Skip To Content

    Losing Weight Doesn't Make Obese Girls Feel Better

    Even after they drop pounds, they still think they're fat. Which, according to one mom's upsetting story, rings all too true.

    The study, published in the Journal of Health and Social Behavior (via ScienceDaily), looked at 2,206 girls over the course of 10 years, starting when they were 9. The result:

    We found that obese black and white teenage girls who transitioned out of obesity continued to see themselves as fat, despite changes in their relative body mass. Further, obese white girls had lower self-esteem than their normal-weight peers and their self-esteem remained flat even as they transitioned out of obesity.

    So the stigma of obesity apparently lasts longer than the pounds themselves. For a sad illustration of this, take a look at Dara-Lynn Weiss's already much-criticized Vogue piece on how she forced her daughter, Bea, to lose weight. Specifically, Bea's side of the story:

    "That's still me," she says of her former self. "I'm not a different person just because I lost sixteen pounds." I protest that, indeed, she is different. At this moment, that fat girl is a thing of the past. A tear rolls down her beautiful cheek, past the glued-in feather. "Just because it's in the past," she says, "doesn't mean it didn't happen."