One time when I was just a little bit fat, a very unkind woman said to me. “You know, I can tell that you need to lose weight by looking at your foot size.” I looked at her and wondered what in the world she was talking about. What did my foot size have to do with how overweight I was? I knew I had gained some weight, but I was still confused by her comment. She elaborated, “If you look at someone’s profile, and see the size of their foot in relation to their body size, you can tell how much weight they should carry.” I mumbled something at her and fled, the whole time wondering if she was right. Did my shoes give away the fact I had gained about 35 or 40 pounds since I had gotten married? I thought I had hidden my weight gain well. After all, I bought clothes when John wasn’t around so he wouldn’t know that my suit size was no longer a 10. I cut the tags out of my clothes so when it was his turn to do laundry he wouldn’t see the size L on the shirt tag. If he hadn’t said anything, surely no one could really tell I was putting on weight.
When I got home I stood sideways and looked in our closet mirrors. I looked okay, a little pudgy I suppose, but not huge. (That would come later.) I looked at my feet and then at my profile and saw what that rude lady was saying to me. She was right. My body size was too big for my feet. I had gone from being average sized to greater than average sized. Even though I was buying bigger sizes I assumed I still looked okay and that my size increase was still a secret. It wasn’t. I was overweight and the whole world knew.
How is your profile compared to your foot size? Are you coasting by assuming that all is okay when it really isn’t? Don’t be lulled into purchasing larger sizes and blame the new size on the fashion industry. The time to get your weight under control is when you first notice the problem. If you wait, as I did, until you are morbidly obese then it will just be harder to lose all the weight you desire. If you want to lose some weight before your weight spirals up and up, now is the time to start. Don’t wait until Monday morning after binge eating all weekend. Start right now by committing to eating less of your calories from fat, watching portion sizes and exercising. If you start today, then tomorrow you will be one step closer to reaching your goals. Good luck! Diane
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I never thought about this. That woman was not nice to say that. I can’t believe how people say mean things to people who are overweight that they wouldn’t say to thin people. I really like your blog and website. You are real.
You are right – she wasn’t very nice at all. Fortunately she wasn’t a good friend of mine! People do say unsensitive and unkind things to people who struggle with their weight. It’s almost a form of allowed discrimination. Thanks for commenting. Diane
I don’t think that woman is right, if it helps. How is foot size really any different than height? It’s not like you’re going to grow your feet, or your length, to keep proportionality with your weight. I call bs! Though one of the side-effects of losing weight has been the width of my feet, which makes some shoes feel less tight. This was a not unpleasant surprise.
Julie,
I agree with you. She really made no sense at all – aside from the fact that she was very rude. I also found that as I lost weight my shoes started to slip off my heels because they were so stretched out from my wide feet. This was a good, underreported benefit of weight loss! Thanks for your comment and you are doing great on your weight loss. I looked at your blog too! Diane
My feet have gone up 2 sizes since I gained weight.
Mine went up with each of my first three pregnancies, for a total of 1.5 sizes! Yikes!