For long weeks, Hayah didn’t set foot outside her home, choosing isolation over mingling with people, a choice she was forced to make. Whenever she would even think of going out a panic attack would swiftly change her mind; remembering the mocking looks and bullying, a nightmare chasing her whenever she socialised with others.
Hayah, a pseudonym, is a thirty-years-old girl, she is but one of many suffering from bullies because of her weight. Obesity hit her when she was 13, at that time she was 89 kilograms, then over the years her weight continued to increase until reaching 250 kilograms.
She describes the kind of bullying and mockery she is subjected to as a mental domination, which people practise on her without caring or taking into consideration how their words would inflict actual psychological and social damage on her … “Isn’t what we suffer from this disease enough or do they need to deepen our tragedies through mockery?”, asked Hayah.
World Health Organization pointed out that suicide cases among children due to bullying are increasing, noting that more than 14% of students are thinking about ending their lives.
Obesity affects the heart, arteries, breathing, and liver, functions and leads to kidney failure, and may cause the patient to suffer from clots, according to Murad Allala, President of the Obesity and Obesity Surgery Society, in a media statement on a radio program.
According to the National Agency for Health and Environment Control of Products, the percentage of children suffering from obesity in Tunisia reached 21%, however, the official entity of the Ministry of Health states that the percentage rises to 50% for children from the age of ten.
Allala estimates indicate that the percentage of women suffering from severe obesity in Tunisia reaches 22%, and 15% in men.
Globally, obesity rates have increased threefold compared to 1975; since 2016, more than 650 million adults, about 13%, suffer from obesity. The percentage doubled among children during the last two decades, according to WHO in 2021.
“Society is unkind, I’m subjected to physical bullying once I go out in the street”, the thirty-years-old Hayah tells “Al-Mashaal” describing the psychological burden cast on her.
Dr. Yasmine Al-Ajili Al-Ghanai, Specialist in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, and Dr. Yousra Al-Gamli, Specialist in treating mental illnesses and disorders, both stated that bullying is a psychological disorder and addiction to violent behaviours, or an indication of unstable home, assuring that the spread of electronic games reinforces these behaviours, adding that society also exacerbates the suffering of obesity patients who are victims of bullying, leading them to depression, grief, and frustration.
Obesity patients suffer during their quest for treatment from the lack of specialist doctors in Bani Khallad local hospital.
In this regard, Iman Zain, a nurse in the same hospital, says that obesity patients' medicine is not usually available in public hospitals as they’re really special, and most drugs available in the pharmacies of these hospitals are for diabetes, hypertension, and hyperlipidaemia patients.
Hayah still remembers an incident when she cried as she was bullied, when someone groped her body while she was unaware of it, and then laughed out loudly.
Many see obesity patients as gluttonous, ignorant, lazy people, whereas Atef Ben Brahem, a Nutritionist, refutes this saying, “most obese people are victims of hormonal and chemical changes in their bodies, and they have no hand in this, their biggest problem is the nutritional ignorance widespread throughout the world.”
Hayah has high hopes in managing to lose weight, acknowledging that obesity is a disease that requires psychological therapy, then diet, then liposuction, adding “physiotherapy and exercise are the best ways, despite the physical effort they require, but in the end, we need to have the right to live in a society that respects us”.
