oh... im so proud of hubby... this was funny... i had been telling him about this thread and we have been watching the world more closly
he stopped at the book store to pick up a book and it is a fairly busy street... more like a plaza i should say... lots of teens running around in a car mom and dad bought...
well they were circling the store... crusin' and as hubby walked up to this woman who was already standing there waiting to get across.... hubby noticed this new dodge ram stopped in front of the store just up from him to let a skinny girl walk by... and the man was checking her out....
he looked right at my hubby and this (big) woman and her little girl waiting to cross the street.... he heard the boy hit the gas with no intention to slow down to let them thru.... hubby started walking out in the road and put his hand up and made the guy stop to let them walk..... ( padestrians have the right of way there.. ) he looked back at the woman and motioned his head " to come on" ... she looked at hubby like he was crazy and then thanked him... as they walked in the store she said she was standing there forever waiting to get across and no one would let her.
me and hubby have been loosing together and we were talking today how much we see a differance in each other... but no one has said " youve lost weight"
i told him where we have been away from people for so long that even loosing 50 pounds we may still shock them with how much we have gained since we seen them last.... i hate that!
D Capulet,
Please don't stop writing. I have the blessing of being able to read your posts. You touch more people than you might realize with your words.
I totally understand about a guy in school hurting you. (My similar situation was due to very bad acne...some guy told me he'd but a paper bag over his head and shoot himself if he looked like me. Junior high and high school were NOT good to me.) If I saw that guy today, I'd smile and ask him how he's doing. I'm betting he doesn't even remember the horrible comment that caused years of feeling ugly. But if he does remember it, he'll just feel guilty and bad when I'm nice to him. As it is, I've decided that the multitude of other people who've described me in much "prettier" terms are the "right" people and this guy...he was just wrong.)
Your writing could bring so much to this world. So maybe you don't feel like reading it outloud. That's ok. But enjoy writing for the sake of writing. It brought you joy. A joy you deserve for a talent, a gift that you have. Revel in your gift, Capulet, revel in it.
ummm...ok...sorry... I'll go do something else now.
Cammie
I was teased by family, kids in school, etc. Usually in school what would happen is some idiot kid would be taunting me about my weight for a good deal of time without me saying anything back. Then when I'd decided I'd had enough I would haul off & smack the kid. Then it's "SHE HIT MEEEEEE!!!!" I never had one teacher say, "Aimee would never hit you for no reason. What did you say to her to make her angry enough to hit you?" Instead I got to write sentences. They would make you write 100 times "I will not hit" & turn it in as homework.
Another time on the bus in junior high (at a school that went from kindergarten to 8th grade), this girl (much younger, but old enough to know better) was hitting me with her jumprope on my way off the bus. I grabbed it & kept walking. That broke it & she looked like she was going to cry. I didn't get in trouble b/c the bus driver had seen what happened.
I've found that when I was 10-15-30 pounds overweight, heck even when I was 5 foot 7 and 215 pounds (ie, not that fat) , my family (uncles, cousins) thought it was ok to tease. Once I hit about 220, 230, no one in the family mentioned my weight ever again, almost like it wasn't funny anymore? I don't know. Even now they don't mention it. Except my Grammy before she died. "Honey you look so pretty when you're all done up with your hair & makeup. Now when are you going to do something about that weight?"
I'm glad I'm not the only one who had to go through some of this, but that doesn't make any of it hurt any less.
Last edited by SuchAPrettyFace; 07-13-2007 at 05:20 PM.
I got one yesterday...
I was walking out of the grocery store and three 20yo male personal trainers were out recruiting for the gym. So Trainer #1 asks me if I've heard of LA Fitness (don't think he was being insulting here) and I say "Ummm, no thanks" as I walk by. Trainer #2 says "What's that?" (like I didn't know what it was). This was he was about 4 feet from me - didn't even have the courtesy to gossip behind my back. I wasn't really in the mood to educate him though, so I kept walking.
