Ten months ago I spoke about how I was completely fat-shamed by a doctor over my BMI and I’ve been a little downhearted ever since.
Well, more soul destroyed, to be honest.
And this week I had that familiar feeling of fat shame when I went for a flu jab.
I couldn’t understand why I had been called in for one when I never had before; not that I was complaining – hubs had the flu when the boy was two weeks old and was very poorly, so I would have paid for one anyways.
When I went in I asked the nurse why I now qualified for a free one; she went really quiet and changed the subject.
“It’s because of my weight, isn’t it” I said.
And I was right – NHS guidelines this year state that anyone with a BMI greater than 40 should have one, it’s classed as morbid obesity and a long term health condition.
I came out and had a little cry. One of my main motivations for losing weight is the health factor – I can’t keep on walking into medical appointments and everything being blamed on my weight.
I asked what they had my BMI down as – 43.7 they said, from around a year ago, and again I was advised anything over 40 puts me as morbidly obese and at serious risk of health complications.
I’ve now lost a stone with Slimming World and I wanted to know whether my BMI had reduced by much if at all; so I logged into my profile and worked out my current BMI.
I was amazed to see it’s now 40.5 – and I only have to lose 3½lbs to have a BMI of 39.9 – taking me out of the over-40 bracket.
It’s given me a huge kick up the arse and made me so motivated – I have a long way to go, but I can totally do this.
x
terrible to be fat shamed by a Dr- over BMI since it’s really not that accurate. I thanked my doctor for having an honest discussion about me being overweight–but it was done professionally (based on several key factors and accurate body fat % test).
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