agonyaunt | Dear Prudence - My Body-Positive Friends Attack Me for Exercising.

Current Mood: curious

Entry tags:

Dear Prudence - My Body-Positive Friends Attack Me for Exercising.

My body-positive friends attack me for exercising One of those partially crowd-sourced DP letters.

CN: diet and exercise, mentions of problematic eating behaviours, no explicit numbers, not valorizing weight loss.

Dear Prudence,

I just moved to a new city and joined a gym I’m excited about. I’ve been unhappy with my (lack of) fitness for a few years now—I have trouble keeping up with my fitter friends, and I have some body image issues that have been popping up more and more often. I really like this gym and the community they’ve created. I also absolutely love the workouts—they make me feel powerful and strong in a way I haven’t in years.

The problem is, quite frankly, the old friends in the city I just left. I know basically no one in my new city, so my old friends are a crucial social connection for me. They are very into body positivity/health at every size. This is great! I think everyone should feel comfortable in their bodies! But my closest friends make negative comments whenever I bring up my gym or how happy I am with it. They say I’m “selling out” and make disparaging remarks about how I represent the patriarchy because I’ve internalized messages about thinness. It’s pretty upsetting to feel excited about a new development in my life, only to get shot down by folks who I’ve supported in their own endeavors.

Do you have any thoughts on how I can get my friends to be more supportive, while not coming off as judgey for the choices I’m making that they’re not?

—Fraught Fitness

Dear Fraught,

When I read your question, I had two initial thoughts, which were a tiny bit in tension with each other:

1) If you don’t want to put non-workout people to sleep or annoy them to death, it’s best to keep gym-talk to yourself. It’s just not interesting. And it can be unsettling to the many people in the world who are struggling with our society’s unrealistic messages about how bodies should look and have understandably stepped back from diet and fitness culture.

2) Your friends should not make you feel judged and attacked. This is especially true when it comes to things that you’re doing with your own body that don’t harm anyone.

But I felt like there was more to say, so I asked for help. Some of the responses boiled down to the idea that you’re making progress and fixing your body and your friends are jealous. I don’t buy that at all: I think your friends sincerely believe in the “health at every size” (HAES) principle that health is primarily driven by social, economic, and environmental factors that require a social and political response, not by individuals fighting an uphill battle to shrink. It’s deeper than just “everyone should feel comfortable in their bodies.”

Reading your admission that you have body image issues alongside the fact that your friends think you’ve internalized messages about thinness, I wondered whether they are upset because they think what’s really going on with you is that you’re fixated on losing weight in a way that has been unhealthy for you (and probably for them, too) in the past.

I heard you when you said you work out to feel strong and powerful—but I also live in this world. So, sure, I believe there are certainly people who take gym classes for the endorphins and vibes or to get better at carrying their groceries. But I know the fitness industry is built around those who are desperately trying to change the size and shape of their bodies. I also know that talking about dieting and working out in terms of “feeling strong” sounds healthier than saying you’re spending hours on the treadmill and surviving in carrot sticks, which nobody thinks is cool anymore. But in truth, it can sometimes be a cover for similar behavior and a similar mindset.

Christy Harrison (

chr1styharrison), a HAES proponent who describes herself as an “anti-diet dietician” and hosts a podcast about intuitive eating, calls this “the wellness diet” and says it often represents the same old unhealthy diet culture under a different name. “I’d be curious whether the letter-writer might be falling into some Wellness Diet thinking that’s raising alarm bells for her friends,” she said.

Your friends may be attuned to all this. I wasn’t sure if I was reading too much between the lines, but others agreed: “I’m curious as to what she’s said in the past about her body to these friends,”

afrobella wrote to me.

“The friends aren’t expressing it well but may be worried about it because of past things the lw has said/done. I think lw needs to have an open convo w/ them about why this is hurting more than helping, and make sure they hear the genuine happiness exercise brings now” —

grouchybagels

“I’ve re-read it now and it does seem like there may be some concern here for someone who’s struggled with disordered eating patterns.” —

latkenessmonstr

So, let’s say that in your quiet, honest moments with yourself, you know that you are working to try to lose weight, and this is part of a disordered relationship that you and tons of other people have with their bodies because of our messed-up society. Does that make it OK for your friends to attack you? Absolutely not. They are being unkind to you.

