As much as we humans are good at brightening each other’s day, we’re equally capable of ruining it. This was exemplified in a recent Reddit post by a woman named Consequence-Prize.

Four months pregnant, she had a distressing experience at Walmart when a rude and intrusive elderly lady took issue with her belly.

The lady followed her from aisle to aisle and felt entitled to make insensitive comments even though she should have kept them to herself.

From morning sickness to backache and beyond, pregnant women face a number of everyday challenges

Image credits: seventyfourimages/Envato elements (not the actual photo)

But this woman also had to endure an additional one

Image credits: lucigerma/Envato elements (not the actual photo)

Image credits: Consequence-Prize

Body-shaming is never the answer

We got in touch with the Redditor and she said she has never experienced anything like this before.

“It was a very strange interaction,” the woman told Bored Panda. “A few people noticed, but I didn’t raise my voice, so those who did went about their business.”

According to her, it’s quite common in the city she lives in to be ignored when you end up in such a situation.

“I couldn’t tell you why the lady asked such a rude question other than maybe trying to belittle me,” the Redditor said, adding that she has noticed a lot of local older women seem to love drama, gossip, and being rude to those they have deemed “bad.”

“People around here can be quite invasive and entitled,” she said.

Indeed, it’s very difficult to understand what the lady was hoping to achieve. Fat-shaming isn’t just rude; it can make a person feel ashamed, inferior, anxious, or guilty about their body. Some experts even argue that it can contribute to obesity by creating unhealthy relationships with food.

The sad part is this form of bullying isn’t exclusive to random encounters at the mall. Angela Alberga, who is an assistant professor in the Department of Health, Kinesiology, and Applied Physiology at Concordia University, believes anti-fat bias is rampant in all parts of society, including medicine.

Image credits: AllGo – An App For Plus Size People/Pexels (not the actual photo)

According to Alberga, studies show that exposure to weight bias triggers physiological and behavioral changes linked to poor metabolic health and increased weight gain. “You actually experience a form of stress,” she said. Cortisol spikes, self-control drops, and the risk of binge eating increases.

In fact, the more people are exposed to weight bias and discrimination, the more likely they are to gain additional pounds and become obese, even if they are thin to begin with.

Alberga explained that fat-shaming is also linked to depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, eating disorders, and exercise avoidance. Emerging research suggests that the severity of harm increases when people internalize weight bias and turn it on themselves.

More Americans than ever are dealing with the health consequences of obesity as rates of the disease in the United States (and other parts of the world) reach an all-time high.

Over half (52 percent) of Americans believe people with obesity are “fat-shamed” all or most of the time, and 34 percent say that they themselves or someone they know have experienced it firsthand. Among those with obesity, that number rises to 43 percent.

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Even if you have good intentions, pointing fingers and playing the blame game doesn’t help anyone. It just makes matters worse.

“The only thing I can add since a lot of people [who read my story] were trying to accuse me of being mean to [someone] with dementia is that she had no signs of mental illness,” the Redditor said. “She was dressed in a lovely outfit and had a very clean, newer car. (She was putting her groceries into her vehicle before she began to follow me.)”

Consequence-Prize asked around and said, “A few people I’m familiar with know her through their church and confirmed she has always been like that; she believes she has a right to people’s private life so she can tell them how to fix it. She is just one of those people.”

People have been very supportive of the pregnant woman

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