To think dh must be eating in secret at work?

[Whenaretheholidayd]

When I met dh he was a bit overweight but over the years he put on a lot of weight and he was morbidly obese. We were both eating a lot of junk food but especially dh. We'd had a baby and we were exhausted all the time.

Dh has got a big appetite but it's one of the things I do kind of love about him, we both love food and trying new things, cooking but it's the amount he eats.

A few years ago we both went on a health kick and lost loads of weight, more dh than me but we both felt great.

Dh has put it nearly all back on. But the thing is we are eating the same things. He's over 6 foot and naturally big built and eats the same as me so I can't understand why he has put all the weight back on. He hasn't gone back to how we were eating before. What he claims to eat is tiny really for a 6 foot male.

Before people jump on me, dh has got high blood pressure, high cholesterol and arthritis and is always complaining about joint pain

I also eat loads of crap in secret/ at work. Have a small bowl of porridge for breakfast and a healthy dinner. But at work I eat take away, cake, biscuits etc etc. And because I often don't tell my husband what I've eaten, even if I'm not hungry I'll eat the same dinner as him.
If I'm off work by myself I'll go to the shop and buy LOADS of chocolate etc. I've been known to eat 2 "sharing" bars of chocolate and a large box of malteasers for lunch.
I honestly believe it comes from previously being on a strict diet for ages and after stopping it I was unable to just have the odd treat and I went totally overboard with the chocolate and take aways.
Anyway I'm going to try from next week to cut out all chocolate/ sweets and take aways again. I've put on 3 stone in 6 months so I really need to.

Are the rest of his family large? Is he under a lot of stress? Is he as active as you? Is he getting good quality and quantity of sleep? How is his mental health? You say he has arthritis? Inflammation can play a big part in metabolism. All these things play into weight. Have you discussed it with him?

if he is eating in secret why does he feel the need to do this?

Thankfully the medical profession is starting to catch up with the complexity of obesity- the public need to cut the ties to the outdated philosophy of run round more ray less being the cure for all.

What’s problematic about a ham roll or a weetabix?

If he promises he's not binge eating at work, it could just be his metabolism. I'm in a similar boat. I could diet, exercise and get really fit but still look big. I have gluten and dairy intolerances so I have to check labels on everything. If I eat a tiny bit of the wrong thing - I can look like I'm really huge. It's annoying and clothes that fit the day before don't fit the very next day. What really helped was something called a Lumen, you blow into it at various times of the day and the app it monitors your metabolism. Knowing when and what to eat made such a difference to my weight. It basically hacks your metabolism so you know when your body is burning or storing fats, carbs etc

He may well be lying to himself.

We had a family member come to stay with us a few years ago and she'd recently gained a lot of weight despite only eating 800 calories a day. She was keeping a food diary for her doctor.

On the Friday I made soup as a starter for a 3 course meal.

On Saturday, we bought frozen pizzas. She said she didn't want to eat pizza due to calories etc., but would have some of the leftover soup. No problem, I heated up some of the soup and we cooked our pizzas.

DH and I both ate half a pizza and put the rest aside for lunch the next day. She then ate both leftover halves. In her food diary she wrote, Dinner: Mushroom soup.

If you'd have asked her how many calories she ate that day, she'd have said 800 and fully believed it.

It's not necessarily secret eating, he's entitled to lunch, but many of the easy options to get when you're out are very high in calories. DH was amazed to learn that his "healthy" mealdeal with sandwich and smoothie contains far more calories than many home cooked dinners.

I used to work as a sales rep - so pounded the streets, this was before pedometers were a thing but must've burned masses of calories as I did walk absolutely miles. Used to stuff myself with food all day to keep going. Then got a more office based job and found it really hard to keep the weight off. Had to really discipline to not spend money by not taking money out with me to work, I also took up swimming. Even so my base weight went up by a stone and a half.

Has your DH changed what he does at work?

How lovely of you - could she have been ill perhaps?

Not every behaviour that isn’t that healthy or that you don’t like or do has to be a ‘disorder’. We medicalise EVERYTHING now and it’s completely inappropriate. You can’t just experience a normal emotion or response to something without someone labelling you with a disorder. You can’t eat anything if you’re very slim or fat without someone completely unqualified to do so deciding you have some sort of eating disorder.

Maybe he just simply likes eating what he likes more than he cares about his weight/health and that is his choice to make.