They’re also missing the point. I asked Harrison whether your friends are messing up by focusing their wrath on your behavior instead of the larger culture that makes life hard for larger people and encourages us to waste tons of time and energy on what can be a fruitless quest to be smaller: “Totally! And I think sometimes at the individual level it can get really tricky to recognize how those things are separate—like maybe these friends feel that they’re criticizing the system, but the letter-writer feels they’re criticizing her,” she said.

So, what do you do about your friends? First, if you value your relationships with them and feel open to it, it might be worth starting a conversation about what—if anything—they can deal with from you in terms of gym-talk.

“Sucks that it seems to be on OP at this point but starting a conversation about what their friends are ok with hearing about and what they aren’t might help” —

_unsarahble

You should also discuss what you expect from them when it comes to being spoken to with respect. A lot of people had thoughts on this:

“Always the option to say that you don’t appreciate their comments but remember that you can’t control their reactions or responses - all you can do is communicate what you are feeling” —

jmsahakian

“HAES has to include her health+size too, and that she’s not selling out. But she should make sure she 1) doesn’t discuss her newfound fitness in a way that sounds like ‘I’m desperate to not look like you’ & 2) focuses on what her body can do rather than what it looks like” —

audrelawdamercy

“I had similar w/ friend who heard I was getting back into running and was mad because she thought it was coming from a dangerous place. We talked through *both* her legitimate concerns for me and my real love of running, and it was helpful for both of us I think” —

grouchybagles

And perhaps remind them that HAES advocacy is really about making structural changes, not attacking individuals for behaviors that are understandable, given the world we live in.

If you agree that they don’t want to hear about your workouts anymore,

afrobella had a good tip: “My main advice to her (and in general) is, if you’re concerned about the feedback from these friends and you have thoughts to process, I recommend journaling and therapy instead. You’re less likely to be misunderstood and more likely to gain understanding of yourself.”

And when it comes to the bottom line, I think

rebelpioneer got it right: “Either the LW isn’t describing the situation accurately and the friends are worried about her body image issues because of the gym, or they’re not supportive of her & the actual message of HAES. The truth is probably somewhere in between. I’d advise making new friends at the gym.”

So be honest with yourself about why you’re really working out and if it’s good for you, taking your history and your mental health into consideration. If you decide to continue, when it comes between talking about the weather or your recent deadlift max with people who aren’t into fitness, always choose the weather. And be open to transitioning to a new, kinder, and more supportive social group in your new city.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

So I'm curious what the community think about this one. I posted it partly because I feel like I could be one of the judgy friends in this scenario. The answers seem split between, well, LW is probably being really annoying and possibly fatphobic by always going on about their new gym habits, versus, the friends are being unreasonable and not supportive and just because you believe in HAES / body positivity doesn't mean you should shit on everybody who wants to get fitter. And I think it's good that both of those interpretations are being considered.

I would definitely not tell anyone they were selling out or serving the patriarchy for going to the gym! But I do have several people who are close to me, including some with histories of diagnosed eating disorders, who sometimes pursue weight loss as a goal. And they know I believe in HAES and I'm fairly vocal about disapproving of the diet industry and weight loss culture. I really try to be supportive but I find it hard to be enthusiastic. I do understand that you can feel a sense of achievement if you lose a significant amount of weight through your own efforts, but I also don't want to validate that exactly.

So what happens is that people I really care about either feel uncomfortable talking to me about the stuff they're working hard on and are really proud of. Or they pre-emptively tell me about all their justifications for why they have health reasons that they need to lose weight, it's not just about trying to be skinny in order to fit a fake beauty ideal. I do believe them, I think their health reasons are genuine (or sometimes imposed by fatphobic doctors who won't treat them for some other condition unless they lose weight). But it's clear they feel judged just by my existence and general political stance, before I've even had a chance to express support, however clumsily.

Short answer: oh I hear you. And I also wonder if something about the situation is triggering one or more friends. I really don't like dealing with diet talk, for example, and would probably find myself anywhere from stressed to triggered if I had to be the prime cheerleader on a friend's diet and exercise regimen.

Maybe LW just needs an Exercise Buddy. Sometimes we can't talk about everything we're doing to everyone we know.

Yeah. I'm in the awkward situation that I am not personally that bothered by diet stuff. I know my friends aren't insulting me when they complain about their thinner-than-me bodies, and because I've carefully avoided restrictive diets all my life I don't have those triggers. But if I try to redirect the conversation because I know other people are present who do have ED triggers, it can come across as judgy as if I were telling the dieting person that they're morally bad for dieting. Of course I don't disclose someone else's mental health history, but that means I might seem to be just making a political point about how diet talk is "bad".

