I don’t mind so much when people are talking about diets and I don’t have to get involved, but so often the ladies at work will pull me into the convo by saying things like “how are you so skinny when you’re always eating cake? It must be all the cycling!” I usually just try to laugh it off or agree that it’s the cycling or the genes, but really I just want a polite way to tell them to stop commenting on my body and bringing me into conversations I don’t want to be a part of.
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“I see cakes as a treat and I’m always on the move, you should try it.”
“I do a frankly astonishing amount of cocaine”
“Please stop commenting on my weight, it makes me feel uncomfortable”
“get on the amphetamines m8, it’s the only way to enjoy this place eh? Eh?” (big toothy smile)
I never have these problems people on Reddit complain about. I guess it must be my tone. If someone said something I didn’t like then I’d think they figure it out by the quizzical look I’d give them and the slightly unfriendly reply.
At work once I watched a collleague slowly dying of anorexia and after a couple of enquiries and polite rebuffs nobody brought the subject up again. By the end she (thirty something) looked in her 80s. I’m not sure what the right approach is if you are genuinely concerned but for normal skinniness it’s nobody’s concern but theirs.
I realised that actually, those sorts of conversations aren’t actually about your weight, your cycling, or what you eat.
They are a nothing conversation, which is just about forming bonds, like conversations about the weather. You can go to loads of different places and they will all have exactly the same conversation.
Them commenting on you is just them subconsciously trying to make you feel included and trying to give you a compliment, however clumsy the attempt actually is in reality.
I just grin and say ‘thanks! I guess I’m just lucky like that’.
The less you make of it, the more it will slide off you.
“Maybe you should try cycling too, Sandra, you fat bitch”.
Never experienced this til the summer, I was at a wedding where the mother of the bride commented *constantly* on people’s eating and weight.
Did it with absolutely everyone. She made several pointed comments towards me: “Oh you went back for cake too?”, “*Still* eating?!”, “Ooooh you pack it away, don’t you?”. There was a real intonation to it, very passive aggressive. I knew the message was “stop eating!”.
I’m a skinny, atheltic guy, I’m training for a marathon. I ate a very normal amount from the buffet. Without wishing to sound smug, you really can’t criticise my weight. Yet she did.
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Once I tuned into it, I kinda watched her for a bit. It seemed reflexive, almost compulsive. I have a funny feeling she wouldn’t be able to stop even if you asked her to.
Frankly I think there was something Freudian going on. Some projection or OCD or low-level mental illness or something.
So I dunno what my advice is, other than that they might genuinely be a little unhinged, and to consider whether you wanna associate with them, or whether you’d have an easier life just forgetting they exist.
I used to get this.
I’d been out for a walk at lunchtime, walked up the stairs. Ate a sandwich and some fruit.
Colleague says “it is alright for you, you’re naturally skinny” while eating large amounts of calories and using the lift.
Get it all the time. Not sure why it’s fine to comment on someone’s weight when they’re slim, but considered rude if they’re larger. I have a horrible time trying to put weight on, to the point where I’ve ended up really ill. That’s fine thought because I’m skinny, I must love it /s.
I’d make something up to really shit them up. Say you lost a lot of weight due to a bereavement or something, say you had a medical issue, say it was because of uncontrollable diarrhoea. Anything to put them on the spot
“How are you so fucking fat when you spend so much energy putting your nose where it doesn’t belong?”
I work in a cookie shop and people always say something like that. My three main responses are:
-I workout a lot.
– I don’t like cookies
– A very fake awkward laugh
Tbh I wouldn’t touch that topic with a bargepole.
“I am anorexic” followed by banshee-like sound. That should shut them off.
Being a lanky fucker I can empathise to certain degree. It’s draining having your looks being constantly picked over. I’ve found the following useful for those who continue to push:
“I don’t appreciate you making comments on my physical appearance, and frankly it makes me uncomfortable. Please stop.”
Well, I mostly work from home, so I ponder my self-image, then comfort myself with a cream cake
I don’t know if I’d recommend this tactic, but they will stop asking if you respond with the truth. I’ve responded in the same breezy tone with “oh thanks! It’s actually bulimia” and boy does that immediately stop the chatter lol.
Generally though I just smile and change the subject or deliberately don’t engage. I do think it’s meant as a really surface-level conversation, even a compliment, but for some of us it’s not a surface-level topic and that’s not the asker’s fault. I think it comes from a belief that there are “naturally skinny people” who can eat whatever they want and not gain weight. And that’s just… not true. I don’t know a single “skinny person” who doesn’t work hard to keep it that way.
I just say yea, I know, but it’s hard to put weight on without eating too unhealthy. It is what it is. Still, a pretty short convo. I don’t find people bother commenting more than once, after all, what would be the point? The answer is hardly likely to be different next time they ask, so why would they bother?
“Unless I’m sitting on your face, my weight is none of your business”
I think commenting on someone’s weight is just bad social etiquette in general. That person may have an insecurity about their weight, so making a comment about it could make them feel worse.