It's not baffling, he's got a bad habit and he's embarrassed.

It seems likely but if he denies it then it may be an underlying condition and would be worth getting checked out.

It's so much harder to maintain a weight loss than to initially lose it. There's a reason most people don't manage it long term.

Weetabix, an orange, a ham roll and a normal evening meal is very little food for an adult who is over six foot tall.

I wonder if he's just really hungry and so goes binging on anything he can get his hands on.

My colleague brings in a tupperware tub of lunch his wife made and supplements it with a supermarket meal deal and a share bag of buttons.

There are several guys at my work doing the same. One must be heading for morbidly obese. He gets lots of greasy food from a snack van, chips and cheese with something deep fried washed down with full sugar coke and a pack of chocolate bars for snacks.

He has been told he is pre-diabetic and needs to lose about 6 stone so his lovely wife makes him a healthy lunch to brIng to work.

Not much you can do. If he is happy being obese, you can't change him. I wouldn't have much time to listen to him moaning about his joint pain or arthritis though. I would be all like " Well, it's really up to you to change that."

This is the sort of post where I don't understand why couples don't talk to each other.

I'd say, 'I'm very worried about your health. I'm worried at the pain you are in. I really want to help and support you. I want us to be a fit and healthy family and set a good example to our DC. I'm going to ask you a question and you don't have to answer me out loud, but answer it honestly in your own head - are you eating a lot of excess food or junk food in secret? And if you are, does it worry you? Would you like to stop? Don't tell me, tell yourself, and if you do want to chat about it, I am here and I love you.'

That avoids him denying.lying, getting angry with you. And ime, it often leads someone to open up about something they have felt ashamed of and siffered in secret.

I walk my dog in a wood near a Macdonalds and a KFC there is a secluded carpark with a big litter bin and there is often a person in the carpark there furtively eating a Macdonalds at coming home from work time.

The only people I know who eat more at work is ones that are sick of been told off like a child at home

Has he spoken to the GP about this? I wonder about CBT/ therapy. It does seem like there is an issue somewhere.

I am losing weight now (mounjaro) but I’ve never eaten any lunch at work - even when I was bigger. I certainly didn’t eat junk food in the car - that’s a really strange assumption. Fat people are not guzzling all the time! I probably had a larger portion of dinner and a bit too much wine/choc in the evening. I wasn’t inhaling doughnuts on the drive to work.

I swear I'm not a penis portions person, but that really doesn't seem enough for a 6', big-built man, especially if he's active. Maybe he's eating junk outside the house because he's hungry.

Do you think you could get him to keep a food diary, even a private one you don't see?

It might seem silly but there's a chance he doesn't realise he's doing it, or at least not to the degree that he is. When I started keeping track of what I was eating I was shocked how many calories I was consuming each day without realing it. A pack of crisps here a couple of buscuits there adds up much quicker than he might realise. Especially if he has an office culture where people offer around buscuits and it's easy to say "Oh yes please" without it even entering your brain!

Yeah I'd guess so. I used to sneak to Greggs at lunch, pub with colleagues . It's a bit shameful, he's perhaps struggling and doesn't want to tell you what's going on because then he has to stop it and well that's hard isn't it

Why do you think I haven't?

We are exercising quite a lot together. I don't tell dh what to eat but I do encourage good choice by doing the shopping and buying healthy filling food.

Dh is very aware that he needs to lose weight and like I said I don't actually see him eat a lot.

He completely denied eating anything at work

I'm not 100% clear - have you actually asked him?

I have to say that weetabix for breakfast and then a ham roll at lunch is not enough food for a large man. My father was never a particularly big man - he's 6ft but with a slim build - but breakfast for him would be something like a large bowl of mixed cereal, with at least some of that being muesli or granola, bran etc, topped with a banana and he'd usually eat at least one other piece of fruit in the morning too. At the office they had a tea lady so he had a cup of tea and a biscuit in the morning and one in the afternoon. for lunch he's always had a sandwich - but always the type that's stuffed with salad (or at home, salad on the side). And then a large meal. And he has a bit of a sweet tooth so on weekends he'd always have a couple of biscuits or a muffin or a pastry. And alcohol.

So I can't help wondering if he's snacking because he's starving. Biscuits/cakes at the office, full fat cokes or other drinks, crisps at lunch etc.

And if his breakfast and lunch are small, what is his dinner like?