Kaitlyn Bruneau (Body Boundaries)
Licensed clinical social worker Kaitlyn offers guidance on handling conversations about weight, self-esteem, and body image. She shows how to set healthy boundaries by understandin...
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Do you want to be proactive or reactive in setting boundaries?
You might also choose to apply the same curiosity to a loved one who's asking about your weight loss. Before you answer them, if they ask you a question, instead of offering a statement about your body, you may want to ask them why they're asking you. Then get to decide if there are motives that you are comfortable engaging with versus those that you are not. You have a good idea of what you need from others to continue on your own journey towards your physical and mental health goals. Then hopefully advocating with others can feel empowering and make those goals even more attainable. If the idea of setting boundaries around others' comments feels really scary, that's okay. You can always start with the people where you feel the most comfortable and can choose what you want to say depending on various contexts.
How can you respond when others ask about your weight loss?
People lose weight for a lot of reasons, and therefore people have a wide variety of feelings about that weight loss. Unfortunately, weight loss is often praised in our society, can therefore be associated with sentiments of celebration and empowerment. This is also related to larger societal patterns where people are often commenting on one another's bodies and physical appearances, which does not always lend to the most positive self-esteem or body image. For a lot of people, whether or not you want to celebrate your weight loss, but especially if you do not knowing how to respond to or set boundaries with loved ones can be really helpful, even if it is a bit scary. Before even thinking about how you want to respond, I would first want to know more about how you feel about your body and your weight loss. Is it just generally something that you would rather not discuss? Is it something that is linked to a health condition or stress and therefore rather others just not make assumptions? What impact do other people's comments generally have on your self-esteem and body image? I ask all of this because first and foremost, I want to make sure that any boundary setting or advocacy is not perpetuating any of your own avoidance, anxiety or poor body image.
Why is it so important to take one's feelings about their weight loss into consideration?
Next, you can choose if you want to be more proactive or reactive in your advocacy. You can either speak to people proactively that might make comments about your body or weight loss, and directly ask them not to make comments about it with or without an explanation. We often feel obligated to have full explanations whenever we ask something out of someone, maybe out of fear. We are inconveniencing them, but you are not required to give extensive reasoning when stating your boundaries with other people. You might choose to do this ahead of family events or in preparation for your changing body when being more reactive. You would be choosing how you want to respond to various comments. You might have different responses for different comments or just a few general responses that work for multiple comments. You also get to decide how direct or succinct you want to be. What is important is that you feel that your response works for you, that it aligns with your values, your needs, and your desired communication style. For example, some people prefer a short and direct comment, such as, I would really prefer that we do not talk about bodies, especially mine in this way. Can we talk about something else while others prefer a more balanced approach with both validation and advocacy? I appreciate your comment or concern, and I'm glad you felt comfortable enough with me to share that. At the same time, I would really prefer if we do not talk too much about my weight loss as it's actually a bit more complicated than I'd like to get into, and all of these can be broken down into smaller pieces if needed. Simply, can we talk about something else or I don't think about bodies like that, or just a pivot to a new topic.