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Why People Never Get Over Being Fat
Posted by Boggart,
25 September 2013
·
1194 views
serious blog
As some of you know, I used to be quite fat. I was 200 pounds at 5'5 at 16, so I was a giant, stubby, round little Asian mofo. Between the ages of 17-19, I lost 60 pounds with diet and exercise. It's been 3 years since then and I'm now sitting at 150 at 5'7 which I'm not extremely happy with, but it'll do pig, it'll do.
This is what I've learned about being in shape AFTER being fat:
Disclaimer: Before I start, I don't want people to think that people like me have a chip on our shoulder or are self-entitled to our self-esteem issues. I just wanna express what people like me go through every day.
People who meet me after the age of 19 never believe that I used to be really fat. I have had to show people my stretch marks as proof (sexxxyyyyyy). Those who did know me when I was fat, basically say "I always forget that you used to be fat." I, however, never forget that I used to be fat. I see the signs everyday that remind me every day (such as a sign saying 2 burgers for $4). I have the same thoughts as I did before I lost the weight. Those thoughts that came from being fat don't just go away. It's not a phase. It's a part of who I am.
Sorry to generalize, but for the most part, people aren't fat due to zero fault of their own. While there are many factors that contribute to one's weight, I still believe that if people changed their life style, most people could be in shape. In the past, I blamed everyone but myself for being fat. But at the end of the day, I was fat for a few reasons:
1) I loved food. Still do. But at the time, knew nothing about nutrition.
2) I hated being active because I was so large, I felt useless and embarrassed for being worse than everyone else.
3) I simply liked video games more than sports. Why work out when I can make my Sims guy work out?
4) Exercising sucks and I can't take these chicken fingers and fries with me while I work out.
I didn't have a gland problem; I didn't have a genetic predisposition to weight retention; I wasn't born with diabetes or anything; it was very simple why I was fat: Too much food and lack of physical activity. At 16, I started actually reading about nutrition and slowly became more active and ate less/better. As I started to lose weight, I could tell people started to treat me better. I got compliments from friends and family. Clothes fit me better. I became less embarrassed to go shopping because I could wear Mediums instead of XL's. Losing weight felt good, so I kept going. At one point, I was almost at the brink of an eating disorder because I got hooked on losing weight, feeling good, "being healthy" and other people treating me better (that's not really the point of this blog, just know that weight loss can make people do crazy things)
People who used to be fat are not the same as people who are still fat. We actively (for the most part) lost the weight because we hated the way we looked/felt. I know many overweight people who embrace and love themselves regardless of how they look, and good for them! I, on the other hand, hated myself enough to lose the weight by doing things I hated and ignoring things I enjoyed. We never loved our fat selves; we hated it. To us, being fat is a constant reminder of us not being good enough.
And here's my point as to why fat people never get over being fat: we're indirectly told every day to not re-gain the weight. It's not just society and magazines that pressure us to keep fit, but our friends and family say the exact same thing. People we care about and new people that we meet compliment us on how we look. People who don't know that we used to be fat make fun or tease people who are still fat. We're conditioned to think that our old way of life is evil and wrong.
In other words, everyone is telling us that a very real part of us, is evil. The "fat part" of me is still very much alive. There isn't a day that goes by where I prefer eating carrots with a small portion of hummus and then going for a run over eating a fully loaded plate of nachos and then playing video games for hours. Every day I suppress my wanting of eating fried, sugary, decadent, delicious and unhealthy foods. And the days that I do indulge, I hate that I let "that other part" of me take over, even if it's just for a day. People act as if "Good job! Now you're a healthy person who doesn't have those evil, evil urges! You've changed!"
No. We just repress it. We ignore it. We've been conditioned to believe that what we're doing now is good, and what we used to do is bad. But the part of us that tells us to eat eat eat isn't gone, we've just gotten better at ignoring it. It'll never go away. It'll always be a part of us. Every single day, we hate a part of us. Not only do we hate a part of ourselves, the better we get at hating a part of ourselves, the more other people compliment us. They say "Good job being healthy!" but we hear "good job looking better by ignoring and hating a very real part about yourself. If you stop hating yourself, other people will hate you instead."
Yes I'm being extreme. No, I'm not exaggerating that much. How are we ever supposed to be happy with ourselves when a part of staying thin is continually hating a part of ourselves? Self-esteem is how much you love yourself; all of yourself. How are we supposed to have healthy self-esteem when we're told a part of us is bad. Society says that you should be happy with the skin we're in, but for those of us who have felt the extreme differences between being fat and being thin, we know that people are treated differently based on how they look. We understand that it's good to be healthy and active, but again, we were fat for a reason. We don't start "enjoying" exercise; we enjoy the effects of exercise, or more likely, we hate the feeling of guilt when we don't exercise. We don't start preferring salads over french fries; we just decide that eating a salad makes us hate ourselves less than eating fries.
