Hi, Ladies! Just wondering about your experiences/looking for feedback:
I was talking to a good friend about my weight loss efforts of the last month or two. I'm happy with my progress and was expressing this to her-- but I just got this...vibe from her. Like she wasn't pleased. Of course, I was telling her about my efforts over a *bad* cheeseburger (NOT a planned cheat meal) and jokingly mentioned that. She rolled her eyes and pretty sarcastically said, "Good luck." What's up with that?! Have you had this sort of experience?
I just feel bad about the whole thing. I know she started Weight Watchers a few months ago and then dropped it pretty quickly-- I'm kind of assuming it's a jealousy thing? She may be upset with herself because she didn't stick to her original plan (which, come on, we've all been there and it's OK). But...ugh. Note to self: next time a friend tells me news about her weight loss, support her!
Not the biggest deal, she is my friend and a wonderful human being (except for that eye roll ). Just needed to share.
I general try to feel out a person when talking about my weight, since weight and weight loss can be such a sensitive topic. I have several people at work who I feel free to talk about almost anything related to my journey, but I try to be a little careful around my sister, who is obese and not dieting. Since we live together I can't avoid it completely, but I do my best to think about if I would have liked someone discussing a topic with me before I was ready to start my journey, and go with that.
I think of it like a common courtesy, to at least tread carefully over the topic before I know for sure how the other person will respond. Some people will be comfortable and some people won't, regardless of their weight or experience with weight loss. I hope for the same for myself over any topic that could be sensitive.
But yeah, it can be hard. Good luck, and maybe seeing your success will motivate her to give it a second chance!
I have had the exact same experience and when someone isnt in support of you and are generally happy for you..then they are not a real friend! The people who truly love you will be there cheering you on the whole way and never second guess you or "roll their eyes" at you!
Focus on the great and positive people in your life and weed out the negative ones!
I'm sure every mention you make of your weight reminds her that she is not doing everything she could be doing to lose weight herself. Jealous defensiveness is a pretty natural human reaction. Sometimes when I'm having a tough time I find myself rolling my eyes at people's completely-unrelated-to-me NSV posts on here, thinking "ugh why don't you just RUB IT IN" and all sorts of irrational tantrum-y garbage.
I'd suggest leaving weight talk out of your conversations with this friend for at least a while, since it seems to be putting her on edge and you have thousands of us here to talk diet and exercise with.
I agree with everyone else, she's probably just upset about her own weight loss downfalls.
Also, is she larger than you? I've realized that when someone smaller than me is talking about dieting I get a little defensive/jealous (but I keep it to myself).
Thanks for the responses. Yeah, after really thinking about it, I think it was a defense mechanism on her part. I definitely wouldn't go so far as to drop her as a friend. I will, however, just leave out the weight talk-- unless she brings it up. No muss, no fuss.
casey-- she's actually quite a bit thinner than me and is probably really close to a very healthy weight.
People don't like people who are being successful at something when they are failing. I know a girl at work gets mad at me because of my weight loss and I'll talk about it and she's like stop it all the weight you lose I keep getting...Not only does she complain and think she's fat, she's constantly doing nothing about it and both myself and another co-work has given her advice on what to do. I don't really care anyways she can be as unhappy as she likes I'm doing well in my journey. I'm at the moment where I'm just sick of people, because they're unhappy they want other's to be unhappy and stuck in their misery. But yours is different since she's a friend. Be supportive of her and maybe talk to her about her poor attitude towards your weight loss. Maybe she'll start to become more supportive about it.
I agree with everyone else... it's a jealousy response. I actually had a similar problem with my ex boyfriend. As soon as I became proactive about working out and eating healthy, our relationship started to unravel. He was jealous of the fact that I was improving my body and life and he was being stagnant and lazy with his. He felt like I was leaving him behind. That sounds like what her problem is as well.
He was jealous of the fact that I was improving my body and life and he was being stagnant and lazy with his. He felt like I was leaving him behind.
