Gorgeous! The story of a girl who lost 65 kilograms after being bullied at school

“I didn’t notice how I convinced myself that happiness depends on a small number on the scales,” Nadezhda recalls. – Perhaps it happened at school during the period of the most severe bullying, but it took root when I began to enjoy the constant weight loss. When I first saw a two-digit number, I jumped around the apartment as if I had been given an Audi A8.

For 23-year-old Muscovite Nadezhda Zenchenko, dramatic weight loss – almost twice – almost turned into serious mental health problems. Having gained a new body, attention and compliments from guys, she also received inadequate self-esteem, nervous breakdowns and a constant fear of gaining weight. How the girl coped with this and retained a new slender body, she told in an interview with Wday.ru.

The guy shouted: “Fu, fat, smelly!”

– Eighth-ninth grade. I am a happy 120 kg girl, the youngest and most spoiled in the family. There are five of us children – an older sister, three brothers and me. A caring mother always served food with “male” portions, perhaps, I ate on these culinary masterpieces.

The heavy weight made it difficult for me to dress up. It was possible to buy something fashionable for such a fat woman only in a specialized designer store, and there was not enough money for it. Therefore, I wore ugly age-related XXL clothes, and sometimes XXXL – for jeans, for example. Often bought for the future with several identical pants, sweaters, blouses.

With another 120 kilograms, it was very difficult to walk. My friends had enough energy to go through the entire shopping center, and I had a maximum of one store. My legs began to hurt, my thighs rubbed against each other, my head was constantly buzzing, pressure.

But the maximum dissatisfaction with how I look and my weight appeared along with bullying from the guys at school. Once I was walking with a classmate down a narrow corridor, and the guy who was walking towards me shouted something like “wow, fat, smelly.” It will be remembered for a lifetime. I wasn’t even smelly, but just greasy, but I couldn’t answer him anything.

Then I thought for a long time: “When I lose weight, I will meet you, and you yourself will come up to me to get acquainted!”

I haven’t met him yet, but he is most likely already old, ugly and fat.

“We finished our potatoes and started to lose weight”

The first attempts to lose weight ended in fiasco. Whatever I tried, I was frustrated: the habit of eating tasty things did not leave me in any way and nullified my efforts. Everything was decided by chance.

One evening we were sitting with an adult friend at home and ate fried potatoes. After giving birth, she had extra fat on her stomach and sides, which she wanted to get rid of. She told me how in my youth, in order to lose weight, after 12:00 I switched to proper nutrition, and after 18:00 I did not eat at all. And I wanted to support her. Said, “Let’s try.” We finished the potatoes and started to lose weight.  

It was just a joke, nothing serious, a decision to which I was skeptical. But when I stopped eating in the evenings, I saw how quickly I lost weight. Then she introduced a second restriction – she stopped eating sweets after 12:00 and made food from 12:00 to 18:00 light and low in calories.

“I asked my dad for a subscription to the gym”

I made a promise to myself: as soon as the weight is less than 90 kilograms, I will sign up for the gym. Until that time, I did all the exercises at home: I rocked the press, butt, pulled up, squatted. Sometimes she even ran and heard ridicule from passers-by. I thought:

When I lose weight, I will meet the same plump girl on a run, run with her and say that she is great, that I must continue.

On January 7, 2018, I begged my dad for a gift – a subscription to the hall. It was a modest, inexpensive fitness club, which also motivated me: I understood that there would be no show-off. At that moment, the weight was already 87 kilograms and thanks to training it decreased to 84.

The meeting that changed everything

A month later, in our company of friends, a guy appeared who did not know that I was losing weight from 120 kilograms. At one of the meetings, for no reason at all, he said: “Nagy, you are kind of plump. Look at your friend – she’s so thin. ” I sat and thought: “Well, where did you come from … Well, why?” I wanted to cry and run away, held on as best I could and decided that I would lose even more weight. But I never expected that after meeting this guy I would be so overwhelmed. I stopped eating normally, limited myself to one apple a day, abandoned the gym because I had no strength. In three weeks I lost 10 kilograms of fat and muscle tissue.

And so we meet again, he sees me in the weight of 74 kilograms, pale, with bags under my eyes, sad. Understands everything and starts to apologize. But then I said:

“You know, everything that happens to me now is because of your words. You screwed up a lot, and an apology is no longer needed. I liked you. But at that moment I didn’t like it right away. “

After the conversation, I exhaled. But the health problems were not over. One of the friends asked: “Nagy, how are you feeling?” I confessed to her: “Very bad.” And they took me by the hand to a psychotherapist.

“I was losing weight, but I lost myself”

In five years I have reached a weight of 55-58 kilograms, but now I am no longer afraid to get better. The psychotherapist helped me a lot. Thanks to him, I learned that all this time I was losing weight not for myself, not for personal happiness, but in order to be accepted by society.

I lost weight in order to wipe the nose of the offenders, so that my beloved brother would not be ashamed of me, in order to find the most handsome guy, so that everyone would admire and fill up with flowers and compliments. Yes, I did it.

I achieved it, but I lost myself. I forgot to look at my well-being, and not the number on the scales. She stopped living, but simply controlled and counted everything. If the weight was standing, she swore that I was trying badly. If the increase – it was generally a disaster.

No need to look for a “pill” for excess fat. You just need to learn to live, practice your favorite sport, make friends, travel, develop, love and fall in love. Just enjoy and not complicate everything with the thoughts “when I lose weight, then happiness will come.”

There is no “then”. There is only “now”, in which you need to feel the most beautiful, healthy and loved.