Sensitive topics

squashyhelen

Do you guys have any advice for how to approach a friend who is an extreme yoyo dieter? She eats one salad a day and can lose 30-40 pounds in two months, leaving her looking gaunt and grey. Very little protein, no berries even (just apples, bananas and spinach). She claims that she never feels hunger and has to force herself to eat. Last time, she ended up feeling numbness in a foot, which I personally think is because she just destroying her body! Don't know what to do about this, or even if I should, since it's her choice. She's really sensitive about people watching what she eats or telling her to eat more. But literally she goes from 150+ to 110ish or less in an extreme time span. Size 12 to size double 0. I keep getting worried, but just when I think "this is it, I'm going to talk to her" she starts bouncing back at an extreme rate. Should I as a concerned friend bring this up? Ask her BF to bring it up? Any advice?

jennmodugno

My mother is similar. The way I approached it was this: I talked about my weight loss often, showing her I was doing it and it was working. Naturally, she talked about hers. That was fine, I just listened. Then I waited for the inevitable weight gain, and sure enough, it happened. She naturally complained about it, and having to go back on her diet, and I casually mentioned this site and asked if she'd seen it, how it encouraged me to eat more and I still lost weight, and how easy it was, and how I still ate cookies and whatnot in moderation. That was all. I gave her the tools to help herself, and then let it go. I figure, you can't make someone do something they don't want to, and I didn't want to risk offending her since she's REALLY sensitive about her weight. She hasn't tried it yet, but maybe when she sees how it's still working for me, she'll get inspired to try.

squashyhelen

Thanks so much. Maybe I'll try gradually and very slowly talking about my weight loss. She knows that I'm watching what I eat, but that I still eat candy and cookies (just less so than before). I'm afraid that she'll see her method as validation because it gets the results quickly. It's no use talking about muscle maintenance ... because she hates the look of muscles on girls. Just saw her today .... so small and grey-skinned now.