It’s happened to me. I asked them what it had to do with them. And they shut up.
Thanks! I’m sure “x” from HR would love to have her say on this matter.
All jokes aside, I have had to deal with this. I think people think that commenting on your weight when your skinny is a compliment, because they never dare say anything about your body if it was because they thought you were “too large”.
I would just laugh it off, say I’m fine, thank you for your concern
“Can we stop talking about my weight please. It’s making me uncomfortable.”
Simple as that. If they feel awkward, that’s on them.
Of course, if you wanna have fun with it, make something up and be as weird as possible.
I point out, nicely and accurately that my BMI is 22 so I am actually closer to the start of overweight (25) than underweight (18.5) and I could actually do with losing a bit which is the easiest way of running faster. As I do this in the manner of someone slightly obsessed, I generally get silence back.
I just tell them I fuck like a champion. Put in that effort, yo.
I get comments about my physique because I work out a lot and it’s quite obvious I do.
I actually don’t mind talking about these things because eating well and staying fit is my hobby but I think in your scenario I’d just say something factual and say exactly the same thing each time it comes up. “Oh, you know, simple: I burn the same number of calories as I consume” or something. But just say the same thing each time (“calories in calories out mate!”)
I doubt they’re doing it to be dicks. They probably want to know your super magic secret and reality is there isn’t one beyond CICO.
Older generations seem to have an internalised need to make statements about people’s weight. I think it comes from an ingrained diet culture from the 60s and 70s and constantly being told slim=best.
My MIL was very kind, but she did used to comment on people’s weight which used to get my hackles up (she’s looking thin/she’s looking bigger than when I last saw her etc).
Poor Charlie Dimmock used to get it in the neck as she had the cheek to change shape over the 30 years she’d been on telly.
In summary- I hate it. Tell them it makes you feel uncomfortable and you don’t think it’s polite to talk about other peoples bodies as you don’t know what they are thinking, they could be really happy with how they look or we don’t know if they are going through something. I found low level shaming worked.
My go to reply for this type of question is always “ you can’t fatten a thoroughbred”. Brings that conversation to a swift conclusion every time.
“Dunno, so how’s X doing?” Just give no answer and change the subject. I’m pretty honest with my colleagues that I had an ED as a teen/early 20s because one of the guys would comment about everyone’s eating habits constantly and it started to really get me down, so I told him that as I was anorexic for 10 years my appetite is still fucked. He doesn’t comment anymore
Give them a polite warning that your personal appearance is not a suitable subject for their comments.
Then take them to HR the next time.
Look them in the eye and ask “Do you REALLY want to talk about weight?”
I bet they back down.
Normally I think it is great to tell people directly and clearly if you have a boundary- *I’m not comfortable discussing my weight & prefer you not comment on it-* But in this case, anything you say that is clear and direct will probably be taken in the wrong way and get you marked as “difficult” if the whole office culture goes along with the diet talk.
If I were you I’d just stop giving them air time. The moment you and your weight come up in the conversation excuse yourself without commenting or responding directly. *Look at the time, I better file that report or Oh, have a call I have to make* etc. etc. If you give zero acknowledgment to the commentary and leave, they will eventually stop involving you since you aren’t joining in. You may get perceived as less of a joiner but you won’t be marked as difficult.
“is it normal for you to comment on people’s bodies?”
There was this one colleague who really liked pretending to be my friend and would often say “Omg you’re so lucky to be so skinny. I wish I had your body”. When I told her I had a long term condition which caused me to lose weight she stopped.
I had this issue, I have a stomach issue and at times can lose a lot of weight and be very very underweight. When I was worked (medically retired) I would try and change the subject until one day I snapped after two staff members kept going on and commenting how they wish they had my secret. I said “if you must know I have a chronic health condition and my stomach rejects all the food it is given. The same condition (EDS) also means my bladder no longer workers, my bowels no longer work and I dislocate daily and it’s partially why I use a wheelchair full time (the condition caused a bad fall that broke my back too) so no, I don’t think you want my secret do you?!” They just sort of stood there blinking at me and I rolled off. They did have the decency to come and apologise to me after and say they never knew and I told them that I hoped this meant they would think twice before asking anyone else in future and they nodded. Funnily enough, no one else at work asked me again after that.
In public, I’ve had random people threaten to push me to McDonald’s to “put some meat on my bones” (happened twice when I’ve been out shopping) and I’ve either tried to educate them on how they have no idea and there are numerous reasons for people to be underweight and it’s none of their business or asked them if they’d threatened to push someone in wheelchair who is over weight to the gym for them to lose some weight? When they’ve shook their head, I’ve told them that it’s the same thing and none of their business. Makes me so angry. Much like how people think they have a right in asking me why I’m a wheelchair user and what happened.
People at work lost their minds once, because I said I didn’t know how much I weighed. Like I give a shit. I’m as heavy as I am and as tall as I am. What difference does it make?
I’d say the same thing I say when strangers ask me if I‘m pregnant – ‘My body is not your business‘.