More than 8 in 10 overweight women suffer from “deep self loathing” because of their size, a survey has found.
The National Slimming Survey of 4,000 overweight women found that 91 per cent felt depressed and 79 per cent felt “utter despair”, while only one per cent said they were happy with their shape.
Celebrity culture and government pressure to lose weight were causing overweight people to feel victimised like never before, the survey found.
Ten per cent of respondents said they frequently felt that life was not worth living, while nearly half said they cut the size labels out of their clothes.
The survey also quizzed 1,000 men.
Some 94 per cent of those surveyed said they felt like “second class citizens” and 71 per cent said they had been “pilloried or poked fun at”.