Does any one get this?

I got that a lot when I first started, I stopped telling people about it. It SUCKS to not be able to tell friends/coworkers about it. But literally everyone has something to say and often its out of a place of jealousy.

If someone comments on your salad, you can always say "UGH! I ate SO MUCH PIZZA last night and I'm just really craving something green, ya know?" No one says anything about that.

yes. A lot of 'gonna have to eat normal again sometime' and 'how much do you want to lose?!' and 'People eat more than that Dr. Oz says to eat 2000 calories'.

I finally said - What do you mean going back to eating normal. Junk? Lunch at the gas station? I don't ever plan on going back to that. Are you suggesting that I should go back to that at some point? What is good about that?!

I never heard that again.

Also - "No, I'm not eating 'normal' amounts of food. No I'm not eating 2000 calories. I want to lose weight, not maintain. I have to burn more calories than I eat. I keep track of it ALL. I will go back to eating 2000 calories when I want to maintain the weight I'm at. I will keep losing until I am at a healthy weight - based on my size and doctor!

So I quit hearing about that too.

I heard a lot of 'well i'm doing this or that as if I was being extreme and logging food was ridiculous. Well I made no comment to that other than that it works for me - but I've quit hearing it because - wait for it - they haven't lost one pound.

When I was a lot heavier, I didn't really diet or care that much about being fat -- for a long long time I was just used to being overweight. So I admit that when I saw healthy/slim women dieting and heard them talk about losing 5 lb I kind of inwardly rolled my eyes. But now I understand, ANYONE can want to change their body, lose weight, etc. It's not a bad thing!

Once I was around 260 lb which was normal to me at the time...and I was talking with a coworker who weighed 130 but she was short, petite, and used to weighing 120. So for her, she was feeling "fat", she felt bloated and uncomfortable in her body and her clothes were tight on her. That would have been like me getting to 300 lb and feeling similarly (which happened, later on). Just because one person is still technically healthy and the other is obese...doesn't really make a major difference when it comes to how we feel!

When your friends, people you work with etc realise that you're losing weight, they comment excessively about it, i.e if you're eating a salad and they go "is that all you're having" etc
Also those who are healthy weight but want to lose a few pounds (like me), do you often get people say "oh you don't need to lose weight, you're a skinny minny"?

Personally, I find it quite annoying. I mean I may be okay weight to them, but I am not comfortable with my weight! I'm 5'2 and at 125lbs. I'm on the heavy range for my height. I'm losing weight because I would rather be in the middle of the BMI scale and also so my jeans would fit! My jeans feel rather snug and would like to get back my original weight of 119lbs.

When I told them I wanted to fit back into my jeans without them feeling too snug and buttons popping off, their response was "well go buy new ones a size up" ... pet peeve!

Here are a few observations I have had:

1) Most people aren't even aware of what a healthy diet looks like - physically. Portion sizes are usually double or triple what they need to be when we eat out. The ratio of vegetables and fruits to everything else is totally wrong and most people have no basis by which to make a judgement. So when they see you eating a balanced meal consisting of nearly all vegetables, they have no concept of what they are eating and what you are eating looks strange.

2) It is difficult to eat well! This is especially true when we eat out. The calorie content of most of our foods is absurd. You can pound one burrito that will suck up 650 calories in one shot and will leave you feeling hungry just 3 hours later. Add to that the deadly combo of fat and sugar in nearly everything, and that adds to the awareness issue.

So three weeks ago I decided to exclude all meat from my diet with the exception of some wild caught fish like salmon. It's just too good for me to cut it out. I cut way back on dairy by not buying much cheese unless it is low fat and switching to almond milk. Lent prompted that decision, but also the fact that I want to be able to run and play with my kids and grandkids without the need of blood thinners, cholesterol meds, heart meds, hypertension meds, etc. I want a good quality of life without pharmeceutical chemistry when I am 70 or 80.

Many have thought this to be a strange move. So this leads to observation three:

3) Most people don't know what to eat if it does not include meat! Again, do a survey of cookbooks and entrees at restaurants. Find the vegan dishes as a place to start. Then look for vegetarian dishes not loaded with processed carbs and cheeses. Hard to do.

The point is that people aren't just looking at your diet as something strange, but many people aren't even aware that this is how everyone should eat!