Anonymous wrote:I mean, its an unpopular opinion but in some ways she's not wrong.
I wouldn't go around saying it but absent medical issues like thyroid disorders (etc.), overweight and obese people really have little to no self restraint. They lack impulse control and dedication. It's working out and eating at a caloric deficit, not rocket science. Anyone can do it. My fatter friends always love blaming genetics, but that's not it. They eat like crap and feed crap to their kids so when the kids become fat they point and say, "see? Genetics!" No, it's your diet.
How did you do in school PP? How about your career? Do you have a good and healthy relationship?
Weight loss, like all of those things, requires not individual moments of impulse control and dedication, but constant control and dedication in pursuit of those goals. It isn't a single moment of willpower that fails a fat person, but willpower for every single waking moment of a day. I know skinny people who can't help speeding or who binge drink. Who can't keep a job because they can't be on time. Who failed out of school because they couldn't get it together to not fail their classes. These people have plenty of food will power, but can't exercise that same impulse and control when it comes to other parts of their life.
Everyone has failures and flaws, fat people just have one that is impossible to hide away from the world. Empathy would go a long way.
OP it is funny, I have recently lost like 40 pounds and have felt myself looking at people at my previous weight and feeling like...something. Some mixture of disgust towards my past self and earnestness of knowing they can change like I did. And I hate myself for this blend of emotions. More than I hated myself for being fat! It is so pretentious, it is emotional and I do not act on it because I know intellectually (and for a fact, since it used to be me) that nothing I say or do would do anything more than make these people feel bad. They will either decide to do it on their own or they will go on being perfectly worthwhile human beings the rest of their life, and its fine either way. But I feel myself having bought into a belief of 'they haven't seen the light' at least emotionally. Like if they understood, they would want it badly enough to do. Because I myself did not realize how much more I'd be able to move (I can tie shoes without getting uncomfortable/out of breath/have to sit down!), how nice it would feel to shop in regular stores again etc, I had blocked away the bad feelings, and it wasn't until I had solved the problem that I realized how it had taken over my life in ways I hadn't realized. But again, no one saying this to me then would have worked, I would have told them, truthfully, that I had no diagnosed health issues, that I exercised, that I was happy.
Anyway, I hope your friend learns to shut down that voice, she isn't helping anyone, she's just being mean. I feel like I understand how people become that person though, and in my case, try to actively fight that as much as any rebound weight gain every day.