AIBU to try to help my wife lose weight? Somehow.

Spot on but the OP ignores advice like this.

@HelpMeHelpMyWife do you actually love and desire your wife? Do you cherish her, make her feel she is attractive? Because I have a BIL who, like you, easily and quickly lost weight, and goes on about it non-stop, and who also refers to his wife as obese, and frankly, if he or you were my husband, I would feel goaded to eat cream cakes IN YOUR FACE.

Criticism is no help. Maybe if you did the shopping and cooking (There are plenty of easy recipes on the WW App) and told her, both in words and actions, how much you loved her, she might be more motivated. Currently I think she must feel that she is totally unattractive to you, so why should she bother?

Being NICE to your wife, speaking to her positively instead of negatively, had never occurred to you?

You needed a 'genius' to win the internet today by suggesting it to you? Fucking hell.

I can see why you've found this thread so frustrating and found so many of the replies unhelpful. 99% of the people replying would have just assumed that being kind and supportive towards your wife was something you'd already thought of and tried before posting for advice.

@Notsosweetcaroline I agree with so much of what you've said.

Yes to wearing a lot of black stretchy stuff! I also decided I was only sizing up because I liked my clothes loose, or because that particular item came up small. Not because I was actually that size.

You are absolutely right your brain needs to catch up both when you've gained and when you've lost. It is very easy to just not 'see' yourself. Then suddenly something snaps you out of it, maybe a photo finally getting on the scales.

The OP probably knows this because he was/is overweight and something triggered him to lose. His wife isn't there yet. He said she's 51 so probably menopausal. That is the age when I gained the 3 stone, but I did subsequently lose it. If she doesn't do it soon, her mobility problems will make it all the harder. But it's her choice.

if she her diet doesn’t seem too unreasonable and she’s more bottom heavy then it could be lipodema, which means it’s almost impossible to lose weight

She’s 51. She’s either perimenopausal or menopausal. Either way, nothing I said is inaccurate.

I don’t care what size she is. I meant for op to look so he knows. Not to come back and write it on here

she will not lose weight till she is in the mindset of wanting to lose weight - same as I wasn’t till I knew I had to for my health and daughter

my mum always had favourite saying

you can lead a horse to water. You can’t make it drink

I think some people are deluded, yet some are extremely self aware. I am very conscious of my size and sometimes visualise myself as bigger than I am. By comparison, a friend had an honest conversation with me recently. She was big and if I'm honest didnt dress for her shape, she dressed like a slim person, and seemed really happy and comfortable. I envied her, truth be told. We were similar but i gave all my mental energy to it whereas she didn't. She recently started to lose weight due to a health issue and told me that she now believes she was deluded, like a reverse of body dysmorphia, whatever that is called. She saw a healthy happy person in the mirror. She never ever felt big or felt shame or embarassment, and it was only when the health issues showed and medical advice told her to lose weight that the illusion was shattered. I think this is relatively rare, I suspect more people are like me than her.

You don’t even know how old she is. Or if she’s in the menopause or how long she’s been fat for.

A size 16 is obese for most women, you don’t need to know just how obese.

The problem I can see with your response here is that you’ve ignored what I said about women and the menopause.

Saying “yes, we all get aches and pains as we get older” is dismissive and not what I was talking about.

While yes, both sexes do get more aches and pains, and yes, losing weight would help, what I was very specific in mentioning was the effect of the menopause.

It’s really hard for many women. All of a sudden you hurt for no reason, you’re exhausted, you get brain fog, and the bloody weight just won’t shift!

Our hormone profile is very different to men. We don’t all experience the same symptoms, some struggle more than others. Historically many women would have just put it down to “getting old”, not realising the menopause can make you achey and sore.

There are plenty of women on these boards who exercise and eat well and still struggle with weight loss around the menopause. You really do need to take this into account because it’s not as simple for your wife as it is for you.

I suspect that your wife feels judged by you. Intentionally or not, your posts sound critical and judgemental. And remember, not all people diet in the same way. If I have no chocolate at all I crave it and go on a binge when I’m next able to buy it! It’s coming across very much as “my way is the only right way”. In real life, suggestions need to be framed differently - why can’t your wife join in the activities with you and DC? If you’re going to suggest anything it needs to be “I need to get fit and I can’t do it on my own” or “this would be a lovely way to spend some time together plus I need to get fit” type of thing.

It’s more to find out if she actually obese as he states in his first post or that due to op losing weight he now sees his wife as big

are we talking say size 16/18 or more like 24/26

when op was bigger he didn’t seem to go on about her weight but now he’s lost weight he wants her to

To be fair I gained a lot of weight , went from a 10 to a 16, took me about 4 years, I say 16. But it was really an 18. And I didn’t see it.i knew I’d gained bur didn’t realise how fat I was, until I got a blood pressure issue and sleep apnea and went on wli for my health. It was standing on the scales and taking a picture of my body I realised how bad it was.

i kept telling myself it was just bad pics or the ring door bell was wrong before.

now I’m back to an 8, bmi 20, fully healthy. But because it’s not like you wake up fat and were slim the day before, you find your brain does not really catch up. So although I knew deep down, I was deluded to an extent of how bad it was, and thought wearing black stretchy stuff hid it. It didn’t.

@Violese

The delusion is really damaging, and we’re all supposed to pretend fat people aren’t fat because it might hurt their feeling. See the nonsense that comes out when someone says a BMI of over 25 is fat. ‘Oh but I’m big boned’, ‘oh but I could be an Olympic weightlifter’ etc etc. People kid themselves so much, society backs them up and they end up thinking they’re not fat when they are.

I don’t think it’s about pretending people are not fat when they are, or denying the potential practical and health consequences. Although I agree that “society has lost sight of what overweight looks like, and there are plenty of people who don’t think they are overweight when then are, and plenty of others agreeing with them.