A lot of people are like that, especially when they have no self worth or confidence in themselves. It's pretty pathetic really. Its like abusive guys who want to keep their girlfriends feeling ****ty about themselves so they stay with them longer. It's a cycle when it comes to people. No one wants to see anyone else happy especially when they are miserable themselves!
Yep, my mother is like that which is one of the reasons I do not talk about it in the house or on facebook because it will make it back to her. She feels like because she has been unsuccessful that no one else can do it either. I have tried talking to her and helping her but nothing works. When she is ready to make the change and keep it she will. We even got in to a fight about it 3 days ago because she was pissed off I have been so suceccful. My mothers problem is after she loses the weight she goes back to eating how she did before and then gains it all back. Anyway my "sister" is unsupportive too because she refuses to lose weight because she is scared her boobs will shrink if she does and my "brother" is already a skinny *** dude with muscles up the wazoo so he doesnt really care much about dieting ****. I just keep it to myself most of the time or talk about it on here or to my best friend who really wants me to succeed.
She's jealous. It's strange but true. My husband was very freaked out when I started dieting, and he badgered me a little about it. Now that it's been about two months---I've lost ten pounds---and he tells me that he can't even tell!
LOL---people have trouble with change. Just make the decision to do this change regardless if you have your friends support or not---and the change will happen.
Scout, you don't actually live in one of the buildings that's in your profile pic do you? Those are the ones on LSD, yeah? I went for an interview in a guy's home there once and the place is INSANE!!!
Regardless, maybe make some more friends who will totally want to hear about your weight loss! If you work downtown near the loop, I'd be up for having a walking buddy during lunch or after work!
Last edited by Amberelise; 04-22-2011 at 10:19 AM.
Weight loss and diet and exercise become so engrained in our lives that we talk about it a lot... I was really fat... people don't really take you seriously until you lose a substantial amount of weight... I got those responses from my skinny friends and family... and they weren't unsupportive they just weren't use to it
It also takes them awhile to realize you really are smaller... I'm the same size just about as my friends and wear size small and extra small shirts... but I remember my friend wanted my free t shirt because she said it was probably too small for me... it fit just fine because well I had lost a ton of weight and was wearing that size...but she just wasn't use to it.
People are also jealous of your dedication not necessarily that you are losing weight and they aren't
It takes a lot of commitment to do this... People find it hard to fathom giving things up and wish they had that kind of will power...
Eventually they get use to it...and they stop judging you when you have a cheeseburger... but my mother still worries about me getting fat again even though I've taken off 140 pounds and have kept it off since September/October... I have my bad weeks where I'm home for vacation or something and she sees me being a pig...and she judges me...but she judges me out of love...because she doesn't want me to throw it all away...
You just have to put it into perspective... when you're overweight you dream of losing weight...you probably talk about it and fail miserably a bunch of times before something clicks... (this is the general pattern... I had never dieted before but talked a lot about being fat) My friends didn't take me seriously because I had never really put in the effort before
Eventually it will get better...but just like you think "how does that skinny person eat like that" they might think "how does she expect to lose weight eating like that" because we never put into perspective the rest of each others lives or days or other meals.
I have had some interesting responses by friends with my weight loss over the past year.
When I started I told several friends and had absolutely no support from my 'skinny' friends, however the opposite was true with my friends who were also obese. There were a few who were trying different dieting techniques, and others who weren't but they were generally all supportive of me as long as I when I was hanging out with them I didn't say things like, "I can't have that... blah blah blah..." However I could barely mention the topic around the thin friends. They would tell me that I looked fine and didn't need to lose weight, and why don't we just go out to taco bell? It was really frustrating. I ended up not hanging out with them as often when I knew food would be involved.
I haven't had too much experience with this. Mostly because I began losing weight when I entered college and most of my friends never knew me at higher weights. Sometimes it is a little odd around old highschool people on rare occasions I go home. It is a bit awkward and sometimes friends will say things but mostly I just keep it to myself and pretend nothing has happened. haha.
Unsupportive friend(s)
What's up with that?! Have you had this sort of experience?
). Just needed to share.
