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Re: Might get some negative feedback on this, but...

sneer
2009-08-04 07:42 pm UTC (link)

With that much exercise, I am sure you have lost a lot of body fat and built up muscle

Thank you so much for your patronizing attempt to not be an asshole, but guess what--you're wrong.

I'm 5' 4", 170, and it's not all muscle. Not even close.

If I lay flat on my back I can poke my stomach and feel my abs but a visible six-pack would require me to lose the three or four jeans sizes worth of pooch and muffintop they're buried under. If I hold my leg at the right angle I can kind of see my quads but when I stand up they're invisible. And there's not a single store in a 20-mile radius that carries a sports bra that actually fits me and works.

If you saw me in a bikini (assuming someone somewhere made one that fit my weird-ass measurements), you would not know how active I am.

Although it does bother me a little for reasons I'll expand on shortly, I'm mostly fine with that. But there are people who see me ordering a small frappuccino and roll their eyes at me, or ask me if I'm really going to eat all that, or even ask me who I'm shopping for when I'm looking at running shoes.

Because I don't look like an athlete. In fact, by (some fucking ridiculous) aesthetic standards, I'm fat. And as we all know, it's not possible for fat people to be active and stay fat. *snort*

It makes some people here angry to say that longterm life changes are possible. For me, what makes me angry is for people to say, "You can't do it, so just lay down and die."

Way to entirely miss the point! What's making people angry is not saying that long term changes are possible. What's making people angry, and what makes ME absofuckinglutely livid, is saying "if you're fat it's because you're not making the right choices."

I have some lingering body image issues. Please see upthread for the fun I had in the military with this, and would you like me to tell you about the series of fad diets my mom put me on when I was in junior high because she decided that at 5' 3" and 130 pounds I was morbidly obese? Would you like me to tell you about how I spent most of 8th grade having gum for breakfast and water for lunch in the hopes that I might lose enough weight to make her stop eating dessert in front of me and telling me I couldn't have any because I had a weight problem? Would you like to hear about how relatives would see me at Christmas and Thanksgiving and go "oh, you've lost weight!" and she would go "No she didn't, she gained three pounds this week"?

Most of me wants to be okay with the fact that by some peoples' stupid standards I'm going to be fat no matter what I do (without resorting to stupid and dangerous shit). There is still that little voice that tells me the guy that leaned out his truck window and yelled "HURR FATASS" at me last week is right. I am still learning to shut it the fuck up. It's not easy.

And I'm not the only person in this boat, not by a long shot.

So how the fuck do you think I'm going to react when I see people who don't know me from Adam tell me I still have that muffin top and those jello thighs because I'm not making the right ~*~long term life choices~*~ ?

I know I can't lose much more weight and I won't get any smaller than a size 12 to 16 without resorting to stupid and dangerous shit. I eat ~2500 calories a day now because that's the amount of fuel I feel healthiest taking in. I don't plan to make the ~*~long term life change~*~ to cut it any further. If that's what you consider "laying down and dying," then just fucking bury me.

And I do know people who are about your height and about your weight who are quite healthy. If you need a cane to walk it's probably not solely because of your weight. I'm sorry you've been so ill, that's a terrible thing to have happen to you. If you don't feel healthy where you are, that's okay and it's good that you're able to recognize it and you're doing something about that, and I say that with no sarcasm whatsoever.

Now learn to recognize when you need to mind your own fucking business.

...ugh okay I'll just mop all that up on my way out, my lunch is here.

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Re: Might get some negative feedback on this, but...

silrana
2009-08-04 08:48 pm UTC (link)

First off, I wasn't trying to be patronizing. I *do* envy your self-discipline to put so much effort into your exercise.

I am not now and would never advocate telling people that they are lazy, etc. for not losing weight. What I *am* arguing against is people making blanket comments about it being impossible. That discourages people who are like me, whose weight is doing them physical harm, from trying.

And like I said in another post, ten years ago I would have been saying exactly the same things as you are now. I've gotten the eyeroll at the vending machine. My mother, who is stick thin, is so rabid about it that I have had to flat out forbid her to bring up the subject of weight in front of my daughters so that she doesn't fuck with their heads like she did mine. My daughters are being taught about health, not looking good for society, and I'm not letting her mess that up. I've gotten the stereotypical 'picked last in gym class'. The yelling out of the pickup truck with phrases I wouldn't repeat, even here. The boss who asked me if I'd gained weight recently because she (again, stick thin) thought that style pants 'wasn't right for people with your, um, figure'. I know *exactly* where you are coming from with the anger about how overweight people are treated.

I would never, ever, say you were lazy. Me? I'm lazy. I work at a computer all day and I don't exercise anywhere near as much as I should, within my limitations. I would say from your posts that you are doing exactly what I am talking about, and a helluva lot better than I am. You have achieved a lifestyle that you feel makes you healthy, and that makes you feel good. Size 12 to 16? Perfectly wonderful! I wouldn't dream of being one of those assholes who think that anyone who is above a size 4 is a whale.

I admit I phrased things pretty snarkily in my first couple of posts today, but I suppose that's because I react to the phrase, "It's impossible, so don't bother to try," roughly the way a bull does to a matador. When doing something is so vital to you, not just for your state of mind but for literally your survival, and people as saying that it can't be done, it gets me worked up.

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Re: Might get some negative feedback on this, but...

sneer
2009-08-04 09:09 pm UTC (link)

What's patronizing is you talking to me like you think I can't tell the difference between fat and muscle. One jiggles. The other doesn't. It's not rocket science. Or assuming I don't know BMI lies. Yes. I do. I know that very well.

I know *exactly* where you are coming from with the anger about how overweight people are treated.

Then maybe you could try learning from that experience and, once again, LEARNING TO MIND YOUR OWN FUCKING BUSINESS about other peoples' weight.

I wouldn't dream of being one of those assholes who think that anyone who is above a size 4 is a whale.

Then don't engage in the same kind of blame-n-shame bullshit those assholes do when someone says "yeah, hey, I cannot safely lose any more weight." This may come as a shock to you but they might just know themselves better than you do.

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Re: Might get some negative feedback on this, but...

silrana
2009-08-04 09:47 pm UTC (link)

I never intended to imply you don't know the difference. It's just that I've had a lot of weightlifter friends over the years, and they were always grousing about how the BMI index said they were overweight. And I wasn't assuming that you didn't know about the BMI distortions, I was trying to show that I knew so you wouldn't think I didn't understand about them.

Normally, I would agree with you about minding my own business. But I was never trying to tell other people how to live their lives. I was objecting to them telling me how I should live mine. I was reading post after post of people saying that making a long term (hopefully lifelong) change in my weight simply wasn't possible. That genetics or any number of factors would not allow it. I don't believe in 'impossible'. And I don't appreciate people telling me what I can and cannot do any more than you do.

It was never about "If you were a good, unlazy etc. person you could lose weight." It was about "Don't tell me I can't save my own life."

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