AIBU to think my DH is overreacting about my eating habits?

Op I think you need to see a doctor. If your bp was high then it is likely higher if you’ve been gaining so it is likely yoire at risk of an event, they will put you on medication,

they also need to discuss the other issues with you, from fatty liver to diabetes, to heart disease, cholesterol, sleep apnea, and muscular and skeletal issues due to the strain your body will be under ie osteoarthritis.

what weight were you 2.5 years ago when your bp was last tested.

Id be pretty annoyed at the pretending you don't know how you got to nearly 20 stone when the answer is obvious.
I would also be asking why have you been lying about the secret eating and what else are you capable of lying about consistently.

I buy junk sometimes when I am out and about but I never lie about it.

I have bouts of doing this too OP, you are definitely not alone. Most of the time I have a handle on it, but when I'm not sleeping due to work commitments, or stressed with life in general I find myself reaching for something to eat when running errands or alone, I do it in secret as I don't want people to judge me for doing it.

I don't think he is overreacting as such, I think you are just flooded with disappointment in yourself and probably feel ashamed for doing it, but he needs to understand that it's not really a conscious choice that you are making, it's more of a compulsion/addiction triggered by something going on in your life.

Now he's found out, it would be a really good time to try and tackle it, figure out your triggers (mine curbs when I get more sleep, and have less pressure on me) and put practical measures in place that make it harder for you to fall back into it. Take snacks out with you to munch on in the car, like carrot sticks, or something easy to snack on, don't have money at your finger tips, put your debit card in a box in the back of the car for instance, remove payment from your phone.. that way you have to make a conscious choice to buy something and have time to talk yourself out of it.

Hopefully you'll look back and realise this is exactly what you needed to happen at this point in your life.

49.6 😲😲😲😲

That's one hell of a drip feed @LPLJS95 .

You know, you're not only hiding the extra food from your husband, you're also hiding it from yourself.

Somehow you're telling yourself that your day-to-day family meals are all healthy stuff and that these extra things you are eating in the car and the takeaways when you're alone at home, somehow "they don't count"

@LPLJS95 you need to treat this as a wakeup call. You do know, don't you, that the term for someone with a bmi above 40 is morbidly obese? You are literally putting your life at risk.

No wonder your husband is upset. You are letting him down and you are letting your children down.

You need to go to your gp TOMORROW and ask for help.

If I was your husband, my first reaction would be to be really concerned about why you feel the need to use food in the way you do and be secretive about it.
No one on here can diagnose you with an eating disorder but it’s definitely a disordered eating pattern. I’d wager you aren’t hungry at the times you’re doing this but are feeling something or need something and you’re meeting that need with food and the quick dopamine hit you get from it.
I’d advise you, with probably some
professional help, to explore those feelings or unmet needs and see what you can put in place to help you rather than eating.
There are some really unhelpful and judgemental replies to your post and I hope you can look past them and get to the root of what the problem is x

Rather selfishly, i'd also be a bit miffed that I'd denied myself in solidarity with a friend who i knew was struggling with their weight - we'd go for coffee but no cake, eating out mains but no pudding etc, only to find they'd eaten treats anyway!

No he’s not making too much of it, if anything too little.

a bmi of 50 is really life limiting, and very dangerous for your health. And to be lying to him and saying you don’t understand why yoire gaining weight and it’s upsetting you whilst knowing full well and continuing is really deceitful behaviour.

From experience, you need to start with the self-loathing that causes the eating. You can try WLI if you can afford it but don't try to do it without emotional help. Trust your husband to be kind about this and talk honestly to him about it. Feel free to PM me if you want, I avoid public fat threads on mumsnet because this place is so fatphobic it does NOT help with the feelings of shame and self-loathing, so my other piece of advice is to get off Mumsnet or at least the weightloss threads or anything that says 'fat' 'BMI' or 'healthy' in the thread title.

I absolutely see where you’re coming from, but with a BMI of 49.6 I think it goes beyond just ‘enjoying food’. Appearance should be the least of the OP’s worries, she’s a ticking time bomb for obesity related health issues.

I'm sorry to hear that, but maybe that's a first step?

@SilenceInside Sorry, that does sound awful. I just sort of assumed that if the OP is 30 and has had children in recent years, she would have been seeing medical professionals. I would have hoped they'd have better solutions, but maybe not.

That’s brilliant, it must be like a whole new lease of life

I can see his point of view and also why he feels like he does. But from what you say this is disordered eating and there’s possibly something triggering this, but there is help and support there.
If you see your GP they will I’m sure discuss your options including maybe counselling if that’s something you’d consider?
Maybe this being out in the open will be beneficial going forward? Especially if you can tell your DH what you’ve said here?

Fair enough yeah, her wording would probably be different. I just wonder if the shame is more about society's expectations of weight and how a woman 'should' look informing her actions re. hiding the wrappers. Maybe she is enjoying the food, and isn't compelled, but that is being overshadowed by her issues with weight.

I'm not arguing with you, just another viewpoint. We both have the OP's best interest at heart.

Goodness OP your BMI throws this into a different light. You have a disordered approach to eating - this isn’t like a McMuffin every now and again is it. I can see why your DH is upset, especially if you appear to be eating a regular amount and still putting on weight, but claiming you don’t know why. Gently I think you need to speak to the GP and do everything you can you stop eating in secret. What’s your blood pressure like?

You are like an alcoholic in denial and lying to your partner about it.

What would you say to someone who was drinking and then lying to their partner saying 'its all in your head, why don't you believe me' about your drinking, whilst they hid the empty bottles of wine?

Think about this - you have a problem. You need to face up to it and deal with it. The issue is the dishonesty and the gaslighting as much as your actual eating.

What are you going to do to resolve this secretive behaviour?

@user678435 why would she have seen a GP? My GP hasn't seen me in person for years and would have had no idea that I was 22st. And, even if they had, they would have only been able to refer me to the Tier 2 weight loss service which is basically an extended version of being told to eat less. Which I already knew, the issue was in consistently implementing that.

@LPLJS95 two years ago my BMI was 50. I don't know if you can afford weight loss injections, but they have been brilliant for me. Specifically Mounjaro in my case. My BMI is now 25 and I don't eat in the way you describe any more. I have the mental headspace to be in control around food and I don't feel any shame, despair, hopelessness any more in regard to my weight or eating habits.

I have to say, I would feel quite irritated by this behaviour. If someone I cared about had been complaining about their weight, and I had listened, reassured, given advice and supported them for ages, then accidentally exposed their secret eating habit, I would struggle to feel okay. I would of course feel some sympathy and wonder why they had to lie, but I would also be quite annoyed at all the emotional investment I had given to support them when they weren’t being honest.

This however would be short-lived. I would quite quickly go back to support them as long as I knew they would be honest with me from then on.

I've been replying to this thread in good faith, but if your bmi is really approaching 50, and you're 30, that puts you at nearly 20 stone (assuming you're 5'4"ish). How is it that your gp hasn't discussed this with you?

You say you don’t live on take aways and totally contradict that by listing all the take aways you have!! The first change you could make to help with the fast food you have often is eat before you go out on errands, eat before you go food shopping, pack a snack to eat on the way home from work so you don’t have to call off somewhere. I can see why your DH is upset, you complain about your weight then don’t mention anything about all the trips for take aways and junk foods you have

He must have known on some level that you were eating more than he could see you eat?