When people say "oh, you've gained weight", we panic. Even if no one says anything to us, we can almost sense that people are thinking it. We're afraid of losing all the things that we didn't have when we were larger. We don't want to start thinking "are those people laughing at me because I don't fit this shirt anymore?", but we do. Those are the moments we subvert to temptation and continue to gain more weight, or we need to crack down and guilt ourselves back to denying our wants.
So to all you people who have never been fat: don't tease and say, "Why are you ordering a salad? Real men don't eat salad," or "Oh come on it's ONE piece of cake. You can afford it," if we've decided to have a healthier alternative. Chances are we're not feeling great about ourselves and we don't want to make ourselves feel worse. If we complain because we've gained five pounds, don't patronize us for freaking out and overreacting. If we seem to be fishing for compliments, don't lie to us, but maybe throw us a bone if we look good that day to show us that it's worth all the effort we're putting in. And mostly, don't pity us. If we start to regain the weight,don't tell us we haven't. We're very aware of our own bodies. What scares us is that while we know we can lose the weight with enough will-power, the lack of this same will-power can cause us to regain all the weight. I doubt many of us who were fat actively TRIED to gain weight. It just happened. We're afraid that we'll get fat, and it'll "just happen" again.
However, it's comforting to know that since we've lost the weight once, we can do it again with enough will-power. Our weight may take a back-seat once in a while and it might mean we're unhappy and are turning to food for comfort, or we're just simply too busy to find the motivation right now, but we know we can do it again. We take pride in the fact that we lost a significant amount of weight with hard work. Sometimes we overcompensate our confidence because of it. Sometimes we just seem to never have good self-esteem. Being fat really does mess with your mind and it's a "one day at a time" process for me. So please try and understand what we go through every single day, and don't tell us to "look in the mirror and look at how good you look now." Don't think that we always hate ourselves and that we're never happy with the way we look. Just understand that some days are worse than others, and we have very legitimate reasons for feeling crappy sometimes. If anything, we're so happy with our progress and how we look that we're just afraid of losing it all.
If you used to be fat and don't feel these things, then you're clearly just more well adjusted than I am.
Boggy
P.S. I sound kinda bitter but I'm not. I'm currently wearing an XS shirt and 30-inch waist pants so yay?
This is what I've learned about being in shape AFTER being fat:
- People treat me way less shitty when I'm in shape.
- I feel less shitty about myself when I'm in shape than when I was fat.
- I feel much more guilty when I eat an unhealthy meal than I did when I was fat.
- I can get away with a lot more shit now that I'm less ugly
- I'm never happy with how I look. I tell myself "Once I reach _____ pounds, I'll be happy!" When I reach that, I'm still not satisfied.
- I'm constantly afraid that I'll gain the weight back and revert to a life where people treat me different just because of the way I look.
- I judge those who are fat. I think "If I can lose the weight with hard work, why can't they? They're clearly lazy" even though I know exactly how they feel/felt.
- People who've never been fat will never understand how we feel.
Disclaimer: Before I start, I don't want people to think that people like me have a chip on our shoulder or are self-entitled to our self-esteem issues. I just wanna express what people like me go through every day.
People who meet me after the age of 19 never believe that I used to be really fat. I have had to show people my stretch marks as proof (sexxxyyyyyy). Those who did know me when I was fat, basically say "I always forget that you used to be fat." I, however, never forget that I used to be fat. I see the signs everyday that remind me every day (such as a sign saying 2 burgers for $4). I have the same thoughts as I did before I lost the weight. Those thoughts that came from being fat don't just go away. It's not a phase. It's a part of who I am.
Sorry to generalize, but for the most part, people aren't fat due to zero fault of their own. While there are many factors that contribute to one's weight, I still believe that if people changed their life style, most people could be in shape. In the past, I blamed everyone but myself for being fat. But at the end of the day, I was fat for a few reasons:
1) I loved food. Still do. But at the time, knew nothing about nutrition.
2) I hated being active because I was so large, I felt useless and embarrassed for being worse than everyone else.
3) I simply liked video games more than sports. Why work out when I can make my Sims guy work out?
4) Exercising sucks and I can't take these chicken fingers and fries with me while I work out.
I didn't have a gland problem; I didn't have a genetic predisposition to weight retention; I wasn't born with diabetes or anything; it was very simple why I was fat: Too much food and lack of physical activity. At 16, I started actually reading about nutrition and slowly became more active and ate less/better. As I started to lose weight, I could tell people started to treat me better. I got compliments from friends and family. Clothes fit me better. I became less embarrassed to go shopping because I could wear Mediums instead of XL's. Losing weight felt good, so I kept going. At one point, I was almost at the brink of an eating disorder because I got hooked on losing weight, feeling good, "being healthy" and other people treating me better (that's not really the point of this blog, just know that weight loss can make people do crazy things)
People who used to be fat are not the same as people who are still fat. We actively (for the most part) lost the weight because we hated the way we looked/felt. I know many overweight people who embrace and love themselves regardless of how they look, and good for them! I, on the other hand, hated myself enough to lose the weight by doing things I hated and ignoring things I enjoyed. We never loved our fat selves; we hated it. To us, being fat is a constant reminder of us not being good enough.
