Question:
How to deal with a possible non-supportive close co-worker?
Hi! I'm hoping to have this surgery done later in the year - early spring, hopefully. Just started a new job in a brand new school, and have a coworker that I work with on a daily basis, same dep't, offices next to each other. My eating habits are horrible -I know - I am ALWAYS hungry, which is one reason I'm hoping for surgery. I know I make poor choices. Well, this one worker is trying to get me to eat better (which is good) but is starting to get overbearing. Example - the other day I did not get to have breakfast at home, so I hit the snack machine at work for something, ended up with a sweet bun thing. She comes in and shows me a banana and says "this is breakfast on the go". I've been down the road of eating a banana for breakfast, in the present state I'm in (and have been for 3+ years, if not longer) I'd be hungry 5 minutes later. I know she means well, and I'm usually not the type to hide information. But I'm starting to feel that when the surgery comes closer, I'm going to have a tough time explaining why I'm doing it and why it's right for me. Any help and advice is appreciated, thanks so much! — Sarah C. (posted on September 15, 2001)
September 15, 2001
Sarah, you need to tell this woman to MYOB. Her feelings might be hurt at
first, but too bad. If the situation is too close to do that, then try,
"Thanks for your concern. I might try that next time. (turn your
back)" or "No thanks, I *like* this" or "OK, I'll eat
that TOO" or "I'd prefer not to discuss my food choices with
you." I mean, this woman does not discuss your OTHER personal choices,
does she? The key thing here is that you don't have to
<b>explain</b> anything to this woman. She is
<b>not</b> your mother, and as an adult, you can choose to not
even tell your mother! Put your chin out and tell her off, as soon as you
can... it's only going to get worse the more you let her invade your
privacy. Good luck!
— Julia M.
September 15, 2001
Sarah, I'm a big one for not "burning your bridges" if you don't
have to. I don't think you have to be rude to this woman. Find a moment to
sit down facing her, look her directly in the eyes and tell her how much
you appreciate her advice and the fact that she obviously cares for you and
is trying to help. Tell her that you are starting a program under a
doctor's care, that you have complete faith in your doctor and so you will
now need to follow HIS recommendations. Tell her that you are sure she
will understand this and that getting further dietary advice from someone
other than your doctor may confuse you, "and so knowing that you will
understand this, I am asking you to hold off on advising me any further for
now, while I work on this with my doc." Unless she is a complete
idiot, she will "get it" and back off and wish you well. In
addition, she will be flattered by your thanking her for caring about you.
(Generally that makes people actually care about you more, if they didn't
before you said it.) After all, you will probably continue to work with
this woman, so why alienate her and make it unpleasant for both of you in
the future, if there's another way to get her to back off without hurting
her feeling or insulting her? I would not tell her about your surgery, she
sounds like the type who would have to "weigh in" (pardon the
pun) on that, too. She will probably not guess that it is related to your
weight issue. I just told people that I was having surgery. If they press
about it, I told them I would talk about it maybe AFTER the surgery, but
did not want todicuss it beforehand, as I didn't want to hear everyone's
horror stories or "alternative" treatments, as I had complete
faith in my physician. That stopped all but the most persistent woman, who
I finally leaned close to and confided, "I'm having a brain
transplant....but don't tell anyone." Her eyes got big, then she
"got it", laughed and hasn't bothered me since. Good luck to you
!!!
— Lisa D.
September 15, 2001
Isn't it funny your worried about hurting her feelings by not being rude,
when fact she is being rude to you. Would you presume to tell another what
to eat? No I don't think so,so why should you have to put up with it?
Because your over weight? This so called do gooder needs to go back and
take a MS MANNERS course. Don't FEEL like you have to do anything to please
her this is your life, no one elses. I am sick of we "MO" people
having to put up with rudness from anyone!!!!We are taking hold of our
lifes,so good luck and GRAB HOLD.
— Sharron J.
September 15, 2001
I know exactly what you are talking about. I have a co-worker the same way.
Infact, I have several of them. It makes you feel like hiding and eating. I
used to have 1 lady yell clear across the lunch room and tell me "you
don't need that. It's not good for you" Rude people like that, need
rude comments yelled back at them. Like Mind your own business, I don't
tell you what you should eat. Or maybe I could give you a few ideas to make
you fill those clothes out alittle better. Then I had another co-worker who
always used the "big sister, I really care about you" approach.
And she genuinley does care about me. But she slipped up one day, when I
was talking about this surgery and said " why can't you just have some
self control?" So I stopped talking to her for a while. She understood
that she hurt my feelings. And she started choosing her words better. I had
pretty much made up my mind to have the surgery but the seal on the deal
was when she took me aside and told me that everyone at work was making fun
of me behind my back and she didn't want me to be hurt anymore. She offered
to come and pick me up and take me to work out... and do alot of things for
me to help me loose it. That was 3 months ago, and I have already had my
surgery. She is the same women who (didn't agree with the surgery in the
beginning) but had a fund raiser for me while I was off of work to help me
out financially. I guess what I'm saying is that for some people, you don't
have to say anything to get your point across. That way you can let them
know they have hurt your feelings, and not have to hurt hers.(They may be
an antisocial way of dealing with it but it works) Now all I have to worry
about is all the other people talking behind my back saying I'm going to
gain my weight back. Or they may even tell me I'm not eating enough:-0
— K T.
September 16, 2001
I would be careful about sharing surgery info with anybody
that isn't behind you %100. I, to this day, haven't told any of
my dysfunctional family. When I was obese, it was, "You need
to do something about your weight"- mostly they told OTHER
people I needed to do something about my weight (my husband,
my best friend)- not me to my face:)
THEN, as I was losing- I looked "Gaunt" and my face looked
"sickly" and "aren't you losing too much??" You can't
trust
everybody, nor can you please them either. Good Luck! PS,
now my Dad is asking ME how to lose weight. Being
as he is too old for WLS, I am helping him with
menue and exercise ideas.
— M B.
September 16, 2001
It seems to me that the biggest problem is that you're going to have to
work with this "control freak" on a fairly close basis. I have a
few of them at work, too. I'm just smiling and saying things like,
"Good for you!" when they talk about how their diets work so
well, how they're exercising, etc. (Of course, they are trying to give me
subtle hints). I'm also not telling a single soul at work about what my
surgery is about. We don't owe anyone the details to our personal life at
work. I just tell people that I'm trying to keep my surgery private, and
that I don't want to let it interfere with my work, but that I appreciate
their concern and everything will be fine. (I don't have cancer, etc.)
Don't let this woman intimidate you; you don't owe her any details of your
private life.
— Kathy J.
September 16, 2001
I agree with all the below..:
You have to decide who controls YOUR LIFE. WHO DOES? Is it you? My boss
is a control freak too. She has made some remarks that hurt. But....shes
not doing ANYTHING about her weight...atleast yet. THE ONLY PEOPLE WHO
HAVE A SAY SO IN MY LIFE ARE....GOD, MYSELF, MY HUSBAND. NO BODY ELSE GETS
A VOTE...!!!!! Try hard not to let them get to you. Be as quiet as you can
about what you do..and go on. My mom used to say, WALK SOFTLY CARRY A BIG
STICK....i think this means...go ahead and do WHAT YOU THINK IS RIGHT...
brush away the hurts and comments as best you can. YOU'RE DOING
SOMETHING!!!!!! best to you
— Jackiis
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