Your slim friends telling you, you look good.....

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  • sheclimbsrocks
    sheclimbsrocks Posts: 110 Member
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    This gets on my &*@+*#% NERVES for some reason. I have a slim friend who I always go out with. She's cool, I love her, but she ALWAYS tells me "you look fine, you don't need to lose weight".

    I secretly feel that she doesn't want me to be as slim, or slimmer then her.

    Does anyone else have friends that make them feel that way?

    Can you just ask her not to say that to you anymore because of how it makes you feel? People try to be helpful, but she's probably just oblivious as to what she's doing. Real friends usually have the best intentions.
  • VP72
    VP72 Posts: 89
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    Ha! Ha! Yes it happens to me, the majority of my friends are miles slimmer than me & always say to me "you don't need to lose weight" or "you always look fantastic when we go out" - but when they are at least 3 clothes sizes smaller than me, I think it's just their way of trying to be supportive & nice, but doesn't help me when I know I do need to lose weight, so I eventually do look better when we go out! Or maybe their worried that when I get to my target weight they will have to make more of an effort to shift a few pounds.
  • Project_Jodie
    Project_Jodie Posts: 171
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    Can I add a perspective from 'the other side'? I'm small, I admit it, I'm not trying to loose weight I'm trying to be healthy because I'm marathon training. I have friends who are larger than me, some of them are classed as overweight, some are obese and others are just being silly. But if my overweight friends say something about being fat I will tell them they are not fat, simply to try and raise their self esteem, I hate seeing my friends upset about their weight. I tell them they're not fat but if they're actually trying to loose weight I will try and give some helpful advice. I'd never turn round to them and say 'Yeah, you're so fat. You better get jogging...' IMAGINE if I said that to my friends, I would have none left!

    THIS (Well said!) - I have 19 kilos to lose so by no means am I skinny right now. I think if they are a good friend, theyr'e saying things with the best intentions. I get the" You don't have to lose weight from my lovely friends, I am tall and do hide the weight a bit but at the end of the day I know what's best for me, I know my happy weight and I gotta do what I gotta do!
  • stepherzzzzz
    stepherzzzzz Posts: 469 Member
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    I have one friend who's tiny, a lot of the time even extra small tops are too big for her, and she's always saying she needs to lose weight and when I say "yeah, me too" she's like "what?! No you don't!".
  • JAT74
    JAT74 Posts: 1,078 Member
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    I know this problem well, when I lost over a some a few years back relatively quickly and everyone who knew me before said I was too thin even though I was only a UK size 10 with around 28% body fat. The people who said it were either overweight and jealous or thin and not happy I was catching up!

    Recently I moaned to a naturally skinny friend who does no exercise about my weight and she kept telling me I had the perfect body with no body fat which is quite clearly not true! It makes me more self-conscious about stripping of at the beach now, I'd rather people were honest and especially people like her who really are thin. We've been out recently to places where we've had group photos and I can barely look at myself in them I look so much bigger than her.

    I always make a point of acknowledging that people who are trying to get fit or lose weight are doing so 'cos they need it.
  • funforsports
    funforsports Posts: 2,656 Member
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    Is there a way to acknowledge that a friend is overweight without sounding like the skinny b!@#$? If they did say run one more lap you would be upset that they are judging. I don't think there is a good answer here other than stop asking if you look fat or making comments about how fat you are/look. Give your friend a break. It isn't like she just runs up to you and starts the topic of discussion. And face it, you allow yourself to feel less than because she is thin. I realized that I used to bring my weight up thinking if I brought it up first it would clear the elephant in the room. Trught be told, everyone trying to be PC was way more uncomfortable than just letting it be.

    Right on, if she is your friend she is probably trying to make you feel better about yourself. It really sounds like a no-win situation for your friend.
  • BCSMama
    BCSMama Posts: 348
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    I think the whole weight thing can make people feel uncomfortable. If someone overweight says something like "oh, I'm going to pass on the beer because I'm trying to loose weight", it could make those around them uncomfortable and likely to say something like "oh, you're fine". I don't think they're doing it to be mean or sabotage your goals. It's just that people often feel like they have to respond and saying "yeah, you probably should lay off the beer", they say something they perceive as nice.

    They might be annoyed that their overweight friends keep talking about their weight loss and it makes them uncomfortable, lol
  • tragedytotriumph
    tragedytotriumph Posts: 3 Member
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    I get this all the time! I don't like to talk about my weight but if it ever comes up, my friends try and convince me that I have some kind of distorted image of myself. Recently I've been much more serious about losing weight and they have generally been supportive, although sometimes they still tell me that I'm not fat. It's a bit frustrating but I genuinely think it is because they don't see me as fat, it isn't important in our relationship.

    What frustrates me more is when my skinny friends go on about their 'wobbly bits' when I would kill to have bodies like theirs!
  • aedlife
    aedlife Posts: 39 Member
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    I have been watching my weight for a long time. My co-workers know my struggles. I also have hypothyroidism and can't seem to get below 150...and I'm 5'2! So, my "friend" lost about 60 pounds. I was telling her how good she looked. She turned to me and offered me her clothes that no longer fit her. I wasn't as big as her when she began her journey, and don't have much to go...30 pounds. I took a deep breath and said, sure! She never brought them in. I think she realized her mistake in hindsight.
  • JAT74
    JAT74 Posts: 1,078 Member
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    Yes I also had that! Someone I know lost weight and at the time I was still smaller than her as she started off a lot bigger but I was always moaning about my weight so when she went to get rid of her bigger clothes she have me the bag and for me to take what I wanted. Everything in the bag was extra large or a size UK 16 whereas I wear size M or 10-12. I was quite insulted that she thought of me being so much bigger.
  • mathchote
    mathchote Posts: 1
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    @ they all backstab me those f!@£$%^ losers, anyway u rock nice q i reallly need true friend !!!!!!
  • bcattoes
    bcattoes Posts: 17,299 Member
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    I've been on both sides so I know how you feel, but also that you may be wrong about why your friend is saying it. When I was younger and slim I had a friend that was overweight. When she would lose weight she would always mention it, which was normal and fine, but what do you say in return??

    "Yeah, good job. Just another 50 lbs and you'll be there!"?? That wouldn't really go over very well, either.

    Even something like "You look awesome. I can't believe the improvements you made." doesn't sound very nice.

    I suppose just a "You look great!" and ending it there is the answer, but it's not always easy being on either side of that conversation.
  • erinsueburns
    erinsueburns Posts: 865 Member
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    The other perspective of this is that just as we sometimes have distorted pictures of what we really look at in our heads, those who are close to us sometimes do too. Like when I was gaining weight, hubby didn't really realize just how much bigger I had gotten until I explained I outweighed him by like 70 lbs and he is 6 inches taller than I am. And on the coming down track, a couple of weeks ago I was unpacking clothes I saved when I got too fat for them and sorting them into what I can wear and what I need a bit more work to get to. And hubby picked up a shirt and indicated there was no way I'd be able to squeeze into it and he was quite shocked to see it fit loosely on me. Pictures get stuck in people's heads.

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