And in general I'm a bit over-zealous about protecting other people; if it were for my own sake, I would know how much I could take and set appropriate boundaries. But if it's for a friend, or children who might overhear, my inclination is to be really careful. Maybe more than necessary.

Idk I think you probably don't express genuine concern for someone by calling them a sellout. Obviously friends feel implicitly (at a minimum) hurt/judged and appear to be putting that back on LW. Otoh I guess probably LW doesn't have much else going on in New City so then is going on about it?

I also think it's a bit hm... That LW is using strength as the motivator rather than weight loss. On the one hand like, it is cool to practice and learn to do things you couldn't previously but... A lot of people think it's a shortcut out of body issues and BOY is it NOT. The mental patterns, fixation on inputs/outputs & numbers going up or down, the community of people giving bad or mixed messages is similar in strength training communities a lot of the time.

I'm someone who has to balance needing to work out to manage certain things with a tendency to way overdo it because of other issues and I do appreciate having friends outside and critical of the idk fitness/wellness community that I can run things by, and maybe that's something LW is subconsciously seeking if they keep bringing this up despite the negative reaction? It can be easy to get pulled in to the bad side of gym culture, and an outside perspective can be really valuable. But I was very upfront with friends who help augment my judgement in this way & would never put it on someone who found that type of conversation triggering.

Thank you, I found this comment really helpful in clarifying my thinking. I would definitely never call anyone a 'sellout'; that's just not the way I operate, so yeah, I am probably not as bad as the friends described. But sometimes just lack of enthusiasm can come across like judgement, if you're looking for celebration.

I really like your observation about strength focused training not being a shortcut. It's really clear that both healthy and potentially problematic motivations can coexist, in the same community, in the same person. It makes sense that LW is subconsciously looking for someone to help them set boundaries, that seems like a much more charitable interpretation than that they're totally clueless about how much they're annoying their friends and keep bringing up the same annoying topic.

I am fairly fitness focused, and I am on team "LW should stop boring her friends." I get it: I've been working really hard at improving my bicycle stamina this past year, and sometimes I want to talk enthusiastically about how much faster and farther I went on my latest ride, because it's an accomplishment that matters to me. But unless that ride involved going an interesting place, it's just . . . not that interesting to anyone else to know that I made my loop ten minutes faster or with one rest break fewer than the month before. I have bicycling friends, and if I want a cheer squad I talk to them. LW would do well to make some gym friends, and stick to talking to her non-gym friends about areas of mutual interest.

This probably cuts both ways, like I shouldn't gush to my dieting friends about this great new fat activist blog I discovered. The thing I'm worried about is a level beyond the bit that most well-mannered people agree is boring. I have few qualms about shutting down detailed lists of numbers of reps and shaving seconds off best times and all that stuff, just boring. And similarly if small talk with colleagues or other casual acquaintances turns to bonding over diet rituals I can change the subject.

But if it's someone I'm really close to, a dear friend or a partner, and they want to talk about how they love their new community and feel powerful and strong, then I want to do better than 'shut up about your boring new hobby'. I would like to celebrate my loved ones' real achievements, even if it can feel a bit like, go me, I'm not ugly and disgusting like you any more. And on the other side of the coin, if someone I care about is talking excitedly about severe calorie restriction and intense exercise or how much they feel good about punishing their awful body, then I might actually be concerned about their physical and mental health. That's more than just an abstract political concern about whether dieting is generally good for society, that's a personal concern for my friend. Quite often it's a mixture of both: they have made real health improvements but also got into a spiral that looks to me as if it might reactivate a past eating disorder.

In that situation, I don't think the right response is, great, well done, what about that [topic of mutual interest], then? I know very well how to position myself as someone you shouldn't share this important to you topic with, but I don't want to cut off people I care about like that.

I reckon it's better to focus on the achievement (personal best, huge distance, big weight lifted, won the game, etc) and just ignore the alleged health benefit. But I've got a real boring story of how exercise did not stop me getting sick to pull out (marathon runner to wheelchair user in 5 years, thanks MS).

There's an answer here that sort of floats under the surface, which is that LW has a new happy thing, and like most people, talks about that happy thing more than people want to hear about it. I know when I was doing serious strength training (for Lucy-values of serious), and really happy with what my body could do, I wanted to talk about it all the time. But there's a limit to how much anyone enjoys hearing about happy things they don't share. Add in the possible triggers that weight brings to the table, and it all comes down to: LW just needs to be more aware of how much she talks about her new gym with her old friends.

