Am I really that big?
 

So I lost some weight and was really pleased with myself. But I am confused now and think my confidence might be too high. I saw this show and it was a bunch of women trying to lose weight. I feel awful for saying this but there were several women on there that currently weighed 180(same as me) and I couldn't help but think I don't look nearly that big. Is this me having a wake up call or what is my problem? :?:

You have done awesome, keep up the good work.

Different people have different body compositions but beyond that we can only compare ourselves to ourselves, not others.

Even on this forum, I often see others who talk about how fat they are and their highest weight is lower than my goal weight. I just figure that they are on a different journey than me and I can only use my former self as a comparison for my present and future self.

So keep up the good work !

I'm looking at your profile photos and I think you look great!

Right now I weigh the same thing you do, but I'm a good 5" shorter than you are. Even so, I think I look pretty good - especially compared to how I looked last year. :)

So it's all relative. Don't let yourself be swayed by other people's body types or their weight gains/losses/goals. We're all different and we all carry our weight differently.

Be proud of the progress you've made! :)

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I weigh over 200 and wear a 13/14 in pants. It amazes me that I weigh so much but I'm not yet in aplus size. It all depends on the person. Don't get discouraged!

You are very tall, so I would imagine that if you're toned then you could easily carry 180 without looking 'fat'. It is difficult to compare yourself to others the same weight. I for example wear the same size clothes as a friend (UK18) who is the same height as me but I weigh 40lb more than her.

Kitty

:nod: What Nelie said. All of our bodies are so different. My family has "thick" women - strong, but small for our weight because we have a ton of muscle. Other people can weigh more but be physically bigger, because they carry weight differently, or carry more fat than muscle.

You can only compare you to you...otherwise, you'll be mixing yourself up with folks who have an entirely different body composition.

Have you seen this site?

http://www.cockeyed.com/photos/bodie...htweight.shtml

It gave me a much clearer idea of how I must look in comparision to others.

Wow!
 

wow! dixie that is amazing! that is an awesome site!! I've had difficulty figuring out why i don't see to be the same size as other people my weight. I guess even an inch adds alot of surface area depending on where that inch...legs or torso...or neck! Hmmm... interesting.

Cool. It certainly shows how everyone is proportioned differently!

I wonder this same thing all the time! I also wonder if I am being overly confident because I think I am begining to look pretty good again and then I see a picture of me and I am blown away. To me I look the same aas I did 20lbs ago. I really wonder if that is how I look or if I am overly critical when it is in print.

You look great!! You are tall and you are probalby just right at the weight you are at. I am 5'9" and I am very happy at 170. 170 is my goal and at that weight I wear a size 14, which might sound like a big size, but I am very happy at that size. Hope someday I get there.

I know what you are saying... I was (am) the same way. I swear to god I do not look like I weigh as much as I do. I about died when I saw the scale. I couldn't believe it. There were other people with me weighing in at the group I'm in...and at the beginning I would have swore I was the "skinniest." Boy was I ever wrong!!! It's so weird how our own realities are much different than everyone else's. seeing the scale made me feel less self confident for a about a day...but then I thought about it... and really I'm a good person, I'm a very smart person, and I'm beautiful...I just happen to be overweight. That shouldn't make me feel like crap though...you know? Why feel bad about yourself. I think I do better when I inflate my head a little, you know? haha...if all this makes sense.

I remember in college we read a study that found in average sized women, that the most confident, well-adjusted, mentally healthy had the most realistic perceptions of their body weight. However, of "overweight" women, the best adjusted saw themselves as a little thinner than they actually where.

I think part of it is that society does still push us to think that fat people are so bad, stupid, ugly, lazy..... that if you aren't any of those things, well you can't be all that fat.

I've mentioned here before that I said in passing something about "being fat" to a friend (not in a bad way, something like how hard it is to find clothes when you're fat), and the friend blurted out "you're not fat." HELLO! On what planet is 350+ NOT fat. My response was to burst out laughing hysterically. Though I still think, why is fat thought of as so bad, horrible, ugly that my friend couldn't acknowledge that I (someone she liked) could be fat because I wasn't any of those other things.

I'm not trying to say that I think you probably look better or worse, or thinner or fatter, than any one person your same weight, even of your same weight and same height. I'm saying it probably doesn't matter. Self-image can be a crazy thing, and none of us (no matter what our shapes and size) will ever see exactly what someone else sees when they look at us (and even when others look at us, they aren't all seeing the same thing).

Kaplods...I agree completely. Everyone has different realities. I'm such a nerd I'd even try to relate it to physics...haha but I'll spare you that one.

I also hear the "you're not fat" thing a lot... I personally think that when you establish relationships with someone (not necessarily intimate even)...they tend to see you for all your beauty. It's not fat/skinny, boring/exciting... you know? It's like their perception of you also shifts. It's sort of fun to think about...

You're pretty tall, especially for a woman. There really aren't that many women that are as tall as you--in fact 50% of all women are under 5'4". So chances are that the women you saw on that show were considerably shorter than you--there's a 50% chance they were more than 7 inches shorter than you.

At 175 lbs you are considered to be a normal weight; you're at the upper end of your acceptable BMI range but you aren't considered overweight. But a woman of 5'4" that weighs 175 lbs is considered obese. So you can see what a difference 7 inches makes. Chances are that you are considerably thinner than the women you saw on that show.