BellaOnline Forums Health and Fitness Exercise How to silence the misguided food police

If you eat a healthy diet or you're trying to adopt healthy eating habits then you've probably had a run in with the misguided food police; those ridiculous people that feel the need to criticize what you eat, why you eat it, and how you eat. Examples:

"OMG you're eating that many carbs"
"OMG do you know how many calories that is"
"Wow, you eat that much fat"
"Did you know eating ____ is bad for you"

These misguided fools are everywhere: your office, at parties, the grocery store, at a friend or family members home, at the gym, even in your own home!!! Get used to it. Nearly 70% of Americans are overweight or obese so you are GROSSLY outnumbered and always will be (Experts are predicting 75% of the population will be obese by 2020).

Learn to not care about unhealthy people's opinions and do what you know is healthy. A few months from now or a year from now you'll be at the weight you need to be and super healthy and fit while those people will probably be heavier, more miserable, and still criticizing everything you eat even after they see your results

Like I told a client the other day. You can't let other people's behavior or opinions sway you in any direction. Tell the misguided food police the only people you take eating advice from are healthy people who exercise. This usually ends the discussion fast and prevents future ones too : )

LOL - I've heard all of them & then some.

Reminds me of a story: a coworker called into our office & took everyone's orders for hamburgers & french fries from a popular eatery. Everyone that is except me. Naturally I got comments like, "Don't you want to treat yourself"? To which I replied, "Have you seen the movie Fast Food Nation or Food Inc & what they do to cows?" (No more comments) In the lunchroom while everyone else were eating their greasy meals I happily indulged in my grilled salmon & green beans to which someone commented, "That looks good" & I replied, "It is". After they finished their meals, the glazed look on my co-workers eyes said it all.

"Glazed look" LOL. The infamous food coma. I was just telling my parents about that movie. I keep trying to get them and pretty much anybody that will listen to watch it.

My mom says she hardly eats protein because the taste grosses her out. I explained that organic tastes a million times better and we even made her some organic chicken soup with whole grain rice, carrots, and spinach so she tried it but was criticizing the entire time because she doesn't know what real food is supposed to taste like anymore. My aunt who has serious digestion issues and is about 40 pounds overweight, high blood pressure, pre-diabetic (eats nothing but processed food) made this face and said what the heck is that. I just said it's called real food you should try it sometime.

I really don't get why they're not used to my eating. I've been eating this way forever and it's not like I don't indulge in some of the stuff they make. I try small plates of their food to be polite. I think deep down it bothers them that I hardly eat like they do. Maybe they feel I'm rejecting them or something.

I didn't mention the whole exercise thing and the comments "I don't know what's wrong with you, exercising all the time. It's so extreme, no wonder you hurt yourself." That made me laugh so hard. Can you imagine what they would say about crossfit people or that crazy chic over at bodyrocktv? I'm starting to really believe that I was adopted!

BTW grilled salmon and green greens sounds so good right now. I have not had salmon in a while. It's sooooo hard to get wild caught here. When it does come in it goes so fast so you're lucky to ever get any.

Most people I know want to lose weight, be healthier, get off medication, have more energy, etc. but they want the easy way out in the form of a pill. And since they can't get that magic pill, they resort to excuses (no time, too tired, eating healthy is expensive, etc) & therefore engage in the "herd" mentality that everyone is doomed to be unhealthy/overweight as they get older. So when they see people who are healthy, they feel guilty & some even try to bring you down to their level by making negative comments and/or sabatoging your efforts. I swear sometimes I feel like everyone's waiting for me to join their "club" & gain the weight back. Fortunately, I've learned to take that negative energy & use it to my advantage & fuel my healthy eating habits & workouts because I'm setting a good example (especially for my daughter).

As far as exercise comments, if someone asks me what kind of exercise I do I just tell them a little bit of everything (yoga, cardio, weights) & move on. Most of the time they're just making polite conversation & I can tell by the look in their eyes they don't really want to know because it makes them feel guilty. Only a few of my fit friends know what bodyweight tabata intervals are & that's when it's fun to engage in conversation.

Absolutely correct Monica, they just don't understand how easy it is to speak and how difficult it is to follow.

I think you might have misunderstood my point. Eating healthy and exercising is easier than people think. If they would just stop focusing on other people's behavior and complaining about how tired they are and how they're so unfit and unmotivated yada yada yada and just do it they would realize that living a healthy life is sooooooooo much easier than being overweight and unhealthy.

You just have to stop feeling sorry for yourself at some point and decide that it's go time. Enough talking, enough complaining, enough focusing on what others are doing, and just go for it. The results will come if you just take it one day at a time and do your best each day.

I've been living like this all my life. I only struggled with 30 lb. of extra weight for 18 months so it's hard for me to understand how anybody would choose to not exercise or eat healthy. It feels freakin horrible to be unfit and overweight. I find it insane that people choose to live that way.

Sorry, if this offends anybody but if you spend a month living the way I do and then were offered the choice to go back to being fat, tired, depressed, lethargic, self conscious, unhappy, would you go back to that? I think not. People just need to give this lifestyle a try and they'll realize it's a zillion times better than the way they feel now.