NSV - overcame the 'fat girl' stereotype

katcunock
katcunock Posts: 664 Member
in Success Stories
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 :)

Replies

  • katcunock
    katcunock Posts: 664 Member
    this wll stay with me for some time :)
  • cuterbee
    cuterbee Posts: 545
    Go You! Absolutely yes!
  • katcunock
    katcunock Posts: 664 Member
    thanks :)
  • byeachmoment
    byeachmoment Posts: 67
    That's great. Hopefully she really follows your advice.
  • katcunock
    katcunock Posts: 664 Member
    i hope so :) it was a case of fat girl + calories + advice = can't be good, surely....
  • LennyInFlorida
    LennyInFlorida Posts: 202
    Great job!!
  • Oishii
    Oishii Posts: 2,675 Member
    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
    katcunock Posts: 664 Member
    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
    JustLindaLou Posts: 376 Member
    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
    katcunock Posts: 664 Member
    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
    JenniBaby85 Posts: 855 Member
    :drinker: Good job, that was really well said :flowerforyou:
  • RhonndaJ
    RhonndaJ Posts: 1,615 Member
    Wow. I love that you did this. Good for you.
  • katcunock
    katcunock Posts: 664 Member
    thank you everyone :)
  • debruhf
    debruhf Posts: 196 Member
    great job
  • angelique_redhead
    angelique_redhead Posts: 782 Member
    Flawless victory! Go you!
  • jerbear1962
    jerbear1962 Posts: 1,157 Member
    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
    newdaydawning79 Posts: 1,503 Member
    Great way to put it and it sounds like it was taken quite positively, as it should!
  • Florawanda
    Florawanda Posts: 283 Member
    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
    ShannonECTD Posts: 203 Member
    :drinker: :flowerforyou:

    Great!

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