Oh man, I really feel for this LW. I've gone through recurring weight loss efforts for the same reason they listed - not feeling comfortable in my body, wanting to look better, feeling limited by my fitness or lack thereof. I've been the friend who talks about having screwed up eating habits and who needs to calorie count to make sure I'm eating balanced meals and not eating 4000 calories a day when I live a sedentary lifestyle. But I've also been the person listening to a friend talk about how pasta is terrible and should never be consumed ever, or how she needs to wake up at 4 am so she can use the treadmill for 90 minutes before her kid wakes up.

I do feel like body positivity and HAES have changed meanings over the past 5-10 years though. I remember reading about body positivity in 2014 and the general message seemed to be "Instead of hating your body for how it looks, you should appreciate your body for what it can do. Instead of thinking 'I hate my thunder thighs,' focus on how you strong legs allowed you to walk two miles today!" and similar sentiments. Similarly, HAES was supposed to be about having the ability to make healthy choices regardless of your weight and how there are multiple factors involved in health.

It feels to me sometimes that both of these movements have been taken over by a vocal minority acting like crabs in a bucket - how dare you want to lose weight for your own health, you should stay down here with us! Body positivity turned into fat acceptance which turned into fat glorification, and I hate it. I don't like that I'm 100 pounds overweight and considered "average" - that's not okay! And I don't believe people who say that weight has nothing to do with health because I know for a fact that if I lose just 15 pounds I will have less joint pain and I will be less likely to get winded if I do something like bring laundry from the basement to my bedroom.

All of this is really a very roundabout way to say hey, I hear you LW, and I hope you can find friends who will be encouraging and support you instead of trying to knock you down.

Not just you re: the massive changes in HAES over the years.

On my corner of the internets I've seen a lot of shaming and concern trolling people who express a desire to exercise at all, let alone any displeasure in the shape/size of their personal bodies.

No judgment of anyone here or their bodies, btw.

I wish it was easier for folks to internalize, "my friend's desire to change their body, absent evidence to the contrary, does not constitute a value judgement of my body or my value as a person."

I first heard of HAES back in 2012, when I was trying to break some really bad food habits and get in shape - at that time it was an ideology that I really appreciated, that I could make healthy choices despite my weight. I have a tendency to eat my emotions and ended up gaining a bunch of weight in 2013/2014 when I was going through some very high stress changes in my personal and professional life.

I looked up HAES in 2015 when I was getting ready to make a change again, and I found it to be more harmful than helpful at that point. And now, having gained 25 pounds in the past year from grief-eating and wanting to lose weight so I will feel more comfortable in my body (because I do not feel healthy what I am 100 pounds overweight, I'm in constant sweaty discomfort with aching joints and shortness of breath)? I don't think you could pay me to approach the HAES community.

At the end of the day, my desire to lose weight is about ME, and it's not a decision that impacts anyone else. I'm not telling my friends to lose weight, I'm not criticizing the decisions made by others. But god, weight and weight loss and dietary habits etc have all become such loaded topics!

A lot depends on how they express that desire to change. "God, I need to get in shape, because I really want to be able to do X" is entirely personal. "God, I need to lose weight" is a lot harder to disconnect from when that person is significantly smaller than you are, especially when they're talking about not being able to fit into their size 4 jeans anymore.

I have had people concern troll me about mental health and ability to be a kind person over expressing a desire to exercise more. Specifically, to exercise more because of the history of heart disease in my family including my dad having a heart attack at the age of 54.

What I really wish existed is an ethos/community somewhere between "sugar is literal poison and will kill you/gotta get SKINNY for BEACH SEASON" and "it has been scientifically proven that sustained weight loss is impossible so you shouldn't even try".

The first I've seen largely offline, accompanied by fatphobic self-flagellation that makes the environment hostile to me. The second I've seen largely online, among people who self identify as proponents of HAES, which makes the environment hostile to me.

Ultimately I identify more with the LW than I do with her friends.

It's legitimately distressing when you make an improvement to your quality of life and people who care about you are so deep in their own hurt that they can neither pretend to be happy for you or express that your X is, through no fault of your own, hurting their Y.

I'm also not thrilled with the defense of the friends' passive aggression (a legitimately bad behavior) and the repeated insistence that the LW should just know better. I am also not convinced that the friends have expressed using words that they don't want to talk about exercise, gyms, bodies, or weight.

