NSV - overcame the 'fat girl' stereotype

katcunock

I am a youth worker.

A colleague and I were talking with a young woman who was telling us about how she didn't eat breakfast, didn't eat dinner, and was tired all the time, which she thought meant she played too much football.

I asked her if she knew what a calorie was.

I could see the look of HORROR on my colleage's face, that the 'fat girl' (me) had mentioned calories. Surely my attitude to them couldn't be healthy? What damage was I about to do?

I gently explained to the young woman that when we talk in school about the energy it takes to power a light bulb, calories are the same. They are energy, so when we eat food, what we are doing is taking in energy. And if she wasn't taking in enough energy, that was probably why she was tired, and why her football performance had gone downhill recently.

The young woman seemed to realize what i was talking about, and that she'd try to eat more. And my colleague..... clapped me on the shoulder, said well done and walked away.

Go me

katcunock

this wll stay with me for some time

cuterbee

Go You! Absolutely yes!

katcunock

thanks

byeachmoment

That's great. Hopefully she really follows your advice.

katcunock

i hope so it was a case of fat girl + calories + advice = can't be good, surely....

LennyInFlorida

Great job!!

Oishii

Great job! I really don't think 'calorie' should be a bad work. I tell my 5 year old that he needs energy so he needs enough calories, because I don't want his first belief about calories to be that they are somehow, intrinsically, bad.

katcunock

Great job! I really don't think 'calorie' should be a bad work. I tell my 5 year old that he needs energy so he needs enough calories, because I don't want his first belief about calories to be that they are somehow, intrinsically, bad.

that's exactly it, people hate the word, just like they hate the word diet when it actually refers to the food you intake.

JustLindaLou

This is HUGE. It is time we stop giving "calories" such a bad name and realize they ARE energy!! Gosh would we fill up our cars if Gas was sold as "calories"? LOL!!! Something I read recently talked about why it was so harmful to weight loss efforts to eat late at night pointed out this very thing - calories are ENERGY, we need them during the day to function, not at night to sleep. Funny how that finally "clicked" something for me, about the nighttime binges and exactly what I was doing to my body. Good for you for speaking up! You've lost a pretty significant amount of weight, you have obviously learned a few things about how it works!

katcunock

This is HUGE. It is time we stop giving "calories" such a bad name and realize they ARE energy!! Gosh would we fill up our cars if Gas was sold as "calories"? LOL!!! Something I read recently talked about why it was so harmful to weight loss efforts to eat late at night pointed out this very thing - calories are ENERGY, we need them during the day to function, not at night to sleep. Funny how that finally "clicked" something for me, about the nighttime binges and exactly what I was doing to my body. Good for you for speaking up! You've lost a pretty significant amount of weight, you have obviously learned a few things about how it works!

this colleague was meeting me for the first time so he didn't realise that i used to be much bigger

sometimes, i can't avoid eating late as i don't get home from work til 1030pm. the body still needs energy at night, just to keep the heart pumping and organs functioning, but not as much as in the day, so while i'll eat when I get in, I wouldn't exactly pig out

JenniBaby85

:drinker: Good job, that was really well said :flowerforyou:

RhonndaJ

Wow. I love that you did this. Good for you.

katcunock

thank you everyone

debruhf

great job

angelique_redhead

Flawless victory! Go you!

jerbear1962

Great job!!! Hopefully that will stick with her too. It's funny what we learn and where we get to pass it on. Keep up your great work.

newdaydawning79

Great way to put it and it sounds like it was taken quite positively, as it should!

Florawanda

You did so well to seize the moment. I used to push the lesson of fruit and veggies on to my children, too, with tales of sailors getting scurvy on long voyages!!! I think they all knew before they were 5 about carbohydrates, vitamins and protein as well... and they loved being told they were not just carnivores but omnivores! I used to relate it to the dinosaurs... triceratops is a carnivore, brontosaurus is a herbivore, but people are omnivores!!!
The sooner our young people learn about how their bodies function, how to fuel them properly, the healthier they will be.
But the best way to teach is by example, and you are setting a fantastic example to the kids you work with, by showing that even if you have extra weight you don't need to store in your body, you can do something about it to get back to a healthy weight!
WELL DONE!

ShannonECTD

:drinker: :flowerforyou:

Great!