Can I have some advice how to deal with overweight Dh

[Bathtimebabies]

I feel horrible for writing this but I need some help on how to drum home how important it is for dh to lose weight.

I love him dearly and would never leave him but I don’t find him sexually attractive anymore because of his weight.

He is actually really attractive but he is so bloated now his face doesn’t even look like the man I met.

He is a big guy, 6,2 and was never slim but muscular. He’s gotten to 20 stone now from 15 when I met him.

He is just greedy. Over eats. If he is happy - wants a take away, sad - wants a take away, Friday Saturday Sunday - wants a take away.

The GP has told him to lose weight. He loses about 7lbs in a week if he finally can be arsed to eat healthy but then the next week puts it back on and more. Said the scales were broke.

I’ve told him sex feels awkward and uncomfortable for me. His belly is like a nine months pregnant woman’s . We’ve not had sex in three months because of it.

If I don’t cook his food or take his lunch to work he is at the shop buying shit. His weight/diet is not my responsibility and he won’t take ownership of it.

He finds ways of being able to eat out by constantly arranging meals out for work colleagues or friends. His clothes are really tight and tbh I’m sick of buying bigger and bigger clothes whilst he has piles and piles of clothes in his wardrobe.

He pays a gym membership that he never goes to, I’ve told him to cancel it but he won’t as he is ‘always going to go after work’ but never does.

I’ve had three children and managed to keep myself healthy. Why the fuck shouldn’t he? Why does he think it’s ok to do this to yourself?

I feel like I’m really going to snap on him and say something horrible which I really don’t want to but need to say something as this is my red line.

I’m only 40 and don’t want to live with no passion or sex for the rest of my life. How can I put this in to words that won’t upset him.

Thanks

I agree that he may well choose the food over you.

Just as an alcoholic chooses the booze over their loved ones.

It is a vile disease

"If he sticks to slimming world he'll soon lose weight. I am on slimming world and really enjoy it."

Agh, this sort of simplistic comment is infuriating. Oh wowsers I bet OP had never thought of that! Because...

"I’ll tell you now, the overweight one needs to be in the right headspace and no matter what you say, if they aren’t, it doesn’t matter what you say, it won’t help. I know that’s deeply unhelpful, sorry, but that’s the way it is."

...is spot on. Fat people know they're fat. We see it and feel it every day. When you are obese and have stones to lose, it is sometimes overwhelming to know how or where to start, so what's the fucking point? A fattie needs to find their trigger to deal with it, not just "oh pop along to Slimming fucking World and everything will be dandy!"

A separate comment in this thread has genuinely set my mindset back by miles actually (I won't say which one) and I have had it sitting in my brain since pp wrote it, and I am very much back in a "whats the fucking point?" trough again because of it.

I really feel for OP - she can't do this for him, but at the same time, she is suffering because of it.

I'm in a similar situation. I really despair. My DHs go to is always food. It's so connected to his emotions too.

I have got really angry in the past but I'm trying to be more relaxed about it.

Currently stress seems to be a major contributor so he's reviewing his career choice which I'm hoping will help.

I'm just so scared he will die and leave our DC fatherless

... so no advice. Just moral support!

Morning all. Thanks for the advice and suggestions there are a few things I’m going to suggest to dh. I think one of the main issues are he doesn’t or won’t correlate the amount of calories you eat = weight gain. He did go gym yesterday (sent me a pick of him on the runner red faced) but then told me he had had his crumpets also . I told him you can’t out run a bad diet but he came back with ‘but I’m a 20 stone man! The dinner you brought up was tiny’

I’m going to see if we can both follow a calorie app that he can link your to exercise calorie expenditure and calories eaten. Even just to see what’s actually going in his gob. But it will allow him to choose food and take responsibility as frankly I’m fed up with taking his dinner up. I shouldn’t have to do it.

I will say though his eating exploded about three years ago through really bad stress with setting up a new business. And now we have more money a shit load of it is going on eating out and take seats over the weekend. For example if we went for a meal he would let me order a starter then order a main meal on the proviso that we would share it as a starter and also a main meal for his dinner - but I wouldn’t eat any of his starter so he would end up with two main meals. This actually causes arguments when we go out because he gets giddy and literally wants the table food of food while he is sweating working his way though it. Not anymore.

We’ve got a couple of holidays this summer so I’m going to use that excuse to do it with him so we can both trim up. Although I only have 9lbs to lose till I’m pre kid weight.

I’m going to swim with him twice a week and he says he’s looking forward to it. But we will see when we get to those days!

I can understand people wanting to do bariatric surgery for themselves but honestly how would you feel if some one asked to to go for surgery and permanently cut of sections of your stomach? I would never ask my dh to do that.

Thanks for all the non judgey comments and advice I thought I was going to get flamed but you’ve been great. I’m going to wait till after we have done our first swim session, tell him I’m proud and I will be but that now is the time his weight comes off because it’s killing our sex knife.

Thank you all

I’m going to see if we can both follow a calorie app that he can link your to exercise calorie expenditure and calories eaten. Even just to see what’s actually going in his gob. But it will allow him to choose food and take responsibility

MyFitnessPal is what you want. You put all your data in and then log all food and exercise. You can mostly scan barcodes or search for stuff - you rarely need to manually input anything anymore. It's brilliant.

Exactly @DaphneBucket it's an awful conversation to have and God knows I'd put it off time and time again if I needed to say this to me DH. However sometimes we NEED to be told things.

Yes, a fat person knows they're fat but when people say 'they need to want to lose weight for themselves' what if they just won't do anything about it? You can't keep drifting along while that person gets fatter and the partner gets more and more upset, frustrated, annoyed...