(I'm also happy to share my weight, height, regular clothing sizes, and measurements in case anyone doubts my experience as real fat person.)

I'm not doubting your experiences with anything. I'm telling you mine. I'm not particularly interested in getting into a more-oppressed-than-thou match over this, if for no other reason than because I can't talk about most of my experiences with doctors, family, roommates, random people in the grocery, etc, without bringing up a lot of emotions I'd rather not spend today stewing in. But again: I am not doubting your experiences. I've just had very, very different ones.

There are communities in dw that have that ethos - I'm in one myself - and they are so helpful

People who claim body positivity who use that to attack others are not doing a good thing, any more than people who claim any positive philosophy who use it to attack others. (Not to No True Scotsman it; shitty HAES people are real HAES just as much as shitty any other group are real.)

But I'd ask you to please reconsider saying things like down here with us or fat acceptance which turned into fat glorification, and I hate it. I know I'm not the only person in this comm who's worked incredibly hard to love my fat body, and not to think of my fatness as "down here".

Which is a roundabout way to say, hey, I hear you, and people who are telling you that you don't understand your own joint pain or windedness suck, and they shouldn't do that to you, and I support you. And I hope you also hear this: in my body, my ill health is not from my fatness, and I wouldn't hate my fatness even if it was, and I don't want to remove my fat any more than I want to remove my disabled arms or my healthy feet. And while I'll fight like hell against anti-fat social structures, I 100% support you doing what makes you happier and healthier, and I hope you'll 100% support your fat friends and acquaintances if they tell you their fat bodies are healthy and hot and pretty great.

Thank you a lot for saying this. This has what I wanted to say but couldn't choke out through the rush of unpleasant echoes, plus so much more.

My apologies, the "down here with us" was related to crabs in a bucket and I didn't really think of how that wording might not be the best choice.

I do think that fat glorification is a problem though, just like I think any kind of glorification is wrong. I'm talking about the posts that exist to drag down anyone with a different body types and that they to pit people against each other. "My body, my choice" isn't just about sex but it seems like that's forgotten in certain corners of the internet.

Every time I can think of that I've seen someone say "you're glorifying being fat" it was in response to a statement such as these:

"Your weight does not determine your worth as a person."

"You have worth as a person even if you are not healthy."

"You did not deserve to be starved, shamed, or sexually assaulted because you are fat."

and so on.

ETA: Also, Hanne Blank put a stake through the heart of the statement "real women have curves" a decade ago when she repudiated fat women, so she is a useful trump card against anyone trying to promote that idea.

Edited 2021-08-05 15:13 (UTC)

I must spend time in different corners of the internet then, because the statements you listed above are things that I think most people consider sane, reasonable, and true. Meanwhile I've seen people post photos of themselves weighing 350+ pounds with captions like "Real men like curves, only dogs go for sticks" or talking about how anyone wearing smaller than a size 16 isn't a "real woman" etc. Maybe this is just a result of where I spend my time online, but it seems like about 75% of the body positivity messages I see these days are really just saying "If you have any preference towards being thin or physically fit, then Ding Dong You Are Wrong and our way is the only way, so eat that chocolate cake babes!"

Wow, 350 pounds is definitely over the limit to be considered a human being, and we all know the only way to be overweight is to overdose on chocolate cake. </ s> I really don't think that either of those details or any of the others provided are going to convince me that this particular group of fat people really are loathesome and deserve fatphobia, and not just because I have myself been accused of living on chocolate cake probably an order of magnitude more times than I have actually eaten a piece.

I remain unconvinced that people who are going too far* in pushing back against a society that tells us that we deserve constant calumny for being overweight are the dominant voices in the so-called health discussion in the wider society. I also don't think we would improve society if all overweight people obediently went back to despising ourselves as we're constantly being told to do.

*: Yes, they shouldn't be insulting other people to make themselves feel better. OTOH mocking someone for being fat is so solidly mainstream I'm not sure this is within even orders of magnitiude.

And as for the statements I quoted I have met not a few people who would disagree with them, including many doctors who blame every problem on weight, the parents whose letters we post here who want to control their children's eating, and my abusive ex who told me I should be grateful to let him smack me around because no one else would date a fat girl.

But then, we may be from different corners of the Internet.

