'Right' and 'Wrong' ways ARGH!

I'm so over the concept of the right and wrong ways to lose weight!

I obviously tried to lose weight before RNY and wasn't successful. Or I was and then I found all that weight and then some. Then I did the surgery. 28 months later, so far so good. This is the longest I've been on a downward trend in my entire life.

A cancer friend who was dx around the same time as me 10 years ago was probably the same size or larger than myself. Around the time I had surgery she started actively trying to lose weight and becoming very active and vocal about her diet and lifestyle changes. I cheered her on every time she posted on FB about these because yay - that's awesome that she was making these changes!

Now she looks great and is smaller than she was and is definitely healthier I'm assuming. She still posts about getting healthier and her new diet/lifestyle. But every time she posts our mutual friends will post about how amazing she is for losing weight the right way, etc. etc. etc. These aren't close friends of mine, but acquaintances. The same people who are posting on random pics I post saying WOW look how skinny you are!? Even when it's just a pic of DH and I on the beach or something.

Why...why...WHY does this persist? I don't get it. I'm truly happy for Michelle and I hope that she keeps the weight off forever. She seems happier now and I'm sure her health is better and I know for certain her oncologist is happy because we've talked about that.

BUT that way did not work for me. Maybe I was lazy. Maybe I didn't have the same willpower she did. Maybe I just suck. But who the F cares!? I had RNY, get over it. And I don't think of it as the wrong way at all. I think of it as the right way for me.

People suck.

I agree that people can suck, but you can't control them, only you. Please remember that there is absolutely no right or wrong way to lose weight. Having the RNY was right for you, having the DS was right for me, and obviously not having WLS was right for your friend.

I guess I'm just old and crotchety and don't care what other people think. I know what I did was right for me and who gives a s&!t what other people think!

Very well said!!!

Excately, it was the right way for you, and for me.

Melinda, I totally hear you! I heard a man once comment on a woman who had WLS...he said, "Oh yeah she looks good - because she took the EASY way out. I mean, I could look stacked if I took steroids. Come on!". I could feel my blood pressure shoot up to the tips of my hair!!! I couldn't even argue because how do you explain to someone the aches and pains and mental anguish of being super morbidly obese? How do you illustrate the hopelessness of having to lose 100 or 200 lbs? How do you explain to a normie how it feels to obsess over food, binge on food, secretly eat food? I mean, a large portion of the population just DOESN'T. GET. IT. That's why I ignore the haters and am thankful every single damn day for my RNY. Even on my worst eating day, the quantity is about 1/4 of what it would have been when my stomach was the size of a basketball. I feel like RNY gave me back my life and I enjoy my daily energy level and my healthy body, and I am able to just put the haters out of my mind. There is no right or wrong way to do anything. I read on OH once, someone said, "yeah, I took the easy way - just like I use a washing machine rather than scrub clothes against rocks in the river, and just like I drive a car to work rather than walk 20 miles". So hey, maybe we are the smart ones for making an easier choice ;)

(And for the record, all of us on here know even WLS is far from easy! It's a tool that helps us, but the other phrase that I hear time and time again is, "they do surgery on our stomachs, not our brains").

I agree. It's the right way for you. I somewhat kept my surgery quiet because I didn't want to hear the "easy way" v. the "natural" or "right" way conversations. That way didn't work for me. I'd always been active and went to the gym though much of my heavier period. One month, one of the trainers started a 30 day diet/workout program. If you lost a certain % of your weight, you'd get free classes. I willingly signed up, and went through the humiliation of having my starting weight charted. I did everything on plan that month. I did the 5:30 a.m. track workouts, I did the 7:30 pm kick boxing classes. I stayed on the diet and at the end of the month got on the scale. The trainer who weighed me looked at me and said "I'm not even going to tell you what it is." When I asked her why, she said "because I know how hard you worked and I don't want you to get discouraged." I'd lost a total of 3 lbs. That proved to me that the "right way" or the "natural" way wouldn't work for me. It still took me a few years to get to the point where I was actually ready for surgery.

I guess my point is only you can decide what is the right way for you to do something. If someone can lose weight, and keep it off, without surgery more power to them. I know it wasn't in the cards for me and don't believe I cheated or did anything wrong by resorting to available outside help.

I've kept my surgery quiet too, except for family and one friend. l just didn't want to have to defend myself against negative attitudes or judgment. Life's hard enough! In time I may have this conversation with some, but until then the most anyone knows is that I'm on a diet, and most don't even know that. Works for me! It's none of their business, anyway.

As the saying goes "There is no wrong way to eat a Reese's". There is no right or wrong way to lose weight, the task is just to get it done.

Have you ever heard the line from a song if loving you is wrong I don't wanna be right. I say if having wls is wrong, I don't wanna be right. Of course this is speaking only for me, but it's what i think of whenever I hear these oh he/she lost weight the right way.

I've done it the "right" way & was wrong every time. I'll take the "wrong" way & do what's right for me. So far so good.

Love that!