'I'm guessing you want to lose the mum tum?': New mom shamed by diet company rep
One woman is speaking out after a diet company body shamed her by telling her she should think about losing her “mum tum.”
Ten months after giving birth to her daughter, Jessica McArthur was contacted by a diet company about a product they sell. The Juice Plus representative, who approached the new mom on social media, suggested she may be interested in their product due to her post-birth stomach.
“Hey hun, how are you? I noticed you have a baby and I’m guessing you want to lose the mum tum you’ve got? Would you like to hear more about our range of products at Juice Plus?” read the message.
The 23-year-old told The Sun she couldn’t believe the company was targeting moms, and said the rep is taking advantage of people who are in a vulnerable state of mind.
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“I was shocked. It makes me wonder if Juice Plus reps are targeting people who they know will be insecure and vulnerable,” said McArthur.
“I had anorexia as a teenager and I would have spent so much money on those products in a desperate attempt to lose more weight. They could have made me worse.”
She said the message was particularly unsettling because of the amount of effort she had put into accepting her body post-baby.
“When you’re a new mum, your body has already changed quite a bit anyway. It’s hard to think how badly affected some women could be by this. She called me fat,” she said.
“I’ve worked hard to get my body back after giving birth and I’m proud of it… I don’t think it’s very ethical if reps are targeting news mum specifically.”
After the rep initially claimed no offense, they later slammed the new mom in a string of expletive-laced messages.
“You could of tried it so you didn’t look like a fat c***… Enjoy being a fatty for life babes.”
McArthur still isn’t certain how the rep found her specifically, but believes the connection had everything to do with the fact she recently gave birth.
“She must have been on my Facebook to ascertain I was a parent then targeted me. It’s a bit weird — it was like she was specifically seeking out new mums by her message,” she said.
“Someone else in my area had received the same message from her and they also had a baby… I’d never spoken to her in my life and she just popped up in my message requests telling me I needed her product.”
After the incident was reported, Juice Plus launched an investigation — but claimed they couldn’t find the person in their database. McArthur says the Facebook account has since been deleted.
“The Juice Plus+ Company would like to sincerely apologize to Jessica and to anyone else who felt understandably upset by the content contained in the message from the independent representative. Having looked through our system and any internal database, we are unable to locate any representatives under the same details used by this Facebook user.”
As for McArthur, she’s not deterred by the cruel comments.
“I’m proud of my body because it brought my daughter into the world.”
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