Edited 2021-08-05 18:42 (UTC)

If a fat woman is posting a pic of herself that says she’s more desireable than women who are sticks, why would you be offended? She is obviously working hard to feel good about herself and if she is putting down women who are built as thin as the proverbial super model as if photoshop isn't the norm, why would you feel it’s skin off your nose to support her? Our whole culture spends enormous amounts of energy telling her she is hideous and taking up too much space and should hate herself. Yeah, I’m not much for the competitive language between women, but I’m an old queer fat woman and don't think twice about cutting her some slack because I get how hard it is for her to feel desireable. Maybe you should as well.

"fat glorification". Hmmm.

*contemplates*
*contemplates some more*
*contemplates judgement, condemnation, pain and tears*
*sits back*

Man, all the oblique speculation into LW's mental health makes me extremely uncomfortable.

I've personally found HAES and fat positivity to be just as culty and inflexible as mainstream diet culture, but in the opposite direction.

And, like the LW, I really wish there was an option in-between the two extremes. I personally don't like being told, "well actually it's been scientifically proven that sustained weight loss is impossible" when I express a desire to be able to walk from my third floor apartment to my mailbox without wanting to die. (Nor do I appreciate all the standard blergh that is diet culture.)

Ultimately, I think LW's friends either need to make a passing effort to be happy for the LW in her new hobby or establish a clear boundary of no health, exercise, or weight talk. Since they're obviously not doing that, it's in LW's best interest to ask about it herself.

(Is it weird to happily take turns listening to your friends about the things you each personally enjoy, regardless of whether those interests are shared? Because with some of my friendships we've definitely spent more time with 0 shared interests than with 1+ shared interest.)

...or establish a clear boundary of no health, exercise, or weight talk. Since they're obviously not doing that, it's in LW's best interest to ask about it herself.

I don't think that's obvious at all. LW keeps talking about the gym, and the friends are clearly expressing that they're unhappy with the conversation. Whether they've expressed their unhappiness about the conversation explicitly (there are absolutely some missing conversations in LW's narrative) or only passive aggressively, they've made it pretty clear they don't want to hear it.

And it's all well and good to say they should be explicit (and maybe they have been! it's quite unclear from the letter) but that's difficult in the moment. I've had family members talk too much about weight loss in front of me, and sometimes I ask them not to, and other times I try to redirect the conversation. (And both work sometimes and not others.) Asking a friend not to talk about something is quite difficult, especially when the friend is so invested in talking about it that they ignore social cues so obvious that the friend picks up on them and writes a letter to Dear Prudence -- but doesn't stop!

I just reread the letter in case I missed anything.

I still believe that the LW is getting heaps of passive aggression with a side of denying passive aggression.

I also continue to come down on the side of making clear and specific requests for change rather than expecting people to read the room/read one's mind. Even and perhaps especially when making those clear and specific requests is hard.

I once got to a point with a roommate who talked daily about weight loss (and who was considerably thinner than I have been since puberty) that I explicitly asked her to stop, because it was making me uncomfortable. It lasted all of a week. I wish we'd had the word "triggered" at the time, because I think it would have gotten the point across that she was making me feel bad about myself, and as someone who had walked a knife's edge between "getting in shape" and "exercising all the time but barely eating," I couldn't afford that.

"Is it weird to happily take turns listening to your friends about the things you each personally enjoy, regardless of whether those interests are shared?"

In general, no. For example I love listening to my sweetie talk about cars and my roommate talk about photography, two topics I don't have much interest in for myself but I love hearing about from them because they really enjoy them.

But there's a difference, I think, between not being interested in a topic and finding that topic fraught. I would have a harder time listening to someone talk about an interest that I personally found fraught than about something I only find interesting by proxy. *contemplates an example* I find baseball mildly interesting so I like listening to baseball fans talk about it. I find American football frightening, unnecessarily dangerous, at the center of some toxic cultural aspects, and generally fraught, and so I wouldn't really want to listen to a friend raving about it.

There's a difference between people talking about their unshared interests, which can be fun and fascinating, and that one person who can talk about nothing but their new dizzy-in-love thing. There is absolutely nothing wrong between being dizzy-in-love with something! But it can be easy to lose any sense of audience with that stuff. Like, Fellow Gamer X will probably like hearing about my RPG. Colleague Y will probably not, unless they're the colleague who is in my game ;). And even with Fellow Gamer X, I should watch how often I bring up my game at the slightest pretext. And I mean, hey: this is one reason I don't socialize much outside of general geek circles. It limits some relationships, but it also limits how often I have to sit in a group of people who will talk baseball stats for hours and have absolutely no interest in the latest season of Batwoman

A few years ago a person I used to follow made a whiny post about how rude it was for her friends to talk to her about topics/fandoms she didn't care about. That stuck with me, because it struck me as weird, and informed the unshared interests pondering.

