I’m trying to talk to the woman about her anorexia, which worries me, and which she probably wants to discuss since SHE brought it up. Your lack of concern and completely unprovoked aggression, however, are duly noted. :rolleyes:
Then he’s rude. He might have been saying it out of concern, though. And this isn’t really too relevant to Creaky, who admits that she’s anorexic, yet somehow thinks this garners her praise and admiration. That runs counter to your experience, which is puzzling.
I guess people have different experiences, then. Creaky thinks she’s most praiseworthy at a dangerously thin weight. You get lectured at a weight that is more healthy than that, somehow. I do know that, from reading SDMB threads on weight, it seems that the very thin women are more defensive about their weights in these discussions than the heavier ones. Not sure why that is. Maybe heavier women are used to getting a hard time? Or don’t expect tons of praise for their weight? And are used to not having clothes in their size? Don’t know.
Dear God, yes. I’ve gotten so many funny looks these past months for not knowing my US shoe/clothing size.
I have to admit, it did make me feel good when I learned I was a size small/extra-small over here. I am just 5 ft and somewhere between 100-105 pounds, and in Korea I’m a medium. I know it’s stupid and vain, but there you go.
I think it’s because it’s still okay to rag on skinny girls, encouraged even. It seems these days society will tear you to pieces for suggesting someone needs to drop a few pounds, but at the same time they encourage the vilification of thin women as an impossible standard. Not everyone who is skinny is anorexic, and I can honestly say I’ve never received a single bit of praise for my weight, only grief. The only people who thinksI’m fine just the way I am (and the only people whose opinions matter on this topic) are my doctor and my boyfriend.
If you ask people whether it’s ok to comment to a stranger or coworker about their weight, I bet 99% of people will agree that it’s rude. But that’s because they’re thinking about commenting to someone who is overweight. People think nothing of telling me I need to put on a little weight, or crack jokes about how I’m going to blow over in the wind. If I go for a piece of cake at an office lunch, I get told to grab a few more pieces. If someone sees me eating a salad, they tell me to slap a steak on it. If I say I don’t want something, or I’m not hungry, I get food pushed in my face. God forbid I dare talk about exercising or eating healthy.
I mean, if I say that I don’t appreciate those kinds of comments, they’ll think I’m sensitive about my weight because I’m anorexic, or because I have issues. It couldn’t possibly be that my body and health is just none of their damned business, but that’s the way it is. It’s just as rude as if someone were making fun of me for being fat, but for some reason it’s socially acceptable, is all. So yeah, as a skinny girl I’m a bit defensive, can you blame me?
While I’ve never had the experiences of other posters about being told to put on weight, unless I’m below normal, I will say that because I’m naturally quite thin (I’d normally describe myself as a hair above unhealthy–right now I’m actually trying to regain a few pounds that I’ve lost) I’m quite concious about my weight. I don’t fret over it much, but for me the difference between healthy and ‘oh good lord eat something!’ is as little as 5 pounds–I don’t think you could say the same thing at the other end of the spectrum. I don’t actually watch my size much–as long as I’m eating normally I’m fine, and if the subject ever comes up the usual response from people is ‘Yeah, you’re thin, but not unhealthy thin’. But if anything screws with my appetite any I can easily drop a few pounds, and I start freaking out at my own reflection. Being so close to that line all the time sometimes makes me wonder if other people see me as just a thin girl, or as an anorexic who really oughta eat a bag of chips.
My only qualm with sizing is that stores never stock enough of the popular sizes! I am 5’10" and wear a 12. Straight up average sized. Not thin, not overweight. But damnit it’s so hard to find pants in stock - especially in long length! I have like a 37" inseam or something and it is impossible to find pants that aren’t too short. Gap feels me and has a whole section of long-length stuff online (x-long pants and even shirts with longer sleeves!! holy crap a miracle!) and they also have a section for shorter women who have a hard time finding pants that aren’t too long. But it sucks to have to pay 60 bucks for each pair of pants because Gap is the only place I’ve found pants that are long enough. So I don’t have nearly as many pairs of pants as I would like. And it sucks to get excited seeing a big clearance rack and everything there is xsmall or a 0. The medium shirts and 12 pants are always gone. When I feel like shopping for cheap clothes I have to go to Marshalls (but actually found a pair of Gap jeans in xlong length there for 12 bucks - they were marked as irregular but there isn’t actually anything wrong with them - no weird seams or anything) and that takes forever.
