for longer, take running back up.
Good luck. You are not as fat as me by the sounds of it! I was a size 16-18 for my wedding, which at 5'9" was a nice size and I looked good. I am broadly built and ample chested and that size for me is my ideal. Before I met hubby when I was 18, I had gone up to a loose 20, but soon lost it through exercise and more control over the bulimia. During uni (2003-2006) I went from the 16-18 to a size 22, and when I was ill last year I went up to a tight 28. I am now back to a tight 26, but it really is dropping quickly now I am in control. What family and friends think does matter, but only a small amount, and what strangers think... well, they can bog off frankly. I find it very sad that so many people have been brainwashed by the size 0 society. Maybe it passed me by because I was fighting big battles of my own at the time; maybe there is time for me to be afflicted yet. Whatever happens, I know size 0 is yuk, I also know size 26 is yuk. Healthy is individual.
Gosh this is long; if you got through it, well done!!!