Yeah, this is a HARD one, absent some more data.

I 100% support HAES, intuitive eating, body positivity, body neutrality, body acceptance, fat acceptance, fat positivity, and similar philosophies. I avoid intentional weight-loss dieting, food restriction, and weight numbers talk (which can trigger some disordered eating/thought spirals for me.)

I also find most gym/diet talk *rampagingly* boring, but since I have various passions that some of my friends don't share, I will listen and make supportive noises to a certain extent (such as "I'm really happy you're feeling good in your body and achieving your goals.")

If a friend gets into weight-loss-diet or body-negative stuff to a point that it bothers me, I ask them to please filter me out or not discuss it with me because it causes issues FOR ME.

But.

I used to be really active in the early-2000's body-positivity (initial meaning) movement, and was a fabulous plus-sized babe, etc. -- and then a combination of my chronic illness + getting Epstein-Barr Virus caused a massive, scary, unintentional weight loss (my hair was falling out, I was getting tested for cancer.)

And I lost a big chunk of my community.

Not everyone, but more people than I would have expected. And I felt fraudulent and uncomfortable staying in my PlusGoths/etc. groups, when I was wearing straight sizes for the first time in my adult life. It felt like losing part of MYSELF, at a time when I was also not in control of my body or my health.

So, I do feel for LW in feeling excluded/rejected because of body changes (even though theirs are more intentional), and I believe their statement that they are feeling strong and empowered through the training they're doing.

Yes, limit the gym talk with the old friends, to a certain extent. But I think the friends are in the wrong to tell the LW that they "represent the patriarchy because I’ve internalized messages about thinness" -- that's really shitty, frankly.

I would like to be completely onboard with the current body-positivity movement, but I honestly think it's absorbed some toxicity and gotten a bit rigid and judge-y, which was NOT the original point.

(I also have Feelings about some HAES messages and how they intersect with and can invalidate disabled and chronically-ill people, but that's another rant for another time.)

And I lost a big chunk of my community....

You absolutely aren't alone. I've watched more than one person go from being "one of us" to being "you skinny bitch" due to body changes they had no control over.

I actually disagree with y'all that this one is that hard. There's a simple answer here:

As much as people like to talk about their Cool New Thing, there are exceptions. Unless your friends respond to your initial mentions with excitement and active positive interest, you shouldn't spend time talking about your

new exercise regime
new fad diet
new religion or philosophy

with people who don't share them.

(Specifically I am exempting a new exercise regime or diet that are doctor-mandated, where your friends are providing moral support. I mean the ones you actively choose.)

None of these things are inherently bad! Your swimming could be fabulous for you, cutting our marzipan might have changed your life, and you might have never have understood the world as well as you do now since you discovered The Church of Bokonon. But the thing is, nobody wants to hear it, unless they're right there with you.

I know that you, dear LW, just want to share your Awesome New Thing with your friends. You aren't criticizing their life choices! You think their fat positivity is great, for them! Just not for you!

But here's the thing, LW: I absofuckinglutely guarantee you that the last person who talked to your fat-positive friends about exercise was hassling them for being fat. And the person before that was concern trolling them about diabetes. And the person before that was their doctor, who told them they got strep because they're fat.

So you have to understand that if they're being assholes to you, it's because the odds are that if a person is talking to them about exercise, that person is about 30 seconds away from being an asshole. You and I know that you, dear LW, are not that person. But your fat friends find it safer to avoid conversations with people who keep pointing conversational pointy sticks at their tender places, even if you'd never actually poke them.

It's the same reason you should avoid talking about your great new religion or your great new diet. Even odds any conversation like that is going to turn evangelical.

Talk to your old timey friends about your shows and books and tiktoks you love. Make a gym buddy to talk to about your workout.

"So you have to understand that if they're being assholes to you, it's because the odds are that if a person is talking to them about exercise, that person is about 30 seconds away from being an asshole. "

Yeah, this. and yet, I do feel bad for LW, if they are honestly not going to do this, getting the blowback from all the people who have been assholes. But that doesn't mean the current friends have to be LW's audience on the joys of exercise and self-abnegation either, I totally agree with you there. Different friends, different conversations.