It is annoying though to have to try EVERYTIHNG on because of vanity sizing. I’ll wear a small in mens shirts (tshirts and the like, and I steal button downs from my friend Kyle because his shirts are cute) and a medium or large in shirts depending on the store. Pants always have to be tried on to make sure they are long enough and aren’t too low rise. I wish a standard sizing chart for everyone could be implemented so it wouldn’t be such a damn chore to shop. I wouldn’t have to grab a shirt in 3 different sizes anymore!
I used to be 5’3 90-100 pounds which is a BMI of about 16.8.
Now I am 5’3 105-110 pounds which is a BMI of about 19.0.
I come from a family with skinny genes. Most of my siblings were/are frighteningly thin through high school. We tend to fill out in college, although only one of us has managed to get above a BMI of 22 and he works out.
I hated being that thin. I did have a few guys compliment me or encourage me to stay that thin, but they were creepy older men that I had no romantic or sexual interest in. When I was at my thinnest, I was picked on and considered very ugly by most males. I couldn’t have gotten a boyfriend to save my life. When I was in grade school, the principal, a very strict nun, pulled me out of class to give me a very long and embarassing lecture about how I would never be able to have children if I “continued along this dangerous path.” She didn’t believe me when I said that I was eating healthily. My mom bought these shakes designed to bulk up body builders and I choked them down every morning but to no avail. In high school, the nurse pulled me aside, accused me of being anorexic, and called me a liar when I denied the charge (she later did the same to my younger sister). By that time, I had more self-esteem and supportive friends who had observed that I ate more than they did so it did not effect my self esteem as much.
I used to hate shopping for clothes. Do you know how humiliating it is to shop in the kid’s section when you are 22? Finding decent work clothes was a struggle. After birth control and a bad diet, I’m finally at a weight I love. I still can’t fit in many brands (Old Navy, I am glaring at you) but I’ve been able to find enough brands in my size to take the misery out of shopping for clothes.
I hated being called anorexic and not considered a “real woman” because I didn’t have curves. I hate being told to eat a sandwich or have to listen to a lecture whenever I go to a McDonalds and buy a salad instead of hamburgers. I eat more than these busybodies, I just do it over the course of a day because when I ate just 3 meals, I was dangerously underweight. Fat women have whole clothing lines devoted to them. I had to shop in the kid’s section or shell out $100+ for each article of clothing to find things in my size.
It’s not OK to rag on anyone. What I do see is skinny girls bragging about how thin they are. I never, ever hear heavier, curvier women bragging about being so, or whining about how people criticize them all the time, even though it happens. Even the women who claim to get such a hard time about being thin still find a way to flaunt it. I have no dog in this, since I’m neither fat nor thin, but it does strike me as sort of a double standard.
I think your perspective is off on this, bigtime. I work in a middle school, and I neve hear thin girls getting teased for being too thin. I hear plenty of comments about short kids, and fat kids, though. Being thin is still held up as the standard of beauty, and clothes sizing reflects that.
No one has ever told you that you’re hot? I’m sure they have.
Oh please. I can’t believe someone would give you a hard time about discussing healthy eating.
Now, you DO realize that fat people still get a LOT of shit in this society, right? Likely more than you do, I’d bet. To keep this on topic, they also have a hard time finding clothing that fits them. They don’t have the option of shopping in the kids department, and clothes tend to get less fashionable and attractive the larger they get, in my experience. Heavier people are never even close to the standard of beauty this society sets, and the fashion industry gives them no love. I hope you appreciate that in the midst of your angst.
Fat women, as you call them, have more than their share of trouble finding clothes. I bet it’s just as humiliating for them as it is for you shopping in the children’s section, something I had to do also until I was in my 20’s because I am really small. I still wear kid sized t-shirts because I’m so short waisted. I don’t find it humiliating at all. At least those clothes are fashionable in some manner. Most clothes for larger women are dowdy, in my experience.
Oh - I didn’t realize that you were a counselor or psychologist with training and specialization in eating disorders. My apologies.
BTW - if you think that was aggressive, you really need to get out more.