And here's my point as to why fat people never get over being fat: we're indirectly told every day to not re-gain the weight. It's not just society and magazines that pressure us to keep fit, but our friends and family say the exact same thing. People we care about and new people that we meet compliment us on how we look. People who don't know that we used to be fat make fun or tease people who are still fat. We're conditioned to think that our old way of life is evil and wrong.
In other words, everyone is telling us that a very real part of us, is evil. The "fat part" of me is still very much alive. There isn't a day that goes by where I prefer eating carrots with a small portion of hummus and then going for a run over eating a fully loaded plate of nachos and then playing video games for hours. Every day I suppress my wanting of eating fried, sugary, decadent, delicious and unhealthy foods. And the days that I do indulge, I hate that I let "that other part" of me take over, even if it's just for a day. People act as if "Good job! Now you're a healthy person who doesn't have those evil, evil urges! You've changed!"
No. We just repress it. We ignore it. We've been conditioned to believe that what we're doing now is good, and what we used to do is bad. But the part of us that tells us to eat eat eat isn't gone, we've just gotten better at ignoring it. It'll never go away. It'll always be a part of us. Every single day, we hate a part of us. Not only do we hate a part of ourselves, the better we get at hating a part of ourselves, the more other people compliment us. They say "Good job being healthy!" but we hear "good job looking better by ignoring and hating a very real part about yourself. If you stop hating yourself, other people will hate you instead."
Yes I'm being extreme. No, I'm not exaggerating that much. How are we ever supposed to be happy with ourselves when a part of staying thin is continually hating a part of ourselves? Self-esteem is how much you love yourself; all of yourself. How are we supposed to have healthy self-esteem when we're told a part of us is bad. Society says that you should be happy with the skin we're in, but for those of us who have felt the extreme differences between being fat and being thin, we know that people are treated differently based on how they look. We understand that it's good to be healthy and active, but again, we were fat for a reason. We don't start "enjoying" exercise; we enjoy the effects of exercise, or more likely, we hate the feeling of guilt when we don't exercise. We don't start preferring salads over french fries; we just decide that eating a salad makes us hate ourselves less than eating fries.
When people say "oh, you've gained weight", we panic. Even if no one says anything to us, we can almost sense that people are thinking it. We're afraid of losing all the things that we didn't have when we were larger. We don't want to start thinking "are those people laughing at me because I don't fit this shirt anymore?", but we do. Those are the moments we subvert to temptation and continue to gain more weight, or we need to crack down and guilt ourselves back to denying our wants.
So to all you people who have never been fat: don't tease and say, "Why are you ordering a salad? Real men don't eat salad," or "Oh come on it's ONE piece of cake. You can afford it," if we've decided to have a healthier alternative. Chances are we're not feeling great about ourselves and we don't want to make ourselves feel worse. If we complain because we've gained five pounds, don't patronize us for freaking out and overreacting. If we seem to be fishing for compliments, don't lie to us, but maybe throw us a bone if we look good that day to show us that it's worth all the effort we're putting in. And mostly, don't pity us. If we start to regain the weight,don't tell us we haven't. We're very aware of our own bodies. What scares us is that while we know we can lose the weight with enough will-power, the lack of this same will-power can cause us to regain all the weight. I doubt many of us who were fat actively TRIED to gain weight. It just happened. We're afraid that we'll get fat, and it'll "just happen" again.
However, it's comforting to know that since we've lost the weight once, we can do it again with enough will-power. Our weight may take a back-seat once in a while and it might mean we're unhappy and are turning to food for comfort, or we're just simply too busy to find the motivation right now, but we know we can do it again. We take pride in the fact that we lost a significant amount of weight with hard work. Sometimes we overcompensate our confidence because of it. Sometimes we just seem to never have good self-esteem. Being fat really does mess with your mind and it's a "one day at a time" process for me. So please try and understand what we go through every single day, and don't tell us to "look in the mirror and look at how good you look now." Don't think that we always hate ourselves and that we're never happy with the way we look. Just understand that some days are worse than others, and we have very legitimate reasons for feeling crappy sometimes. If anything, we're so happy with our progress and how we look that we're just afraid of losing it all.
If you used to be fat and don't feel these things, then you're clearly just more well adjusted than I am.
Boggy
P.S. I sound kinda bitter but I'm not. I'm currently wearing an XS shirt and 30-inch waist pants so yay?
Preach. A couple yrs ago I lost 20 pounds. Recently I've pretty much gained all of it back and I think about it all the time like "how the fuck did that happen?" People always try to tell me "oh you're not fat" or "it's all in your ass anyway" but it doesn't help. It also sucks how much food is pushed on us. I counted how many food ads come on in 1 hr of television. It's fucking ridiculous.