This reminds me of this girl at my gym - it's a college gym, so they hire students. One of the girls was this 18 yr old Miss Twiggy cheerleader type who was always extremely distant to me. I got the impression that she had the attitude "fat people don't belong in gyms". Whatever. So one morning she was on the treadmill running hard and I was on a machine behind her. While running really hard she took a misstep and quite literally fell on her face. At first I was concerned whether she got hurt - but the look she had on her face was priceless - she gasped, sat up, and looked around all shocked to see if anyone else had seen her make a fool of herself.
Today I was waiting for my kids to finish swimming after my workout and got into a conversation with a lady. As we were saying our goodbyes she says that she will pray for me to lose weight. This was pretty out of the blue since most of our conversation had been on children's names, and none of our conversation has been about weight issues. I decided to take it at face value because I think she was being sincere, but still. How would she have felt if I ended our conversation with "I'll pray that you are able to find a dentist who can help you get a beautiful smile."? Her teeth were not in good shape or they were just plain missing.
If she wants to pray for me, go for it, she didn't need my permission.
My sister and her 6-year-old daughter were walking by an outdoor clothing display. Her daughter said, "Mommy, if you weren't so fat, you might be able to buy some of these clothes." Bad, right? But then, when she told her husband, he said, "Well, maybe you should fix that." As though that's all it took. My sister struggles with weight, but she was this size when she first met him, so why would he assume it was so easy to make those changes?
Oh, and I agree with Cammie, Capulet. I'm a writer, too, and would love to see some of your work. Why is it that bad words are always so much more powerful than good ones?
This woman and I were waiting in the hotel lobby after the kidney conference in Anaheim a couple of years ago. We both still had our name tags on, and she was kind of staring at me, so I thought it would be ok to ask her what chapter she was from & how she'd been diagnosed, etc.
Well. Am I ever sorry I did that!
She began to drone on & on about how my weight was only damaging my kidneys further & how she felt exercise was the only way she could fight this disease, etc. I really began to be sorry I opened my mouth.
When my friend showed up to pick me up, she nearly followed us out to the car to continue preaching at me. It didn't help that at the conference there are bowls of candy out. Now I hate hard candies, but they were my favorite color, so I grabbed a few as souvenirs. Just as I was getting into my friend's car they all fell out & I could still see her watching me from the door.
I went again this year to the kidney conference, and did not speak with anyone I did not know.
My boss is guilty of so many hurtful comments. Which is interesting, because he's actually fatter than I am. He doesn't seem to think I can lose the weight. Which is funny, because he also didn't think I could quit smoking. Which I did, over a year and a half ago, and I don't miss and I haven't TOUCHED one since.
I work with two very thin co-workers. We were all out for lunch one day, and boss was saying something about being on a diet, and then said, "But Jessie and James, you guys don't need to worry about that. Shelby knows what I'm talking about."
Another one was when he came back from holidays and dumped a big bowl of Werther's candies on the table. I resisted them for THREE DAYS and then ate ONE. ONE Werther's. He came in as I was eating it, and said, "Shelby, are you eating those?" My face turned red with embarrassment, I said, "I just had one." And he goes, "Tsk, tsk. We need to keep each other honest. Better leave those for the.... [insert pause while he's pretending to think of a non-offensive word to use] carefree people [again, my two thin co-workers]."
I was FUMING after that one. I mean:
1. It's none of his business what I put in my mouth.
2. It's ONE WERTHER'S! He sees me eating a salad every flippin' day for lunch.
3. He's fatter than me (do I need to mention this again?)
4. I've done VERY WELL KEEPING MYSELF HONEST, thankyouverymuch. I didn't lose the first 25 pounds by having him watch over me, and it's not how I plan to lose the last 15, either.
Whew. Sorry. It really felt good to get that out... thanks for this thread.
I actually have quite a few more from my boss and other people as well. That bothers me, because I never considered myself *that* heavy - when I started this journey I was technically one pound shy of obese. Thinking about all the crap I've gotten really makes me feel terribly for those of you who have been dealing with this your entire lives. (((HUGS))) Thank you for sharing your stories.
