"I don't want to be too thin" - a "fat" people thing to say?

alleycat88

Hi!

Just something I overheard the other day that got me thinking. Usually larger people saying that they don't want to be "too thin" or "skinny".

In my opinion both of those terms are relative so one person views skinny as 5'5 110lbs person and another may say that the 5'5 girl is skinny at 120.

So when you say "I don't want to be skinny/too thin" what are you implying? Are you saying you don't find thin attractive or are you simply saying it because you don't believe you can reach a certain weight or is it just an excuse? Like you're heavy and you'd probably like to be that weight but are too lazy to actually work for it?

I don't mean to offend anyone. When I say I don't want to be skinny I mean under 120 (I'm 5'4) and at that weight I have hip bones jutting out and don't look healthy in my eyes.

rml_16

Hi!

Just something I overheard the other day that got me thinking. Usually larger people saying that they don't want to be "too thin" or "skinny".

In my opinion both of those terms are relative so one person views skinny as 5'5 110lbs person and another may say that the 5'5 girl is skinny at 120.

So when you say "I don't want to be skinny/too thin" what are you implying? Are you saying you don't find thin attractive or are you simply saying it because you don't believe you can reach a certain weight or is it just an excuse? Like you're heavy and you'd probably like to be that weight but are too lazy to actually work for it?

I don't mean to offend anyone. When I say I don't want to be skinny I mean under 120 (I'm 5'4) and at that weight I have hip bones jutting out and don't look healthy in my eyes.

This usually comes from two camps:

1. Women who have never been a healthy weight and so can't imagine themselves at one and
2. Women who think fat = curves.

Spartan_Maker

You're right: it is all relative.

For instance, I'd like to be 8% body fat; however, if that means I need to get down to 175 to do it, I'd be disappointed. To me, that would be "too thin." Other people might think 6'0", 175, and 8% body fat was great. It's okay, but it's nothing extraordinary.

skylark94

For me it was totally an excuse to not try my hardest.

gmichaelguy

"too thin" to me means an unhealthy thinness. There is actually a level where it becomes just as medically unhealthy to be thin as to be overweight. I know this is easy for me to say since I don't face this issue, but I'd rather be too thin and have to over eat my way to healthiness than my current situation although I seriously doubt the solution to being too thin is more cookies and cupcakes like I would dream of.

shelbyfrootcake

I think its more a case of wanting to feel comfortable in your own body. For people who have been overweight for a long time, or always overweight, it's diffuclt to gauge where 'too skinny' would be so better to set a higher, realistic, figure to aim for and then adjust when the time comes if one wanted to be smaller.

suzieqcookie

i have been both severely overweight and super, super skinny. I flat out state that this time around i am not going to aim for skinny because i know that i can't maintain skinny in a healthy way and i love my curves. I also don't find bones attractive. Not on men or women. Sex is also more comfortable when i have some meat on my bones as well, which is my biggest motivator for losing weight to begin with.

sarahcuddle

To be honest at this stage I just want to be in the healthy weight range for my height (5 ft 3") which would be anything 140lb or under. When I get there I may feel differently of course but even in my teens and doing loads of swimming I was never below 9 stone which is about 126lb. People have different frame sizes and not one weight suits all

shelbyfrootcake

"too thin" to me means an unhealthy thinness. There is actually a level where it becomes just as medically unhealthy to be thin as to be overweight. I know this is easy for me to say since I don't face this issue, but I'd rather be too thin and have to over eat my way to healthiness than my current situation although I seriously doubt the solution to being too thin is more cookies and cupcakes like I would dream of.

I've noticed that a lot of people mention the 'too thin' thing a LONG way off of being near a BMI of 18.5 though.

thetrishwarp

To me, "too thin" is looking breakable, not any particular weight.

aljeca

I find I look best at around 140 pounds (I am 5'6"). I have been smaller but it wasn't sustainable over time - 140 is. My body feels great at 140 and I look proportionate. I am generally a canadian size 6 at that weight which is very healthy!

I do NOT want to be "skinny" or very "thin" - I want to be muscular, I find it looks more attractive. This is my opinion obviously some people will naturally be thinner than others and it's not a BAD thing just not my cup o'tea for myself, I have never desired to be waif thin.

So 16 pounds to go for me.

Edit to agree with the poster that mentioned frame sizes - very important!!

Substances

I think when people say that, they're really worried about becoming like sticks after losing a lot of weight, not that that's a bad thing. One of my larger friends said that she wasn't doing her best on her diet because she was scared of becoming "too thin" and "losing her curves." It's probably because of all of those "go eat a sandwich" comments that thin girls get.. Yeah, I doubt it, because fat girls get those too, but it sounded good.