Rather than pretending people are not fat when they are, I think it’s about believing two things:

1. that losing a significant amount of weight and keeping it off is extremely difficult and requires sustained effort. Only the person concerned can make that effort, no matter how much others might urge them to do it. And urging them when they are not ready is likely to be counterproductive.

2. That if the person concerned is not losing weight, then it’s either because they don’t want to (unlikely, IMO) or that they have tried and failed so many times they are utterly demoralised and giving up hope that it can ever be possible. In that situation, when someone else says your weight is a problem how about trying to lose some, it is perfectly understandable that they feel got at rather than supported, at least I did. Especially when you put it in the broader societal view on weight (especially for women), which actually has very little to do with health, and everything to do with a woman’s duty to conform to the beauty ideal.

Why is losing a significant amount of weight and keeping it off so difficult, and why is it so easy and so common to gain excess weight. There are multiple factors, but it comes down to a mismatch between our genetics and our environment. We evolved to seek food high In fat and sugar, and to consume it whenever it was available and lay down fat. We are very good at this, though there is obviously variation in how good.

But we evolved that capacity when food was often scarce, unprocessed, and required effort to get. Whereas now food is abundant, requires minimal effort or cost, and is highly processed and highly palatable. Those last two combine to make effectively addictive for many people. A recipe for disaster, and expecting personal willpower to withstand it is unrealistic for the vast majority,

Speaking personally, I was deluded. I 'knew' I had gained a bit of weight because I had to keep sizing up my clothes. But I was in denial about how much. It was only when I'd sized up 3 times and then even that size was too tight that it triggered a realisation it was worse than I thought, and I got on the scales. I thought I'd probably gained a stone. I had gained 3 stone. Logically of course it must have been more than a stone but I avoided 'knowing' that.

Seeing that number on the scales prompted me to lose and control my weight because I didn't want to be in that situation again. That was my choice to make. There is very little anyonelse can do to help/encourage OP's wife. She has to decide for herself.

This woman is not deluded. She knows. So many people are infantalising her on this thread and yes, I would say the same of a man.

No one can make another person lose weight. It has to come from them. If they want to then they can be helped and encouraged but if they don't want to then nothing at all will make them.

OP is wasting his time if that is his aim.

She will get bigger each year. She won't change her diet and she won't attempt to lose weight any more than she has done already.

She might go for WLI as I am certain she is of the mindset that nothing works and dieting makes her miserable and WLI has probably crossed her mind.

If the only obstacle for her is the cost then that is the one thing that OP could reassure her about, if he is happy to support the cost for as many years as necessary.

Other than that, his input is done. She doesn't need another person telling her she needs to lose weight like she's an idiot who doesn't already know that.

Well said @Violese it's like the Emperor's new clothes. I think it also contributes to the sense of shame and negativity. If we were more open to speaking about it, it might be easier to lose weight.

I lost a lot about 10 years ago (sadly regained) and I found everyone was suddenly talking about exercise and clothes and food and healthy habits. It took me a while to realise that was always the case and i had been excluded from these discussions most of my life because I was overweight. People didn't want to mention their own losses or gains in front of me, or talk about food or anything that might trigger me. They weren't entirely wrong, I was sensitive, but the tip toeing is ridiculous. I have a colleague from another culture and if I said 'oh I need to lose a few lbs' she would say 'indeed you do, what's the plan?' Wheras most people would say 'oh no you are lovely as you are'.

You need to get a back-bone or nothing will change.

If your wife was alcoholic in recovery would you allow bottles of booze in the house? Or if she was a recovering drug-addict would you allow drugs in the house?

Your wife is going to weight watchers and speaking to doctors to try to lose the weight, so in fact she’s trying to be in recovery from her food addiction. So should junk food be in the house?

This is so intrusive and you have no need for this detail.

I’m less sure it’s delusion, more people want to tell themselves they carry it well it’s not noticeable, they are heavier than they look, they’ve lots of muscle etc,

im a little dismayed by some of the anger displayed on here to the op. There are multiple threads about a woman posting about her overweight husband and the responses are very much tell him, tell him he’s selfish, why should you have sex you don’t enjoy, he’s negatively impacting your family and often some insults like he’s a greedy pig,

but when it comes to an overweight woman there is outrage from some. How dare it be mentioned, she knows, how shallow are you, and some really horrible comments to the op.

You say you have no idea of her size. Check labels

height - short 5ft - average 5/7 - tall 6ft

what are you @HelpMeHelpMyWife and is she a lot shorter then you ?

till someone wants to lose weight - give up drinking - smoking etc , till they want to do it , it’s not going to happen

WW is a business Sure it does work for a few people, but if it worked long term for everyone, they'd have no business. And they're never going to suggest WLI or anything other than their own model.

You don't get it do you.

Nothing you say or do will work.

This is her life, her body, her choice.

Your choice is to live with it or leave.

The delusion is really damaging, and we’re all supposed to pretend fat people aren’t fat because it might hurt their feeling. See the nonsense that comes out when someone says a BMI of over 25 is fat. ‘Oh but I’m big boned’, ‘oh but I could be an Olympic weightlifter’ etc etc. People kid themselves so much, society backs them up and they end up thinking they’re not fat when they are. Just like how people tell trans identifying boys that they really are girls and everyone is seen to agree, and when the Supreme Court steps in with scientific fact and kicks them out of girl guides they’re distraught.

Honesty is much kinder than white lies in the long run.

OP I’d suggest you both ship together for food online. This prevents many impulsive purchases of unhealthy foods. If your wife is determined to eat themselves into a grave I’d leave her to it, divorce and find happiness elsewhere. A family member left her husband when his overeating leaving him in a wheelchair - as doctors said it would.