Your boss says those kind of things because he is so unhappy with himself and he needs to make someone else feel as bad or worse than him. That's all there is to it. Maybe you should say, "I'm sorry that you feel so bad that you need to make me feel bad in order to make yourself feel better." Or not. You don't want to get fired. I think I would just feel bad for him.
After reading all of your stories, I feel so fortunate that I've never really had anyone say such horrible things to me. I can remember a few small things in school, but nothing as horrible as what some of you have experienced. And it doesn't make sense. The average American is overweight. The average weight continues to go up as people get fatter and fatter, yet we treat each other so badly. I feel fortunate to live where I am currently, actually. I live in Kent, OH, home of Kent State University. Made infamous 37 years ago due to the shooting of students by the National Guard. There is an air of acceptance here that I have never experienced anywhere else. Everyone, regardless of how different they are, is welcomed and accepted. It's the way the town and the school are. It's terrible that such a tragedy had to happen for people to wake up and realize that it's okay to be different and that we have to love each other no matter what because when we start to fight about our differences, people get hurt. But fortunately, that message of hope and love and acceptance is what people here strive for and encourage others to keep alive. Intolerance is not tolerated
Wow, this is long. Sorry about that. I think we can continue to improve the way people are treated, but always doing our best to treat everyone the right way.
"We can do no great things. Only small things with great love." Mother Theresa.
My boss is guilty of so many hurtful comments. Which is interesting, because he's actually fatter than I am. He doesn't seem to think I can lose the weight. Which is funny, because he also didn't think I could quit smoking. Which I did, over a year and a half ago, and I don't miss and I haven't TOUCHED one since.
I work with two very thin co-workers. We were all out for lunch one day, and boss was saying something about being on a diet, and then said, "But Jessie and James, you guys don't need to worry about that. Shelby knows what I'm talking about."
Another one was when he came back from holidays and dumped a big bowl of Werther's candies on the table. I resisted them for THREE DAYS and then ate ONE. ONE Werther's. He came in as I was eating it, and said, "Shelby, are you eating those?" My face turned red with embarrassment, I said, "I just had one." And he goes, "Tsk, tsk. We need to keep each other honest. Better leave those for the.... [insert pause while he's pretending to think of a non-offensive word to use] carefree people [again, my two thin co-workers]."
I was FUMING after that one. I mean:
1. It's none of his business what I put in my mouth.
2. It's ONE WERTHER'S! He sees me eating a salad every flippin' day for lunch.
3. He's fatter than me (do I need to mention this again?)
4. I've done VERY WELL KEEPING MYSELF HONEST, thankyouverymuch. I didn't lose the first 25 pounds by having him watch over me, and it's not how I plan to lose the last 15, either.
Whew. Sorry. It really felt good to get that out... thanks for this thread.
I actually have quite a few more from my boss and other people as well. That bothers me, because I never considered myself *that* heavy - when I started this journey I was technically one pound shy of obese. Thinking about all the crap I've gotten really makes me feel terribly for those of you who have been dealing with this your entire lives. (((HUGS))) Thank you for sharing your stories.
Wow, I'd take this to HR and file an harassment complaint. He can't say those things and get away with them!
i am growing intolerant of the worl and their ANTI Fat ways.
I saw a lady that use to work with my husband years ago at a festival... she kept looking at my stomach and said something baby.... and then looked at my 7 year old and said somethingelse about not being a baby anymore.... then looked at my stomach... i guess she couldnt get over how fat i have got since she saw me last... i could be wrong... but i think she thought i was pregnant.... ... i think i would have rather her just ask instead of looking at my gut.
I looked at my reflection in a store window and i still see this big woman... of course i am still obese!. And i see people looking at me and i am feeling good thati have lost what i have...
dont you just wish they knew.... if you think i look bad now you should have seen me before i lost xlbs.
it is really annoying... people look at fat people and say " Boy they need to lose weight" and then when they see you eat eating right and exersicing, they laugh at you for even tring!
Before when we went to mcdonalds or something my family would go sit down and i would go order the food... so it looked like i was ordering for 1 intead of 3, i use to hate the looks i would get.
im just in a mood today... im sorry... i will stop before i go off....
I'll go do something else now.
