The agony and the ecstasy of weight loss compliments

Three things to consider about the risky business of discussing someone's body.

iStock, Denis Novikov

Thanks for reading! Please click the ❤️ at the bottom if you like this piece, or better yet, share it! If you invite friends to Body Type, you can get a free upgrade to a paid subscription — learn about that here.

Also: I’ll be sending out a special author Q&A tomorrow, so stay tuned for another free post this week!

---

When I was in my early 20s, I collected weight loss compliments by the bushel. I graduated college, moved away, and didn’t see most of the regular characters in my life for several months. When I arrived to my own months-delayed graduation party almost 70 pounds lighter, I was showered with the typical cards and cash, and a deluge of congratulations about my weight loss. I finished my degree early to take a dream internship in the big city, but that topic was cast aside in favor of the topic of my body.

This was more than a decade ago, so let me impress upon you just how different the cultural vibe was. I imagine there were very few people who questioned whether they should compliment my weight loss. I doubt anyone considered that it could be the result of an illness, a mental health issue, or a restrictive eating disorder (it wasn’t for me, but it is for some people). Clearly no one thought that saying how beautiful I was post-weight loss suggested that I wasn’t beautiful before (it did, but I was too starved for affirmation to care). If a woman lost weight, it was necessarily a celebration; surely she intended to do it, because that’s what women are forever trying to do, right? I won’t lie: I was intoxicated by these accolades.

But intoxicants are addictive, and weight loss compliments hooked me. When the stream of adulation became a trickle and then finally ran dry — because at a certain point, your “new” body is just your body, no one cares anymore, and it would be weird to keep bringing it up — I was despondent. Surely I needed to keep reminding everyone I was “better” now, that I’d kept the weight off, that I was still beautiful. I’ve written how weight loss made me obsessed with my looks, and constant compliments that reinforced how much my smaller body was valued had a lot to do with that.

This is one of the reasons why there has been much discussion over the past few years about why complimenting weight loss is potentially harmful — it doesn’t always mean someone is healthier, we might not know if it was intentional, it can reinforce a focus on weight as self-worth. All of that is true.

But as someone who did get healthier, lost weight as a result, and is happy about that, I’ve wondered whether I think weight loss compliments are “good,” “bad,” or something in between. The truth is, I would have been upset if no one in my life reacted positively to my weight loss, because it was the result of positive things I was doing for myself, and because frankly, losing 70 pounds is a big deal — if no one had said anything, it would have been obvious to me they were trying really hard not to, and that would have caused me even more body image confusion. But how people talked about my weight loss and body is what trapped me in the feeling that those are the most important things about me.

Here’s what I think they should have said, and what you might consider doing instead.

---

Know what you’re talking about

At this point in my life, I wouldn’t comment on the weight changes of someone I don’t know well and if I didn’t know their intention and what’s going on behind the scenes. But I did say something complimentary about weight loss to a friend recently, because I knew without a shadow of a doubt that my friend was trying to lose weight — which I think is OK, depending on context and caveats — and that they were doing it in a sane, safe, sustainable way (I call this The Triple-S Way).

When I lost weight, only a handful of people knew I was going to therapy, trying to recover from binge eating disorder, getting into strength training, and truly taking care of myself for the first time. The other people were complimenting me based only on assumptions that my weight loss was intentional and healthy. Even though it was, how would they know? I could have been sucking down Kardashian weight-loss lollipops and cocaine and they would have reacted the same way. Often we don’t know if everything’s good behind the scenes, so we should avoid compliments that spring from assumptions. But if a good friend of mine has told me how they’re eating better, feeling better, and loving exercise as they try to lose weight, I feel it would be kind of rude not to acknowledge the results of those efforts.

Here’s the thing, though:

You only get to do it once

My mother gave me the most weight loss compliments of all. Every time I saw her, she made a big deal about it, even if my body had been the same for a while. She would call me me “skinny” as a compliment. (I’m not skinny, but this is just a thing some women say. It’s a kind of recognition of any weight loss, even if the recipient of the compliment only lost, like, six pounds.) At some point I stopped saying “thank you” and started saying, “I’m the same size as last time you saw me,” or, “Oh, please,” or nothing at all. This was my attempt to diminish how much we valued a smaller body.

But inside, I liked it, may God strike me down. I grew up at a time and in a culture where “skinny” was a compliment, where weight loss was the apex of achievement, where my mom and every other woman made envious remarks about thinner bodies. When my mom gave me these compliments, how could I receive them as anything other than, well, a kind of love? It’s always been my mother’s opinion of my body that’s mattered the most, because her opinion about my body is the one I heard first.

While my mom knew all I was doing to get better, and so I think it’s fine that she acknowledged my body’s changes, I think that how effusively and how often she did so only fed my addiction to this kind of affirmation. I’m not angry with her about this — Mom: Hi, I’m not angry with you about this — because she was just trying to be kind and supportive, this is how people were taught to be, old habits die hard, everyone knows better now, etc. But it has taught me something:

You can’t go overboard. If you want to compliment someone’s body changes, I think you get to do it once. Acknowledge it, be nice about it, and then drop the subject. If they’re anything like me, you need to save them from themselves — don’t let them get too hung up on the idea of weight loss as The Most Important Thing Ever by bringing it up constantly and reacting to it with more enthusiasm than you’ve shown about anything else in their life. Throw them a “Hey, awesome job!” just like you would if they got promoted or remodeled their kitchen themselves or whatever and then everyone can move on with their lives.

And when it comes to exactly how to compliment them:

Make it about their soul, not their size

Of all the compliments anyone has given me about my weight loss or body, one that my husband said will stick with me for the rest of my life. It wasn’t even really about my body. He just said:

I’m so proud of you.

He was privy to all that I’ve done to turn my life around after I realized that being a totally sedentary borderline alcoholic with binge eating and anxiety disorders was, shall we say, no longer serving me: the therapy, the research into nutrition and exercising, the commitment to new habits, the consistent and dedicated work to get better and stay better, the tenacity and determination, the commitment to simply taking care of myself. He was proud of me for all that. You can bet your ass I am, too.

People have said some of the most flattering yet superficial things you can imagine about my weight loss and body, and I won’t pretend I didn’t like or appreciate hearing them, even if I know they feed the beasts of ego and insecurity at once. But the compliment that endures above all those is the one that’s about who I am, what I’ve done, and how far I’ve come. Weight loss was really just a side effect.

If you’re going to compliment someone’s weight loss because you know they’re trying to do it, they’re going about it in the Triple-S Way, and you’re close enough to them to know this will be well-received, add more specific feedback about what they’re doing to any mention of what their body looks like. For example:

• “I know you’ve been getting into working out and that you love it. I’m so happy you found that outlet/hobby/habit.”

• “It’s inspiring to hear about how you’re trying to have a better relationship to food.”

• “I’m so glad you feel like you’re taking care of yourself.”

The third point is key: Ask them about how they feel! Almost no one did that when I lost weight, it was all about how I looked. I would have loved it if someone asked how my emotional state had changed. I could have raved all day about how I had more energy, less anxiety, a greater sense of self-efficacy and self-actualization, etc. But I know most people don’t want to hear all that woo-woo shit. They just want to know if you did keto or Pilates.

Still, if you’re talking to a close friend or family member, I’d hope you can make a little space for their woo-woo shit, because it’s the woo-woo shit that matters. If you truly care about who they are more than you care about what they look like, it’s the woo-woo shit that’s most worthy of a compliment.

---

What do you think? How do weight loss compliments make you feel? Does this seem like good advice? Let me know.