At a small wedding, amid the celebration of love and new beginnings, she faced a mirror of her own vulnerability. An acquaintance’s relentless curiosity about her drastic weight loss pierced through her fragile composure, turning a private struggle into a public spectacle. In that moment, the weight of her suffering was not just physical, but deeply emotional—a raw wound exposed to the world.
I (25F) had a miscarriage in early January this year. I lost my mother to a completely unexpected heart attack in February. We used to be very very close and her death, coupled with the loss of my child devastated me.
I slipped into depression, developed anorexia and lost a huge amount of weight in a very short time. I used to be 165 pounds and now I’m at 120 pounds.
I attended my best friend’s wedding yesterday (tiny ceremony). It was the first social event I attended this year after my “transformation”.
There was an acquaintance there who seemed enthralled by my body. She’s very into fitness but she’s not someone I am particularly close and she kept asking me about diet plans and said that she needed to know my “secret workout routine” for her clients.
I politely deflected the questions at first and said something along the lines of “I just was not in a good place, lost my appetite and it just happened”. But she kept pestering me and said I should help other people lose weight too.
I lost my patience and told her that “I actually developed an eating disorder and severe depression. I don’t think your clients would like this routine”. She made a face and left me alone for the day.
I thought this would be the end of it.
Turns out, after the celebrations were over, she went and complained to my best friend’s husband (she’s his sister) and he called me and asked me to apologise for “embarrassing his sister on his wedding”.
I’ve refused to apologise as of now and I’m not sure if I should.
Conclusion
The original poster (OP) is navigating profound grief following the loss of her mother and a miscarriage, which led to severe depression and an eating disorder. Her central conflict arises when an acquaintance publicly comments on her significant weight loss, demanding details about her ‘routine,’ forcing the OP to defend her painful reality against inappropriate curiosity.
Considering the severity of the OP’s recent emotional trauma and the acquaintance’s persistent, insensitive questioning, was the OP justified in directly stating the cause of her weight loss, or should she have maintained silence to avoid conflict at the wedding? The question remains whether protecting one’s privacy during extreme vulnerability outweighs the social pressure to appear agreeable.
Here’s how people reacted:
I lost a lot of weight a number of year ago due to simply not having the money to buy food – I was living on rice and lima beans for months. When people asked how I lost the weight because I “looked so good now,” I would straight up say “poverty.” They’d normally back off and change the subject. I don’t feel bad and neither should you – your body is no one else’s business and those who don’t respect that boundary should be prepared for the backlash.
She was rude. She violated social boundaries by asking repeatedly and badgering (honestly, for people struggling with long term weight loss, asking once is rude, let alone repeatedly).
It’s pretty obvious too why it’s considered rude: this is personal stuff and *no* *one* *knows* *what* *is* *going* *on* *in* *another* *person’s* *life*.
(Not to mention that this person supposedly has “clients” but no knowledge of how to plan exercise or nutrition? If this is her job, she needs to get an actual education about such things, not interrogate random acquaintances at weddings.)
Shockingly, in this family, one person with no sense of proper boundaries or etiquette has a brother with no sense of boundaries or etiquette. /s
Ugh. Don’t give this matter a second thought. And feel free to avoid them in general.
You tried deflecting the questions, you tried being gently honest and she still kept pestering you. If anything, you probably did a good thing by teaching her a lesson.
So many people have the idea that weight loss is always a positive thing and don’t stop to think about if it’s the result of an illness or other awful circumstance. It’s an unfortunate byproduct of living is a fatphobic culture and doesn’t do anyone any good.
Good for you for standing up for yourself. If anything, she’s the one that needs to apologise. Hopefully this will stick with her as a reminder not to do it again in future.
Hell no you won’t be apologizing, and if your supposed best friend knew how your year has been they’re ridiculously callous!
“[Best friend], you know I’m still grieving from my family losses this year. She wanted to use my trauma as a weight loss regimen. I was vague about my weight loss not being fitness or workout-related to avoid this but she would. Not. Stop. Her embarrassment is 100% due to her not leaving me the fuck alone when I literally told her my weight loss is because I wasn’t in a good place this year
I look forward to HER apology for forcing me to overshare my medical conditions so she wouldn’t promote neglect to her clients.”
Also, she’s a super douche. Usually when you make a social gaffe like that (or are super rude accidentally), you apologize and then shut the fuck up.
I have been witness to someone asking a person they hadn’t seen in a few months how they lost so much weight. It was chemo, the person had cancer.
The fixation on weight people have is so incredibly dangerous. I actually heard people “compliment” people on their weight after they went through chemo therapy and I just don’t understand why they think these comments are acceptable.
When I was recovering from my ED, people in the running community would constantly say small things like “guess you want to run a couple extra today?” in reference to me gaining some (much needed) weight. I had to get more and more blunt about it, and I’d love to say that they stopped, but they didn’t, I stopped running. The “fitness community” doesn’t learn.
Call the husband back and say “what would you like me to apologize for? For having a miscarriage or having an eating disorder? Which one was embarrassing to your sister?”
You tried to politely deflect questions, and when that wasn’t good enough, you told her the truth. You did nothing wrong and hopefully this woman learns a valuable lesson about NOT talking to people about their bodies!
Edit: Hey thanks for the award!!
It should have been clear from that statement not to press the issue further. That was a pretty obvious clue that your weight loss was unhealthy.
NTA