This is such a great, compassionate and informative answer! I mean that's often true of your comments to this community and elsewhere, but I really admire how you've set this out. LW isn't necessarily the problem, it's just that they're adding more pointy sticks to people who've constantly been told they are awful people because they are fat. Oversharing about a new health regime isn't only boring, it's also potentially hurtful even if LW's enthusiasm about it comes from a really good place of being excited about their new thing.

I’m having a hard time believing the LW. her complaint feels so much like white people complaining about reverse racism. The big red flag for me is when she talks about wanting to be able to keep up with her "fitter friends". She’s making an opposition between her "fitter friends" and her HAES friends, which I’m taking as badly covered code for fat friends who don’t exercise due to this opposition she set up. HAES has never been about not exercising as far as I’ve heard---it is sometimes anti-dieting to lose weight The H in HAES is health and the importance is not setting health in opposition to fatness or fitness when dealing with doctors who don’t believe you actually do exercise and know dieting involves unhealthy yo-yoing.

I suspect the judgey comments from her HAES friends may be a reaction to the actual language she uses and what it reveals about how she regards them as well as fatness. Here’s the thing, none of us completely believes HAES because it is not possible to escape internalized fatphobia in this culture, so HAES is an ideal we want to believe, but we never can completely feel and think.

My advice to the LW is to stop rubbing your new “fitter friends" in their faces and stop all the boring gym talk that you damn well know makes them feel like you’re judging them, but you’re pulling reverse body shaming on them to make it their fault. If you’re trying to break away, drop all this upsetting HAES talk, and concentrate on your new life with your “fitter friends" you’re trying to blend in with, then go on with your bad self.

I’m not saying there may be negativity coming from her old friends for a variety of reasons, but I don’t think LW is being honest about who is judging who here and why and hanging it on HAES ideas, maybe because she’s both done with the old friends and thinking about fat positivity for now.

In the society I live in, weight loss and fitness and wellness are essentially a religion. There are existing guidelines that cover talking about religion to people who have different religious views. When I apply them, conversations about the religion of wellness become a lot easier to understand and navigate.

I'm not a believer, but I will listen to someone prattle on about it for a while, until they start implying that I should join their religion, or everyone should join their religion, or everyone IS a member of their religion. If I get those things, I shut them down. And if they come right out and say I'll go to hell if I don't join their religion, I shut them down hard. The same goes for them pressuring me to join their weight loss/exercise/wellness practices, judging me or others for not joining, and telling me that if I don't join, I will get sick or die in some specific way that's directly a result of my not joining.

Also, many people have been subjected to religious pressure and even abuse, either as kids or as adults. Similarly many people have been subjected to pressure and abuse over weight and wellness. That's why some people have strong negative reactions to hearing about the religion of wellness even if it's only your personal religious journey you're talking about.

::squinty side-eye::

LW is going to the gym in NewPlace partly to keep up with fitter friends, but their OldPlace HAES friends (who, being separate from "fitter" friends, are by implication not fit) are their only social connection so ... ::confused headtilt::

It's also really hard to tell *in abstract* who's overreacting, because there's a large gap between "I personally love my gym" and "gyms are morally good for everyone", and between "uh you're saying something non-HAES-y, are you ok" and "how dare you do anything to improve your health", plus what people say is not always what other people hear. So much nuance in word choice and tone that gets lost in summarization.

For how is worded, the fitter friends and the HAES friends seem to be the same. Perhaps they keep physically active but do not go to the gym, ans see that as a problematic behavior (like eating healthy vs dieting). In any case, regardless of the reasons, LW doesn't need to put up with people who are being assholes to them. Even if they quit on the new way of life, they should seek better friends.

Yeah, I have zero interest in weight loss (wouldn't argue with gaining some muscle, which I struggle with because of my genetic disorder, but my size and shape are fine by me), but I would LOVE to improve my endurance and cardiovascular health, which are absolute crap and have gone downhill during the pandemic.

It's a real struggle for me because my heart and lungs and the rest of me are screwed-up, so it's all challenging . . . but I would LOVE to be able to keep up with my fitter friends, which is pretty much all of them other than my fellow disabled folks!

And anyone who called me a tool of the patriarchy for wanting to gain fitness be able to DO THINGS would get a serious side-eye from me.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Dear Prudence - My Body-Positive Friends Attack Me for Exercising.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject