You have to love yourself...

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...before anyone else can love you.

I've been hearing this a lot lately, as have others who are down on themselves. Sure it makes sense and sounds like a good idea. Why wouldn't you love yourself? Not like a narcissistic but in the self-respect kind of way. But how do you go about obtaining that self-respect stuff?

Seriously, I'm clueless. I've hated myself since I was 10 years old when I gained a lot of weight at puberty and was forced to take classes with the NT children who simple didn't accept me as one of them for being fat AND weird. I apparently was too much for them, even though I barely said anything. I was put on anti-depressants (which made me even fatter) when I was 16 and while I was care-free-ish when I was on them, as soon as they would wear off, I would be crying myself to sleep knowing that I have been lying to myself throughout the day as a result of a pill.

I've been off the anti-depressants for almost 10 months now. While I have been losing weight, I'm still struggling with the whole self-respect thing. When people tell me to see something positive in myself, something that I can do that none of my friends can, I strain to think of something. Anything at all. So it makes me sad. So how can I obtain self-respect? Sadly, it doesn't come in a pill or I would have bought a lifetime supply of it already.

However stupid it sounds (which it does to me ) you can always try the talking to yourself in the mirror thing.
I only hate myself 95% of the time now because of it.

Reinforcing the positives other people see will help you start to believe them.

& I don't think that cliche line 'you have to love yourself before someone will love you' is entirely true either.

I think accepting yourself is a better place to reach for, firstly.

...that was a little rambly and vague, sorry about that. >.<

May be you should start off by finding a support network. By this, I mean find a club or some group of people who would not criticize you and accept you for who you are? One thing comes to mind is weight loss club. Since they all have issues with weight they wouldn't criticize you for this.

I am not saying limit yourself to some group of people. On the contrary, once you have a support network, you can then proceed to socialize with the kinds of people that are less accepting. The negative comments won't hurt you as much since you would have something to fall back on whenever you hear them.

That, plus you would be able to network: once you are friends with "overweight" people, you can be introduced to their friends who are NOT overweight but they would accept you for who you are because you are "friends of their friends". Once you are more accepted in general people might be more willing not to judge you as much for your negatives. They might think something along the lines "I don't like her but hey everyone else does, there must be something I am not seeing, let me get to know her better before passing judgement".

I kinda used the "self respect" and "loving yourself" as synonyms for self-acceptance. They're pretty much the same thing in my head and equally as difficult to obtain.

I don't think looking in the mirror is a good way of making me like myself. I try to avoid the mirror whenever possible because sometimes my reflection makes me cry, as pathetic as that sounds. However, I need the mirror to put my contacts in and make-up on so I'm forced to look at myself at least a little. >.<

The main reason I have difficulty accepting positives from others because I can't tell if they're being honest with me or are just being nice out of the social institution of "friendship."

Oh okay - fair enough. Definitely not easy to obtain.
But nothing in life worth having comes easy.

Ugh I know how you feel, I hate looking in the mirror, all I see is scars and imperfections.
But it does seem to work strangely. How about when you look at yourself (like the times you have to) tell yourself the positive things.
Even if you don't believe them, it can't hurt?

I don't have any friends, so I can't really tell the difference between people being honest or people pretending to be honest.
But i'd say if they're your friends, they're telling the truth? Friends don't lie to each other, right?

I'm friends with the people at the Renaissance club at school. They like me, I think, but they don't understand the weight thing because they're all naturally gorgeous with small waists and giant natural boobs. So when I point out my weight they're like, "no you're not." I'm like, yeah I am. I'm much heavier than you by a lot. And they look at me funny. I guess they don't see it but I don't know how they can't. I'm 31% body fat for f**k's sake. >.<

Weight-loss clubs = older women. At least the ones in my area anyway. They'll say things like my mom and grandma do, "You're so young to be so fat. You have a metabolism, use it!" I'm trying. I don't think I'd fit in there. It's either chill with the old ladies or the brain-dead ditsy instructor.