Oh - I didn’t realize you needed to have a degree in psychology to talk to someone who obviously wants to talk about something. Your “apology” is accepted.
I realize you don’t like me, but maybe you should just open a Pit thread instead of taking unprovoked shots at me in random threads, OK? It’s getting on my nerves and it’s a hijack.
Rubystreak – I was coming in to lend you support here – only to find you’re, as usual, doing just fine on your own. This is exactly the point. I’ve been staying out of the discussion because I’m a big woman, myself – not huge, not grotesque, not eyebrow-raising – but definitely big. And I have a hard time separating my own defensiveness about my size from my negative reaction to the “don’t hate me because I’m thin” stuff. Thanks for unpacking the point that their presentation of self on this really is a big disingenuous.
Yeah, because some of these “put upon” thin posters in this thread think nothing of declaiming their scorching hotness in other threads. It’s disingenuous all right. The fact is, sexy, fashionable, hot clothes are not being designed for plus-sized women in mainstream fashion. I can tell you they’re not being designed for short women either, and in fact, I don’t know how ANYONE finds clothes that fit. “Real women” of all sizes have plenty of valid beefs with the fashion industry.
Creaky, if you’re still reading, I hope you don’t feel like I was jumping on your shit. Truly, I hope you are OK and that you feel as good about yourself as you deserve to. Be well.
Wow Ruby, I’d offer you some dip to go with that chip on your shoulder, but we all know I need the calories more than you do so I’ll refrain. :rolleyes:
Sweetheart, I don’t even know you. How could I possibly not like you?
I think if you would like to have a discussion with Creaky about her eating habits out of a concern for her health, that’s a lovely thing to do - I’m just not sure that a thread about women’s clothing sizes is the best place to do it, even if it was where she brought it up. Perhaps a private e-mail conversation or something.
Finally, you have a very inflated idea of your own importance if you actually think that I’m following you around to take shots at you. Honestly - I can’t remember you from any other thread. If I have made other comments to you, they were obviously of much more relevance to you than they were to me - any chance that the truth hurts? Really dollface, get over yourself.
Good thing you’ve told us repeatedly what a nice person you are, because otherwise I’d start getting confused about it right here.
I agree that media/the fashion industry are guilty of pushing thinness as ideal, but I’ve noticed that on an everyday level, criticizing people for being overweight is more taboo than ragging on them for being thin. Even on the level of good-natured teasing, my friends will poke fun at the skinnier ones among us (me, for example) but they would never dream of doing the same to someone who was heavier than average. For example, they might say to me, “You’re going to need to tie some weights to your ankles if you don’t want to get blown away in all this wind,” but they would never continue with, “Of course, Sally here doesn’t need to worry about that, now does she?”
For me, the double standard is this: it’s supposed to be okay to be overweight, but it’s still treated as something that shouldn’t be brought up in polite conversation. Teasing someone about being skinny is considered acceptable because being skinny is the “ideal” promoted by society, so the teasing is actually construed as some kind of weird compliment (I think this applies to snide comments about how you should eat a steak with your salad - they think it’s okay to say this because in their minds this is somehow supposed to be flattering). But tease someone about being obese and everyone would think you’re a douchebag, because obesity is something you’re supposed to want to avoid.
(FTR, I don’t mind being teased by my friends about being small and skinny, because I am and I’m comfortable with it. Although if people I didn’t know very well gave me snark about not eating enough I’d probably find it offensive.)
Funny, reading this thread as a formerly obese and still somewhat overweight guy – i.e., as a mostly impartial observer – **Rubystreak **is the one coming off as the belligerent one while alice_in_wonderland and **XJETGIRLX **are just responding in kind.
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I think it’s exceptionally rude to comment on ANYONE’s size. I’m a formerly morbid obese person; when people would ask how much I lost, I use to say “Both Olsen twins and a supermodel”. I realized one day that this was just as cruel as mocking someone for being fat, so I stopped it.
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I guess it’s because I was once a 30/32 in womens sizes, but I am not the least bit bitter about being a double digit misses 14.
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You don’t have to be an (unnatural) size 2 to be happy & fulfilled in life - clothing manufacturers nothwithstanding.
VCNJ~
I’ve never said that I was a nice person.
But kisses to you too.