bad roommate

[scoundrelking]

I am only 5'8" and 220 which isn't THAT bad for a guy...but I love with a roommate who constantly insults me. He only calls me "fatty." he's probably 5'11" and 150 lbs. I'm getting really sick of it, all his insulting, and I know he's only doing it to spur me into losing weight and eating less, but it still hurts. Does anyone else have any more of this sort of negative reinforcement to lose weight?

[psisar]

I wouldn't suggest using negative reinforcement to lose weight in the first place - it might be good for the short haul, but eventually you could start feeling so bad about yourself you just give up. That's happened to me a few times. I'm 5'6, 170 lbs (female) and I've been trying to lose weight for years... I've lost 20 lbs since this time last year (yay!) but I don't worry about it. You just have to learn to be happy with your self image. I mean, I'm overweight but I still go on dates, have a good time with my friends, have guys flirt with me at bars - it's all about personality.

The thing that worked for me was just staying focused. Get yourself pumped up for eating that grapefruit instead of a Big Mac. Don't even think about the things you're giving up, because if you do you're more likely to induldge. Don't even think about losing weight, it will just stress you out. Only worry about eating healthy and working out and if you don't stress about the things you're giving up you'll do a lot better on whatever diet you're on.

[Laura Moncur]

Talk to him.

"Hey dude, cut it out. I don't need to you knocking me down all the time."

"If you can't be respectful, it's going to get ugly."

I don't know what kind of guy your roommate is, but guys seem to like to razz each other all the time. For some of them, it's the only way they know how to communicate. For the really bad cases, you end up needing to find out their sensitive spot and zinging it every time they say something rude. Hopefully, he'll just cut it out when you tell him that it's off limits to treat you that way.

[Pyrochaos]

If I were you I would just pee in his cool-aid.

[jerradk]

Pyrochaos said:

If I were you I would just pee in his cool-aid.

And give him a laxitive in his brownies.

[Laura Moncur]

Then you could call him Runny. Ok, this has devolved...

The best thing to do is to talk to him frankly about it.

[3apa3a]

I'm 5'11" and around 220. My roommate is prolly about the same height and 140 - 150. If he gives me crap, I just straighten out and look at him like I'm about to do something horribly violent. He usually calls me a name or two, laughs about it, then sulks to his room and closes the door.

In short, shrug it off, dude. Be happy in the fact that when you lose the weight, you will be so much stronger with ripped muscles than he can ever even hope to be, that it just won't matter anymore.

Also on that note, don't look at a scale, look in a mirror. Body fat percentage can often change without a single shift in weight, especially if you're lifting.

[Laura Moncur]

So, what's the update about the bad roommate?

Did you talk to him? Did you smack him down?

I'm just wondering how you dealt with it.

[scoundrelking]

Update: Eh, nothing has changed, I've just gotten tougher skin. He's still a total douche bag, but he's still my friend so whatever. I just call him skinny and he calls me fatty. It works.

[scoundrelking]

PS: I totally thought about peeing in his kool-aid...but stopped myself :-D

[Pyrochaos]

It gives it that extra ZING!

[Skycania]

Put mayonnaise in his socks. That really gets to people.

[0rion.78]

unfortunately "ignoring" or "putting your foot down" doesnt always work. ive just learned to pretend it doesnt bother me, and if the person doesnt stop, i usually just hit him between the eyes with a knuckle sandwich. just last week a guy told me "the bigger they are the harder they fall" i told him "thats just to give scrawny little runts like you hope!" he's never bothered me again.

the point of this story is, if you cant fight, act like you will anyway, if you can, let him call your bluff and see what happens

[jrd]

Hahha Orion I like your solution better!!

Seriously, just ignoring him isn't enuff dude. My question to him would be honestly "Dude what is so wrong with 'your' life that you have to get into my biz, don't know what it is but fix it."

Seem like to me it may be redirected anger or something or even jealous. I've experienced it both ways but its always on that person, so dont let yourself become his personal whippin boy.

[WildBerryZinger]

I've definitley encountered that sort of treatment. Sadly, it's from my famiy. Both my mother and my grandfather have the tendency to criticize everything. You can't eat around them without a comment. I once walked into the room with a bowl full of the rice dish I was making for dinner, and my mother automatically assumed it was all for me and asked, "Mast Kur oder wass?" which translated essentially to asking if I'm trying desperately to become nice and pasty. She always looks at my plate suspiciously and makes comments, even when I'm not eating anything even remotely bad. She has a lot of bad eating habits and a weight problem herself (my grandfather does also) and I know it's because she's worried about my health, but it just isn't the way to do it. My advice is to tell the guy it isn't working to make anything better. Although, if we're going for putting things where things shouldn't belong, find a way to put kool aid in the showerhead. When done properly, the victim can stain for days. That should make creating nicknames really easy.

[havix]

Well I like calling myself fat sometimes, good way to start a conversation.

"So, anyways, I'm fat."

[Emily Coffin]

*sigh* yeah. That can be difficult. I'm in a situation where my roomate is my boyfriend, and he's a freaking TWIG! (6'5", 150 lbs soaking wet). He never says anything that will directly hurt me...but it's little things on the sly that I don't think he realizes are as hurtful as they are. I'm a big girl. (5'11", 213 lbs) I've been a big girl for as long as he's known me- but I think since he's never had an issue with being overweight, he doesn't recognize how bad something really minute can make someone feel......

If this whole board were there he'd shut up- your roomate might pick on you, but an entire block filled with pissed off overweight DDR players? methinksnot!
;-) Good luck

[Emily Coffin]

havix said:

Well I like calling myself fat sometimes, good way to start a conversation.

"So, anyways, I'm fat."

I do the "Oh- by the way? Yeah, I'm fat!" thing. People don't know what to do. funnnnyyy!

[Manga]

I think we can all relate to this. People who have never had a weight problem just think it's okay to poke fun at that kinda thing... Honestly, it's really hard to be confident in something society keeps shoving in our face it's bad to be. Like, I was watching Behind the Music and this one guy said "When I stopped drugs, I gained like.. 50 pounds, I was up to like 220. In some respects, I think it's much more acceptable to be a druggy than fat." That got me thinking..

My buddy Mike used to do this thing where he would pretend to punch my stomache and then get "stuck". That really made me feel like sh!t. I used to roll with the punches, though, instead of saying "Shotgun" I'd say "Fatty gets front", and often times I'd get it because I was the biggest.. -=sighs=- Good times. And, like, it's true that I can call myself fat but when other people do it's not cool. A lame double standard, but that's how it is sometimes.

No real solution aside from asking him to stop. Of course, pride will enter into it and that's always lame.. I know I don't like telling people their mocking of my weight made me feel like crap.

Insecurities are hell.

[havix]

Emily said:

I do the "Oh- by the way? Yeah, I'm fat!" thing. People don't know what to do. funnnnyyy!

HAHA, yup, always a chance to end a conversation, specially that annoying Yu-Gay-Oh kid that always hangs around the arcade and wants to trade cards....I'm so glad I grew out of the trading card games a long time ago (when pokemon came out).