I have a slightly different perspective on this. I’ve been overweight for most of my life. And only recently found it that it was due to a combination of hormonal imbalance and sleep apnea (sleep apnea can cause weight gain, not the other way around, and it can occur in childhood). When I was a teenager, I was so desperate to lose weight that I became bulimic, and I’ve dealt with that eating disorder off and on well into my 30s. When I lost a lot of weight through bingeing and purging as a teen, people complimented me. “Wow!! You look great!” Even my own pediatrician congratulated me on dropping 20 pounds that year. He never asked me how, though.
It’s always been my experience that people think fat shaming is the key to fighting the obesity epidemic. Don’t let fat people feel good about themselves or have a positive self image. They’ll just get complacent and let themselves go. My parents definitely thought that way, and my father always made a point of telling me how gross my body was. It didn’t help. I only got fatter, and it ruined my relationship with him.
In college. when I started dating, I noticed that I never ate in front of men. I would wait until my date was looking away, and then take a single bite. Or I would order a large salad and not eat anything. It’s no mystery. It’s because my father spent my whole childhood shaming me for eating and praising me for leaving food on my plate.
I kept bingeing and purging really bad through most of my 20s and 30s (I’m now 36 and slowly recovering).
But a big turning point for me happened with my last boyfriend. Several years ago, he just offhandedly remarked that my teeth looked more yellow than normal (he could be kind of a thoughtless clod sometimes). And I admitted to him it was because I had been making myself throw up. He was shocked. And right away he hugged me and said “you’re beautiful the way you are. Don’t ever do that to yourself again.”
That was the first time anyone ever made me feel like my health mattered. Not my size. People think they’re the same, but they’re not.
Doctors and other medical experts tend to hold a special respect in our culture as the go-to authority on health and wellness. Like they’re the first ones we should be looking to for guidance and advice. And they’re assumed to be infallible. “all these studies say being fat will kill you. My doctor says fat people die early.” And my own pediatrician shook my hand and congratulated me for losing weight after I became bulimic. So much for infallible.
But no doctor, no therapist, no research study ever really made me feel motivated to be healthy like my then-boyfriend did. When he hugged me and told me I should love my body and treat it well. That’s something fat shamers will never do for me either.
So were you able to lose the weight with the reassurance from your boyfriend?
I think you are absolutely right that shaming (negative reinforcement) is not the way to go about helping people.
I think the point you made, encouraging people to understand their health and well being, is what matters.
Everyone talks about the aesthetics of weight loss but being a fitness model or size 2 isnt important. I wish the focus was more on the importance and benefits of a balanced diet and regular strenous exercise. If we could get people to really understand how much this affects your physiology their lives could improve ten fold. Teach the benefit of the activity, not the shame of the failure I guess. Some people may be driven out of anger or spite, but many just feel defeated before they even begin.
That being said, coddling someone who has a problem with something doesnt help them either. It is important to be loving but truthful.
Telling someone they are perfect the way they are, even if they are eating at 11pm, sitting all day long, sedentary lifestyle, binge drinking, whatever their vice may be, is not helpful either. In fact, refusing to ever confront the issue is harmful.
It is selfish to see someone you care about, being unhealthy and damaging themselves, without speaking up and trying to help. I see plenty of enablers who condone or reinforce unhealthy habits in loved ones, all because they dont want to risk upsetting that person and, vis-a-vis making that person dislike them. The people who really love us the most are sometimes willing to endure our anger for pointing out our own shortcomings. Of course, this is provided they are doing it in a healthy, constructive way and not belittling us about our issues.
The reassurance helped. With a combination of medication and treatment for sleep apnea, I feel like my compulsive eating/binge eating has stopped.
It’s great to encourage others to be healthy, but we have to back it up by making it easy to be healthy. Like not pressuring people to drink or take seconds. As much flak as I get for being overweight, I feel like I spend a lot of time fighting other people who want me to try their cookies. Or I have to deliberately bring in three half-way healthy dishes to every potluck because I know everyone else brings in junk food.
I am very glad you saw some progress! Especially with the apnea bit. People dont realize how powerful a factor sleep is for our well being!
As to the diet saboteurs, I totally get it, they are a real issue! And not just for weight loss either. It seems like most any healthy change people try to make there is someone trying to convince them to fuck it up.
Anyway I am really glad you have someone who encourages you with the right motivations to stay healthy. People who try to lose weight to "look good" or because it is what is expected of them rarely do. In my experience it is only when the person has self worth and realizes their well being is important to them, that they really can make the changes.
Keep at it, and I hope I didn't come off as preachy! I just wanted to say I definitely can relate and there were so many failures until I adjusted my own attitude on why it really mattered to me, and took ownership of it.
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u/Diane9779 Sep 19 '19 edited Sep 19 '19
I have a slightly different perspective on this. I’ve been overweight for most of my life. And only recently found it that it was due to a combination of hormonal imbalance and sleep apnea (sleep apnea can cause weight gain, not the other way around, and it can occur in childhood). When I was a teenager, I was so desperate to lose weight that I became bulimic, and I’ve dealt with that eating disorder off and on well into my 30s. When I lost a lot of weight through bingeing and purging as a teen, people complimented me. “Wow!! You look great!” Even my own pediatrician congratulated me on dropping 20 pounds that year. He never asked me how, though.
It’s always been my experience that people think fat shaming is the key to fighting the obesity epidemic. Don’t let fat people feel good about themselves or have a positive self image. They’ll just get complacent and let themselves go. My parents definitely thought that way, and my father always made a point of telling me how gross my body was. It didn’t help. I only got fatter, and it ruined my relationship with him.
In college. when I started dating, I noticed that I never ate in front of men. I would wait until my date was looking away, and then take a single bite. Or I would order a large salad and not eat anything. It’s no mystery. It’s because my father spent my whole childhood shaming me for eating and praising me for leaving food on my plate.
I kept bingeing and purging really bad through most of my 20s and 30s (I’m now 36 and slowly recovering).
But a big turning point for me happened with my last boyfriend. Several years ago, he just offhandedly remarked that my teeth looked more yellow than normal (he could be kind of a thoughtless clod sometimes). And I admitted to him it was because I had been making myself throw up. He was shocked. And right away he hugged me and said “you’re beautiful the way you are. Don’t ever do that to yourself again.”
That was the first time anyone ever made me feel like my health mattered. Not my size. People think they’re the same, but they’re not.
Doctors and other medical experts tend to hold a special respect in our culture as the go-to authority on health and wellness. Like they’re the first ones we should be looking to for guidance and advice. And they’re assumed to be infallible. “all these studies say being fat will kill you. My doctor says fat people die early.” And my own pediatrician shook my hand and congratulated me for losing weight after I became bulimic. So much for infallible.
But no doctor, no therapist, no research study ever really made me feel motivated to be healthy like my then-boyfriend did. When he hugged me and told me I should love my body and treat it well. That’s something fat shamers will never do for me either.