Personally, I think you can be slender and have curves! I weigh about 125 pounds and I'm five foot three. My BMI is very healthy, just a little bit under the line of middle ground between underweight and overweight. I wear a size four women's pants, which doesn't sound very large, but I also have thirty-eight inch hips and a twenty-five inch waist. When I was ten pounds thinner the numbers dropped only slightly.

Proof that thin girls can be curvy too! If you consider me thin, or at least healthy.

Or it could also be because they envy those slender girls, especially the ones that don't have to work to be tiny, and they just don't have the motivation to become healthy themselves so they push it off on not wanting to become "too thin," often because of a (fe)male love interest in their life. I.e. "My boyfriend likes my curves the way I am! I don't want to be like all of these skinny witches!"

kidtechnical

I would say I don't want to be too skinny because when I lost weight aged 21 I have photos where I definitely crossed the line between slim and healthy, my cheeks looked sunken and I just generally looked pale and tired. It was the result of finding maintenance hard after being so restricted so I dipped below my target weight by maybe 7 lbs. When I put the 7lbs back on & looked healthier, I still said at the time "I don't want to be that skinny" and at the time if it was a "fat" thing to say, it was not being said by someone who considered themselves "fat". So I want to lose weight, but not down to that weight as I know that for me it wasn't a healthy look.

misskatibear

I just don't want too many bones protruding, I'd kinda still like to have a little 'pudge' not massive, just a little something to grab I guess. I noticed someone mentioned people who think a little bit of fat = curves. Well I guess I'm an idiot? But I want curves, which I already have! Just need to lose the weight to show them off a bit more. I do like the 'thin' body, but it's just not how I want to see myself. Slightly busty curvy red head :P, but healthy weight is what I'm aiming for!

kayemme

super thin is not attractive to me, so when I have said that, it's because I have found over the years that the women I htink are most attractive are "overweight" by "societal standards"

stockholmhasago

I've been at a 100, and I've been at 195 in my adult life. For me, my "too" thin is below 120. By "too" thin, I mean my body doesn't look well. I look underfed, malnourished, and bones stick out in awkward places that I'm not comfortable with. My face looks hollow, my cheeks sunken, and the term "corpse" may have been said.

pkw58

Never said that when I considered my self "fat".

So I think beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but we all have to be comfortable in our own bodies. I don't want to look like the cartoon character Olive Oil, but certainly don't want to be the Muppets Ms. Piggy either. (which is what I looked like sunburned when I was heavier)…

So I feel great when I hover between 135 and 140, but I now weigh 134, and my energy level has picked up… so I am working on maintaining below 135 but above 125. I am 5'8", light framed… for me, I like being a size 8 because I can find clothes in most stores (even though I am now on the journey to live in Project 333) and fit in airplane seats, etc. But if a few pounds gets me from feeling great to feeling like superwoman, then I am willing to go there - and I will not go below a weight my trusted advisors and medical doctor says is too low. So now , as a new "skinny again" person, "I don't want to be too thin".

And I think all of us need to decide what and why

RhonndaJ

I've been thinking about this a lot lately, as it turns out.

On the way home at night I get to sit in traffic where I can see a lot of people walking past and I find myself looking at the figures of the women.

And I have come to the conclusion that I don't want to be 'too thin'.

I don't really know how to describe the point where thin is 'too thin' for me. Of course, there's the unhealthy level of 'too thin' that I definitely don't want to be, but there's also what appears to be a healthy version that I simply don't find visually appealing.

I don't think it's a fear mindset, though I suppose it might be and I'm just blind to it. It may simply be that I don't view myself as wanting to be athlete thin, because that seems to be the thin point that doesn't appeal to me.

When it comes down to it, when I am closer to goal I will see about making a more informed decision on where I want to be. I have a lot to lose. I expect my mindset to change as I lose weight. I don't see it as necessary to make that decision now.

donna_glasgow

I'm one of those people who say I don't want to be too thin ... here is my reason why.

I used to be 8 1/2 stone which is 119lbs and I was a bean pole, way too thin and gangly looking, that when I was late teens early 20's and 5ft 7.

I am now 39 and Ive lost an inch in height im now standing at 5ft 6 and I wouldn't want to go back to my previous weight as I didn't like how I looked then, so I know I wont like it now .... I would like to be about 10 stone (140lbs)

sho3girl

I've never been skinny (ever) always what's the polite word? oh yeah chubby. The puppy fat your supposed to grow out of (well i stopped at 4"11") in your teens stayed . Bad diet/realatioship with food plus a complete non interest in any activity/sport/execise. Add that to a mind set that i was never going to get any smaller.