The fact is that any change will have to come from him. Nagging him, or taking control of his eating, or whatever is pointless.

I say that as a man/husband/dad who has problems with weight and eating. I’m getting on top of it now, and am almost 4 stone down. But that has come from internal motivation and determination. No one could make me do it except me. But I know that I could just as easily put the weight back on.

Over-eating and obesity is like an addiction. But it is also a choice. A constant choice he is making to NOT address it.

Sorry, not much good advice to give. If he doesn’t want to fix it then THAT IS HIS CHOICE. So you’ll just have to decide what action you want to take around it.

SW and similar are shit diets with a calorie intake set far too low. He's right, he's a 20 stone man and he needs enough calories to function while losing weight.

What he needs to do is look up a TDEE calculator which will give him an estimate of what calories his body needs to function and then reduce these by around 200 calls a day .
His wright loss will be slow on this but he will be able to stick to it.

Calories are king. Syns and points are made up bollocks.

Ask yourself why SW brand sausages are zero syns while lower calorie ones have x number of syns each.

Calories count and nothing else dies.

But OP, size doesn't matter, you should love him for who he is, not what he looks like.

lilmiss Are you being sarcastic?

Baptiste

Yes, yes I am. However that is exactly what women say to men when they complain that their wife has put on weight, so there are some double standards at work.

You say he went to the doctor's in 2010 and was given the all clear - that was 10 YEARS AGO!! I'd encourage him to go and get a health MOT, because from what you've said he's on course for Type 2 diabetes at present. And going to the gym together twice a week will make fuck all difference if he doesn't dump his takeaway habit. There's a programme on next week actually about how damaging takeaways are for you - perhaps you should sit and watch it with him? The Truth about Takeaways BBC1 8pm on Thurs 27th Feb.

Yes, yes I am. However that is exactly what women say to men when they complain that their wife has put on weight, so there are some double standards at work.

Yes, when I posted about my situation some am time ago, this was the reaction I expected.

I feel irritated though, that I’m the one who has been pregnant 5 times, I’ve had several complex births, breastfeed several babies etc etc and I weigh the same as I did before hand and don’t look that different either. My DH hasn’t had any of that medical complexity, he is overweight simply because he overeats, not because his body has been ravaged by childbirth/breastfeeding.

zaf he went to the Gp recently and they gave him the all clear - the GP referenced his weight back in 2010 to compare it to now. Maybe I worded wrong.

Buzz that’s the one I’m thinking off as it should link up to my Fitbit

french I know what you mean about leaving the kids fatherless and I have said this before.

fedup same here.

@lilmishap that's why I posted above, from another perspective.

A separate comment in this thread has genuinely set my mindset back by miles actually (I won't say which one) and I have had it sitting in my brain since pp wrote it, and I am very much back in a "whats the fucking point?" trough again because of it.

God, I hope that wasn’t my comment about the sex life

No, fedup, not you.

Although I did find some rather awkward similarities to my own sex/body issues with my ex in it (which is just me being honest and no reflection on you)

If i thought my female partner didnt find sexual contact with me because of my weight id be pretty devastated. If that hasnt motivated him to act then i am not sure what will. I think we all have a duty to look after our minds and bodies as much as we can. Complacency can creep up on you and one day,well its all over. The answer to losing weight is of course to manage what you eat .

@BuzzShitbagBobbly I’m glad it wasn’t what I said. I am struggling to know where to go with this discussion with DH though without it descending into an personal attack on him or a complete character assassination.

There is a programme on the BBC the truth about fat, watching how a Doctor about 3 stone over weight had a body mri. Her organs were encased in fat. It was a real eye opener how fat good and bad automatically enter the blood stream. It talked of emotional eating and ways to combat it.

"Yes, a fat person knows they're fat but when people say 'they need to want to lose weight for themselves' what if they just won't do anything about it? You can't keep drifting along while that person gets fatter and the partner gets more and more upset, frustrated, annoyed.."

What's the advice MN usually gives for any other undesirable behaviour that a partner refuses to change?

It’s actually really affecting me now which I didn’t really realise until I sat down and thought about it.

Not only is sex disappointing meaning I don’t want to do it (which is sad because I like sex very much), but the way he looks (food covered, stomach hanging out, trousers hanging low around his arse) and for at care (or is even angry if I point it out) means I have lost respect for him. Because he looks like that, I’m embarrassed and don’t want to go out with and socialise with (even particularly be seen with) him so our social life is affected.

I feel very low and sad at the moment. When I’m in bed and can hear him making cereal and toast every night (whilst blaming me for him not losing weight as I organise the odd takeaway with friends which apparently causes his massive setbacks)-it is very difficult not to get angry with him as it’s not just about him now-it’s about everything.

That’s without the health factor (and his v overweight brother dying young of a heart attack recently) and him possibly leaving me to either bring up our fatherless kids alone if he dies, or the prospect of nursing an aging, obese man who is likely to be riddled with weight-related health issues.

I have got to speak to him about it before I go crazy. Not being able to talk to any of my friends about it (out of embarrassment) doesn’t help either. Problems are always worse when they spiral and ricochet around your mind.

Fedup would you write him a letter and say what you’ve just put? Maybe if you don’t even give it to him you could get your thoughts out your head.

Do you think your at a point where you want to leave? Sorry to hear your feeling shit today

Yes, that’s a good idea actually-maybe that will help me structure it diplomatically rather than all spewing out in a ‘your fat is ruining my life!’ kind of selfish diatribe!

Thank you for posting this-it’s reassuring to know I’m not alone.

Can I ask where your DH’s clothes (especially jeans) come from that fit a large stomach and don’t just fall down .