It's not so much what others say to my face, because they don't. My issue is that I'm constantly comparing myself to other girls and seeing myself as the lesser person because of it. I evaluated my body shape based on what's popular among men and I'm nowhere near it. So it's more of my brain needs to shut the hell up but I don't know how to do that. >.<

If I don't believe them, would that make me a liar? I hate lying. >.<

Friends protect each other's feelings so they don't seem like a catty b***h. So I never know what they really think unless I wasn't present.

I know that there are younger people who are overweight, it is just not as common. May be you can google something on the internet for younger women who are overweight?



I think the issue is that even though ppl don't say it to your face, they think it in their heads and this realization is what bothers you. Perhaps you can do some things that would make you more popular in other areas. Do you have some talents/interests that might have some overlap with things that make people popular (writing songs, poetry, playing musical instruments, and so forth).

Last edited by Roman on 08 Apr 2011, 11:43 am, edited 1 time in total.

I think liar is a strong word. Just because you don't believe them when you start saying them, doesn't mean you can't grow to believe them.
But, you have to want to believe them, and i'm not sure if you do or not?

Lol, well i'd fail at being a friend then. i'd have to tell someone what i thought, even if it hurt them. >.<
well, i have one friend, and last time i saw her i told her a dress she was wearing made her ass look huge
i'm subtle as a brick when it comes to stuff like that.

Googling my weight issues is what gets me in trouble in the first place. I see all the blogs of the sad fat girls and the people who criticize them and I get sad. D:

I don't want to be popular. I think you're missing the point. I have friends. I want to be able to accept myself so I can be happy and one day attract a man who will actually treat me right and get married and have kids.

I want to believe positive stuff about how I look but I just can't. I see massive amounts of disgusting fat and scars and there is nothing positive about any of it.

That's why I keep my mouth shut with stuff like that. "Does my ass look big?" Find an excuse to leave the room or start talking to someone else. >.<

Perhaps it would be a good idea to list all the things about you that you can do and then narrow that down to what you can do that makes you feel good.

Comparing yourself to other women is unhealthy, also, what women find attractive physically is usually different than what men find attractive physically by varying degrees (it can even be vastly different, I've asked guys about it). Another thing to consider confidence is an attractive trait, which can turn heads more than an attractive figure would without it.

Erisad, have you tried confidence courses?

There are men who realize that there is more to the person than just weight. Of course, they are in minority. But, at the same time, they are not nearly as shallow as most other men. The men who would judge you by weight the most, are also the ones who think of women as just a sex objects; do you REALLY want to date one of them? So, in this respect, you might be lucky that you are overweight: you have an easy way of screening out all the shallow men and leaving yourself with the ones that are worth your time.

Have you tried dating websites? I believe this might be a good idea if you have difficulties finding men who are looking for someone to settle down with.

Hmmmm...I may do that later. >.>

Actually, I thought my ideas of what was attractive were similar to a man's: big boobs, small waist, and medium-large hips.

Do those classes exist? Would they really work?

That's not always true. Being larger, I am subconsciously screened out as a possible date in the minds of even the nicest and least shallow people. I think I don't even register as an option to most people, which is why I never had a bf before I started asking guys out. Also, I have dated really shallow men before. They figure that they can get anything that they want from me just because I'm a bigger girl and I wouldn't protest because I don't have that many options.

Yes. My last ex was from one of those. He's selfish, immature and his mommy made him break up with me. He's 24 years old. Sadly, he was the best bf I ever had. Needless to say, my standards aren't really high at this point. :/

May be asking guys out is a good idea.

But may be before asking out you should screen out everyone and only ask out the kinds that wouldn't hurt you in a way the previous ones did. I realize you might have a mentality that you can't afford having high standards on guys because of your weight. But there is a loophole here. The guys worth having are not necesserely the most popular. So you can ask out the kinds of guys that are NOT popular but, at the same time, who have a lot to offer and who wouldn't hurt you.