My goal is not to be skinny/thin I just want to be the best version of myself. I will not beat myself up that at my height the chart advises I should be 112 pounds. That figure just feels impossible to me currently but 3 years ago I didn't think I would ever fit into a size 14 and I now do. At school if my future self had told me I would be getting out of bed and execising before work I would have not believed and yet now I do.

Just like to think I'm a work in progess and at my age (38 the age my Mum was when she died of breast cancer) it's about damn time I got myself in better shape.

Will I ever me skinny - hey maybe

8goodgirl0

I don't understand why fat people feel they are allowed to tell healthy people they are 'too thin'.

joeamendiola

To me it has nothing to do with weight. I wouldn't want to leak like I was all skin and bones. It looks sick and weak.

pikselinka

alleycat88 people make up this usually as one of the excuses to not get thin (I'm not talking about anorexic thin here).

wewon

Hi!

Just something I overheard the other day that got me thinking. Usually larger people saying that they don't want to be "too thin" or "skinny".

In my opinion both of those terms are relative so one person views skinny as 5'5 110lbs person and another may say that the 5'5 girl is skinny at 120.

So when you say "I don't want to be skinny/too thin" what are you implying? Are you saying you don't find thin attractive or are you simply saying it because you don't believe you can reach a certain weight or is it just an excuse? Like you're heavy and you'd probably like to be that weight but are too lazy to actually work for it?

I don't mean to offend anyone. When I say I don't want to be skinny I mean under 120 (I'm 5'4) and at that weight I have hip bones jutting out and don't look healthy in my eyes.

I see it as the mirror image of not wanting to be "too fat". The comment should be taken at face value, no hidden meanings behind it. No need to assume that the person is saying it out of laziness or some passive-aggressive motives.

Either extreme is unattractive IMO.

melindadunston

To me curves and rolls are two different things...Yes it cracks me up when people say they are just curvy and they are actually obese. I am still about 10-15 lbs from being at the "healthy" weight range for my height. Too me being "too skinny" is showing ribs. I don't want to be able to count every rib. To each their own but if I could snap my fingers and be that thin I would rather stay where I am.

8goodgirl0

"too thin" to me means an unhealthy thinness. There is actually a level where it becomes just as medically unhealthy to be thin as to be overweight. I know this is easy for me to say since I don't face this issue, but I'd rather be too thin and have to over eat my way to healthiness than my current situation although I seriously doubt the solution to being too thin is more cookies and cupcakes like I would dream of.

I've noticed that a lot of people mention the 'too thin' thing a LONG way off of being near a BMI of 18.5 though.

I don't quite get why you'd even mention it until you thought you might be in danger of being 'too thin'

EmBlazes

Great topic!

I'm "obese" according to all the charts but I know people started to say I was "too thin" when I last lost a lot of weight when my cheeks looked too sunken and my bones started to show in my chest. By the way I wasn't even at the top end of the "healthy weight range BMI" and that happened to me.

Because BMI is an average way of looking at things it's important to look at the whole person.

For me, although I'd love to be at the lower end of a healthy BMI, I am not sure I would be able to maintain at that weight easily. It would become only a focus on how much I was eating and in my mind that's not really healthy either.

Personally I'd love to be more athletic and as everyone knows, when you are super-active, then you can eat more

LeenaRuns

I feel like "too skinny" for me is more about health. I'm 5'6" and weigh 115 lbs. I'm very active and I eat. A lot. Of healthy food. I'm strong (I lift 3x/week) and I have awesome endurance (I run 4x/week, training for a half marathon). Other people tell my that I'm too thin, but I'm really just in the best shape of my life (and believe me, I have been "too skinny" before).

Graceious1

I think it is about getting to the point where you feel really good about the way you look and feel. I lost two stone (28lb) before I joined here and want to lose 1 more and know that I will look and feel really good there. Good luck in your weight loss, this is a fantastic forum to achieve it.

There are some great comments on here.

mwilke

I know that they say that a healthy BMI for my height (5'2") is 101 to 136, the last time I remember being in that range was when I was in 8th grade (131). Even in the "obese" category right now at 175, I think that I look better than I have in a long time. And I am healthier than I have been in a long time- and only becoming more so. That being said, if I were to weigh 101 with my bone structure- I would look sick. I think I may even look sick at 136. I would gage it as a how I feel type of thing. If I couldn't maintain a weight in a healthy way, and if I didn't have the energy to work out- then I think I would be too thin.

8goodgirl0

Many people would say endurance athletes were 'too thin'. Too thin for what?