So upset by comment from stranger

[Glitterblue]

I will begin by saying I’m just starting out on a weight loss journey. I haven’t yet decided what road to go down but I know I have a few stone to lose. I had both hips replaced within 8 months of each other, I was largely immobile for 2 years before the surgeries, painfully hobbling around on crutches and the whole time between the first and second I was really struggling because I couldn’t even do one step without crutches or hanging onto a piece of furniture. Then depression set in and continued for months after the second surgery along with complete exhaustion. It’s only now that I’m beginning to get my old energy back and starting to feel better mentally and in a place where I can address the weight that I gained over those years.

On Thursday I went to visit my late grandmother’s best friend in hospital. An old man who I had never met was there but said he was just leaving. I was introduced to him and he looked me up and down and said “my goodness, YOU like to sit at the table and eat, don’t you!” I honestly couldn’t believe what I was hearing, I wanted to burst into tears on the spot. I felt humiliated and upset.

I’m a size 16 but he made me feel as if he’d never seen anyone as big as me before. I cried when I came home and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head. I’ve even been dreaming about it. What makes people think it’s ok to say things like that to anyone, let alone a total stranger?

Maybe it was the kick up the backside that I needed to decide what I’m going to do and get started, but I feel even more self conscious than I was before and I was already very self conscious, always hiding in baggy hoodies etc.

I don’t even know why I’m posting this but I suppose I’m just hoping someone will understand how I feel. He may as well have said “my goodness, you’re fat aren’t you!” I know I am, I don’t need a stranger to tell me!

Thank you for reading if you got this far.

Honestly, don't give it any headspace. He's a stranger, and a rude one at that. I remember a friend of my grandparents saying something similar to me, when I was a teenager. I was a size 12 🙄

Good luck with your weight loss.

This has made my eyes prickle with moisture... What an awful and uncalled for thing to say to someone. He doesn't know your circumstances. Not that he has the right to be such a cunt.

That is a horrible thing to habe said to you. I don't know why people (particularly elderly) think this is acceptable.
Afew years ago I had a man make a very hurtful comment to me. I knew I was unhappy with my weight but for him to comment on my weight made me so upset. So I hear you.
In time it won't feel as raw. You will regain your confidence. Just think you are at such a better place than you were healthbwise and you are ready to start your journey for you nobody else.
I've lost 5stone over the past 12 month, I still have a way to go and my aim is to get to size 16 but I know you can do this.
I am so sorry someone spoke to you like that

I'm so sorry that happened, what a prick

He’s just your common or garden arsehole unfortunately, trying to make himself feel better by making other people feel miserable.

How rude of him and at a size 16 you are probably average in the uk. I hope you said something cutting back to him.

It was quite commonplace for people of his generation to make personal comments about anything and everything. He hasn't moved with the times and still thinks it's fine to talk to people this way. If you'd been particularly tall or had red hair or spots or whatever, he probably would have commented on any of those things also.

He has hit you where it hurts because your weight is very personal to you. I doubt very much that he meant it in a way to hurt you but he was inappropriate and had no business speaking to you like that. Wonder that he had no visitors.

Sorry OP, probably not helpful at all but I definitely hear you. People should keep their traps shut about other people's appearance, full stop.

When you say he was old, how old, some elderly people lose their filter.

id not give it anymore thought to be honest, and do what you need to do to be happy with your body, deciding which route to go down isn’t really something that should take a long time.

Oh dear, how rude.

I was at a funeral once and elderly family member I hadn't seen since childhood commented that I'd gotten fat. I did actually cry as I was already upset and bereaved.

It's not helpful at all.

It's a STRANGER's reaction to a size 16!
His reaction is both irrelevant and irrational.

Don't give it any headspace OP x

Some people think that it's ok to comment negatively on other people's weight, I've been big my whole life and regularly have strangers making insulting comments, I don't really understand why they think it's acceptable to go around showing everyone that they are great big horrible twazzocks with severe moral and behavioural failings.

He was completely in the wrong to be so rude and cruel to you, and as hard as it is to do, you need to try to put it out of your mind and see that this is more a reflection on his inherent personality flaws than it is on you.

