Can't Stand Formerly Fat Friend

Q. Can't Stand Formerly Fat Friend: A friend of mine had weight-loss surgery six months ago. Within three months, she'd dropped nearly 100 pounds. The problem is that she won't stop flaunting her weight loss. Every day she posts dozens of photos and status updates to Facebook about how she's so thin now and everyone is complimenting her. Her most recent post is about how she's really starting to notice fat people a lot more now that she's thin! I can't stand it anymore, and I've blocked her updates from appearing in my FB feed. I've tried talking to her about how she makes me feel, and she said something about loving me just the way I am and then tried to shove a bunch of her old fat clothes off on me. I see my jealousy, but I just can't get over it. Is this friendship doomed?

A: Maybe not if you wait long enough. If you've seen Bridesmaids you know that singer Carnie Wilson, after bariatric surgery and a dramatic weight loss years ago, is now struggling again with her weight. It turns out that about two years after gastric bypass surgery many patients find that despite the fix, they are able to gain weight again.

This may or may not happen to your friend. And it's understandable that she is thrilling to her new body. But incessantly flaunting it, disparaging overweight people, and being condescending to her friends with weight problems is simply obnoxious. You can tell her you are happy her surgery was a success (you can silently add "so far") but that your friendship never revolved around discussions of weight before, and you don't want it to now. If that's all she wants to talk about, then you may have to distance yourself.

www.slate.com/id/2295899/

Just the other side of a common topic on here...
Discuss, if you'd like.

Good advice, I suppose, but one can't help but notice the smug "so far" that was almost permission for the still fat friend to wish her ex-friend regain.

How about telling the sulking fat friend to distance herself from the WLS chic****il the newness of her surgical transformation wears off and she becomes "normal" again.  It is just so common for the new post-ops to go through this, it is a cliche'.  Someone could probably write a book called "The 5 Stages of Being a WLS Post-Op":

* Misery
* Honeymoon
* Normality
* Struggle with Regain
* Acceptance

Honeymoon has subphases:
- Holy **** it works!
- Wow - look at all the fatties out there - how CAN they eat so much at a buffet?
- Wow - my fat friends really are gross and not very cool people - why did I ever hang out with them anyway?
- I'm going to find some NEW friends to hang out with, who don't focus their lives on food.  And who don't know that I was ever "one of those fat people."

Not everyone goes through this, but it is common enough that friends and family should be aware of it - kinda like when you are in a group of single chicks and one of the group becomes Bridezilla.

HaHa.... you forgot the one about now having *all* the answers to healthy eating for losing weight.

Too right we do turn into utter wankers at about a year out.  I had to do some introspection lately when I realised what a self obsessed arse piece I was becoming.  Now however I've got a bit too skinny for my frame and my skin is flopping about like an old tarpaulin so any measure of smugness I once felt is now eclipsed by my shock at my truly hideous skin laxity.   I looked better with more fat but hang fire I'm sure I'll meet it again on the way up!!!

I am mindful when I read others posts on here of just how starved for attention we were as fat chicks and dudes.  I sometimes cringe when I read how suddenly every man and woman wants to sleep with said poster.  Maybe it is because we suddenly dress like tropical fish teenagers and constantly look like we're about to go out night clubbing that people stare??? Hmmmmm????  Or that we shriek and flap in public like an early warning system???

Dunno I'm as guilty as the next I suppose.  I'm lucky to have acerbic utterly sarcastic mates who are constantly teasing me about my weight loss.  It keeps my massive head from utterly inflating and floating into the path of an on-coming Boeing 747.  I also work out in the gym with a SMO friend who is doing it "the natural way" and together I feel more grounded about who I am and where I came from.  Also I loved many aspects of fat Kirstin and in some ways miss her still.  Maybe that stops me from laying the boot into fat people......it was only a year and a bit ago I was struggling to wipe my own arse. 

Do I love my size 10-12 body (not naked no) well yes.  Would I ever go back to the way I was before (screaming, thrashing, biting and hissing like a cat) no.  Am I proud of myself for getting here....yes.  Does everyone have to know how fabulous I am **** no....just you poor long suffering folk.

Great post.  As a newbie I need to "check myself" .  We all do lest we become the odious bore we once reviled.

OT reply here. . . just wanted to tell you that I love your grasp on the English language.  I always enjoy reading your posts :)

 Still love reading Kirmy's thoughts!  Excellent!

ahhhh weight loss and weight gain change everyone, the person who's weight changes and the ones that they interact with.  no one thinks they will regain the weight, just human nature, there is nothing more humbling than losing weight then gaining it back.......

 Been there, done that more times than I want to recount.  I am hoping life after DS will be different!  I am hoping the regain won't be as easy as it was "before".  I hope I can keep it in check by keeping the carbs reigned in!  Before DS, just normal eating put the weight back on.  Went from starving myself to eating like a normal person.  So, I hope the DS will save me from that fate!  Here is hoping!!!

I have to remind myself that others are not so interested in my success or failure.  Maybe we speak about it because we are experiencing "happy".  For years i was so miserable and now I just want to share.  

Now I talk about it to my poor DH till his eyes glaze over.   lol

I do limit my discussions to a very few friends now and only when they ask.

So the advice is essentially to keep the friendship going with the hope that the person will regain and therefore be tolerable again?