Denial is a big thing. I was convinced I wore an 8 when I was pushing a 12 and figured if I told people I wore an 8, maybe they would believe it too.

She could be telling the truth, or she could be lying. But from the sound of it, she's just not ready to accept what needs to be done and do it. Which is fine, if irritating to you - she'll do it when she's ready, and if she doesn't at all that's her choice too.

I don't understand a lot of social stuff very well, but is it possible she's not really interested in losing weight at all, and is really just trying to reaffirm that you're not going to stop being her friend and supporter?

I don't think lying about her size is a big deal.
If she asks for help, offer to help her. It's up to her to take the advice or not.

I wonder about this too. People lie about their size, what they eat, all kinds of things. And it's not like they've been put on the spot and don't want to admit to their real weight/size/whatever. They volunteer! My favorite, and one you see all the time: I don't eat enough. Or it's cousin: I don't eat frequently enough. There are all kinds of theories about how often you should or should eat, and why, but you don't get to be over 300 lbs because you skip breakfast! I'm thinking of a friend of mine who at her peak out-weighed me by 100 lbs., and was shorter than me, yet told me she wore only one size bigger than me. I found out her weight after she'd gone on the Fat Smash Diet and wanted to tell me how much she'd lost. When she did start losing weight, she was eating only 800 calories a day, and she went nutso and alienated all the rest of our group of friends, and eventually me.

I had a friend like that too. She'd starve herself all day, drink 6 cans of mountain dew- then eat chinese at night and tell me she didn't understand why she was fat. I did point out to her 6 cans of mountain dew and chinese food was not healthy. Needless to say we haven't spoken in over a year since I started losing weight AND keeping it off.

I think that the next time she asks me for help (in a couple weeks if the cycle doesn't change), I will gently tell her that the best advice I can give her is to be honest with herself. I don't care if she tells everyone in the world that all she eats is broccoli while she secretly scarfs down McDonald's, but she needs to be honest to her. I've advised her to keep a food journal before, I think I will remind her of that and suggest putting it somewhere only she will see it so that she can be completely honest in it. I'm thinking that I might also tell her that if she wants someone outside of herself to be honest with that I'm here and that I promise I'm not going to judge her or tell anyone else anything she tells me about this stuff. Good plan?

Lies are easier than going to the gym or regulating food intake. I get it. I did it.

Women lie about this stuff because they are not getting admired, praised, complimented enough by others AND themselves. I did it because I had a lot of negative self-talk to combat. I needed to have people believe an illusion that I was worthy enough to have their praise. And that this might somehow quiet my thoughts that berated me.

I think the food and activity journal helped to give me a source of praise to myself. But I really had to work at using it for praising myself for everything in it rather than treating it as the correct behavior that I should have been doing all along and therefore not noteworthy. This also goes for not berated myself for eating off plan BUT being joyful about getting right back to it.

I think it's a good plan. If you feel like she needs it, you can couch it either further. Tell her to write down everything, and if she still isn't losing she can take it to her doctor as evidence to look for some further problem. But my guess is that honesty truly is the problem.

How close is this friend? How annoying is all of this to you? Because if it's a problem for you, you may have to tell her at some point that you can't help her and she has to stop asking. And that she might like that. I hope it doesn't work out that way.

I think that's a good plan. The friend I mentioned before, I just resorted to listening to her tales and just plain being her friend. I've noticed she's been more open about all she eats now and her sweet weaknesses. I just chalk it up to...one day she's decide to lose weight on her own there's just nothing I can say or do to encourage her. It has to come from her and (Like you said) she has to be honest to herself.