The man was horrible, I'm so sorry that happened to you. There was absolutely no need for his comment.

People like this pop up from time to time sadly. If it's not someone's weight then it's something else. They are just horrible.

How awful. Did your grandmother's friend saying anything to you/apologise for him?

People will make ageist comments but honestly, I wouldn't have been surprised no matter how old he was. Misogyny is everywhere. He believes women should look a certain way. If you were male of equal size he wouldn't have said a word, and not because he was afraid of getting decked, but size in men just doesn't register for him.

One of the reasons I decided to lose weight was actually comments from 2 individual children on separate occasions asking why I was so big. I was so upset I cried too. It spur me on. I’m sorry OP as it is rude. My nan used to ask me things like this without any concern for how I might have felt too

Years of pain, immobility and 2 hip operations and you are only a size 16. Honestly I think you have done really well. His comment was very hurtful but try to forget it. I hope you continue to heal and feel better in yourself.

Pity you didn't still have the crutches, they'd have come in very handy to smack him one.

It was quite commonplace for people of his generation to make personal comments about anything and everything

And what's 'his generation,' do tell? OP didn't say his age, she just said old. Could have been 80, could have been 60, given that a large percentage of MN thinks anyone over 50 is tottering on the grave's brink.

The man was a twassock and his words don't deserve notice.

Glad you are finally starting to get your energy back after what must have been a hugely difficult couple of years recovering mentally and physically from your hip surgery. I hope you feel proud of your recovery and I wish you joy of whatever exercise, etc, you feel ready to move on to now.

Sometimes people just say daft and horrible things, because they are a bit dim, or socially inept or massively insensitive or confused or whatever, His remarks reveal much about him and probably very little about you xxx

He's an idiot , try not to be upset.

MrsDanvers, There's no need for that. My grandmother's general (I'm in my 50s), if that helps.

I was in hospital alongside an elderly lady (75+ at a guess?), referred to the doctor attending both of us as a 'darkie'. Called him that to his face but in a jovial manner. I was gobsmacked, don't know if he was offended.

It is a generational thing, or was. This generation and the next will have their own complaints and in turn, be the subject of those from the next.

I was supporting the OP though so if that's all.

Absent dementia, other mental health issues or severe learning difficulties, he's just a nasty person who gains his energy from putting other people down. As PPs have said, like any school bully, he would have picked on anything once had identified you as a target.

You sound like a kind, caring person who maybe happens to be currently carrying a little extra weight - for very understandable reasons - that you hope to lose when your circumstances and opportunities allow.

He's a horrible, bitter, rude, negative, irrelevance-spouting person who lives in that ugly frame of mind 24/7. He deserves to be pitied and then soundly ignored.

Always a man, usually an older one and I doubt he was a specimen of peak physical fitness either. I have had this since I was a teen - not actually been big at all either. I was told to be careful what type of chair I sat on & not to get any bigger. Never had any comments from women except to notice some weight loss.

a 'grow up you bit*h' usually silences them.

It’s not a not a generational thing. Some people are rude/racist/ignorant and some aren’t. My stepmother was racist and outspoken and a misogynist too. My lovely mother in law was always very progressive, inclusive, kind and supportive.

Its making excuses for people to say it’s generational.

*MrsDanvers, There's no need for that. My grandmother's general (I'm in my 50s), if that helps.

I was in hospital alongside an elderly lady (75+ at a guess?), referred to the doctor attending both of us as a 'darkie'. Called him that to his face but in a jovial manner. I was gobsmacked, don't know if he was offended*

I'm 70 this year, and I don't believe that a lady of 75 (even ish at a guess) would even think of saying something like that. DGM would have, but she was born in 1905 and that's how PoC were referred to when she was growing up.

And please don't police my tone.

And there's another one. There is no excuse. It's my observed experience and opinion that it is generational. It is not in any way likened to the lobbed insults from louts aged between 18-40.

If you don't understand what I'm talking about then that's ok, but I'm referencing my own experience.

Seems we really do have to have 'NOT ALL PEOPLE ARE LIKE THIS' as a disclaimer.

This was some 20 years ago. Frankly, I don't care what you believe or don't.

Your tone was spikey, for no reason, I didn't appreciate it and told you so.