This is going to sound so crazy. I feel so uncomfortable when people make a big deal about the weight loss. When people say what a big difference my weight loss has made, it makes me feel bad. I just wonder how bad they must have thought I looked before. Im glad I've lost a lot of weight and Im glad people notice but I guess Im not use to compliments.

Be nice to yourself. Compliments are great. You probably did look bad before. At least now you don't. Julie

Donna,

I haven't lost enough with my lap band for people to notice, but I have been on various diets and lost weight before. It is so hard for me to change my "self image."

It is also sometimes, hard to accept compliments. At my heaviest weight, my husband would still tell me I was beautiful, but I didn't believe it. Mainly, because of the way I felt about myself.

Oddly, this works both ways. There have been times, that I was heavy but still saw myself as "slimmer" I think this was a kind of denial.

I am working on doing positive affirmations, telling myself I am a good person and deserve to take good care of myself. I am practicing telling others "Thank You, I am working hard at developing a healthier lifestyle."

I think its much harder to change inside than out, but I am working on it!

Don't focus on what they might have thought, just be proud of your progress!

This is going to sound so crazy. I feel so uncomfortable when people make a big deal about the weight loss. When people say what a big difference my weight loss has made, it makes me feel bad. I just wonder how bad they must have thought I looked before. Im glad I've lost a lot of weight and Im glad people notice but I guess Im not use to compliments.

This is going to sound so crazy. I feel so uncomfortable when people make a big deal about the weight loss. When people say what a big difference my weight loss has made, it makes me feel bad. I just wonder how bad they must have thought I looked before. Im glad I've lost a lot of weight and Im glad people notice but I guess Im not use to compliments.

Donna, you are not alone with these feelings. I know EXACTLY how you feel. It has taken a real force of will for me to train myself not to think negative thoughts when people compliment me. It's really important that you (and I) understand that people think they are saying something that will make you feel good, and that is their intention. Just try to see it as that and then put it behind you. I would tell myself over and over that "you're not doing this for compliments, you're doing it for yourself, don't worry about others' reactions." Finally I got to a place where I can smile and say thank you, and then just immediately move along to something else.

I feel that way, too. There aren't too many people that I haven't told about my surgery, and a *FEW* of them go out of their way to rave on and on about how good I look, and how great it is that I'm losing so much weight.....and I know in my heart that in the couple of weeks that I haven't seen them, I haven't lost ANY additional weight, so I kind of wish they would just spare me.

And with one of these people, (my step-mother) it's usually in a very public setting, with lots of people around, and she's NOT a soft-spoken person, so now there are 20 more strangers that know I've had surgery, and that I'm looking SO great....When they're probably looking at me, and thinking, OMG! She looks good compared to WHAT??? I'm still 100 lbs overweight, so I'm not looking slim and trim to the casual onlooker yet.

*sighs*

Some people just have no sense of propriety.

Thanks, Jack! What an en-"light"-ened way to look at it!

"every size we abandon".... I love it!