Husband leaving me because of 8 stone weight gain

[user1495500843]

Ive never been a slim girl in but I've put on 8 stone since I met my husband 10 years ago. About 3 years ago he told me this was a problem.he had paid for personal trainers, weight loss retreats etc but I've not maintained a steady weight loss. He now says he cannot bear it any longer. He says that I've lost him now and have done for some time. He wants a divorce. No children. I can't help thinking he is right and I have really messed up and ruined my marriage.

Goldfishjane- We were together 10 years married for 6- our anniversary is this weekend. I should also mention that in order for him to be in this country we had to get married so he could get a visa.maybe I've also had this underlying feeling he marryied me to get a visa. I really hope not.

I doubt he'd have put as much effort into trying to help you lose the weight if he only married you for a visa tbh.

He'd have gone long before this.

8 stone is a lot and anybody who tells you ''he's an arsehole" is doing you no favours.

Have you had psychotherapy? HIs leaving could be the start of you finding out why you comfort eat. You can work on becoming more secure as a single person. As a PP said, maybe now the stress of 'keeping' him has gone, a few stones might fall off.

I dunno, I know 8 stones is a lot but I still think the guy is an arsehole too.

I doubt he'd have put as much effort into trying to help you lose the weight if he only married you for a visa tbh

I agree with this, you were together a long time and it sounds like he was trying to get you to fix it and making his unhappiness clear. If he was just there for the visa he wouldn't have bothered and been oflong before now. I very much doubt your marriage was a sham, I don't think uou should be thinking this.💐

WakeUpCall when I talked about my DH weight issues, I didn't mean he ate like a kid, I meant he had childhood issues which resulted in his overeating.

His mum is most definitely a "feeder". All his family are over weight and several have type 2 diabetes. Is been difficult for him to change his attitude to eating.

Thanks changedname- not eaten a thing for days! So should be the kickstart I need.

I really appreciate everyone's advice. I'm not sure what to do next. He said he wanted to leave last night but has now gone away for few days for work. Do I not contact him? Do I just wait for him to move out? We are renting the house.

What can you say though? What is there to say even?

To clarify, in no way do I think it's the H's fault that the OP gained 8 stones. I was in an abusive relationship and I ''turned to'' shop lifting. So I do understand that behaviours are down to head stuff.

OP, have you listened to Thomas Hall 8 hour hypnosis (more like a guided meditation) he has one for over eating and you listen to them over night. I listen to the ones for motivation and last night I listened to the ''don't worry'' one. I find them really good. I have two issues that I could be worried about right now and after listening to the Thomas Hall over night ''don't worry' thing on you tube, I do feel that whatever happens I will calmly deal with it a step at a time. So they do work. Not miracles perhaps, the things I am worried about are still there, but you know, I like to take help where it comes.

I would not call anybody who wasn't attracted to somebody 8 stones overweight an arsehole (m/f)

I will risk being flamed here now when I say I eat a bit less than I would like to eat ideally and I exercise and I am a very kind, generous person but i would not be attracted to an overweight man.

Or do I fill the fridge with kale, get a gym membership, organise a counsellor and show him that I am really ready to make a change a not for him- but I've had a massive wake up call and know I need to do it for me.

You deserve better.

Don't go mad eating ''diet food'' or food that you perceive to be diet food.

A lot of people talk about their relationship with food. Think instead about your relationship with hunger. Hunger comes and goes and it's not a medical condition. It's not even that bad. I finally lost that bit of weight when I had that epiphany. more like half a stone i'll admit but still after a life time of sporadic sleb endorsed fad dieting it was that simple realisation that hunger is not something that must be avoided, that it is bearable for brief periods a couple of times a day that got me where I want to be. I really apologise if that sounds trite.

You deserve better.

Really, so you'd stand by your partner if they put on eight stone?

Thatis a massive weight gain. I used the Acid Watcher Diet by Johnathon Aviv. I lost the couple of stone I wanted to. Spoke to my GP who said she gets very cross with people saying they "cant" loose weight. Most people dont realise how much they eat. But, yes you have to want to loose it for yourself. I cannot understand the concept of "comfort eating" when I have been depressed (ex H tried to kill me) I cannot eat loose weight really quickly. I love my food, but want to be healthy. Exersise alone wont make you magially loose weight.

So onionnignt, I guessing you wouldn't stand by your partner if you were in a similar situation. I. completely understand my husbands point of view- not being as attractive, his frustrations etc. But people are more than what they weigh! Is it really that cut an dry?

You've had a personal trainer before though.

OP. Have some very un-Mumsnetty (((())))

It doesn't matter who is to 'blame' here.
Just how to help support you to a healthier place.
(I am 2.5st into a 10 st weight loss journey. No judging from me.x)
I think the best thing you can do is to work on your own self esteem.
That may be why you overate to start with. Boosting it can only help.
What can you use (apart from food) to feel good?
Is there anything? If not, you need to try to find things.
Think about who you are, who you would like to be. You CAN be her.
What do you want in your life? how can you get closer to that?
The weight will slowly shift as you feel happier.
Let your husband go, stay friends. See if he comes back - he may well do when you are happier, and you may find you are so happy you don't want him.

OP, what was your intimate life like?

Had the relationship become platonic?

That is a high expectation in my view. Granted I'm single and maybe I wouldn't be if I were more attracted to overweight men, I don't know, but just in my view it's a tall order. There's no point focusing on why he walked away now, at 8 stones overweight. It could have been two. or Ten.

The important thing is to think about why eating is a coping mechanism and can you resolve whatever it is you need to cope with, and in the mean time, find other ways to cope with it.

Again I sincerely apologise if this sounds incredibly trite when it's merrily typed by a person of normal weight.

I was kind of paralysed after a bad relationship, for years. I was in survival mode and ''achieved'' nothing and felt very ashamed of it. Only coming out of that fog now. Starting to take risks.

"maybe I've also had this underlying feeling he marryied me to get a visa."

I think this suggests you feel, on some level, that there is something not quite right with your marriage and set up. And I would also suggest that this has possibly fuelled your weight gain.

It's an odd thing, weight gain from overeating. It's often part of a wider net in your life that you are caught within, made up of lots of strands of unhealthy and unempowering habits. My personal perspective is that those habits arise out of developing a coping strategy for a life or a set of circumstances that are not optimal for the person you really are.

The thing is that you know you want to lose this weight. And that want, that desire, is a powerful tool. But you need to own it. You have to grasp the idea that you want to do this for you, not your husband or your marriage. You have to feel selfish about it.

Unfortunately, I think the situation with your husband is somehow stopping you taking ownership of this desire on the deep level you need to and stopping you from making the changes to your lifestyle that need to be made.

I'd suggest that you might find morning pages a good place to start figuring out some of this stuff. All you need to do is just free write three pages a day, filling the page with any old crap. After a few days, you'll notice that odd things start to come to the surface. It's a great way to get rid of buried emotions and sentiments.

If my husband gained 8 stone in 10 years I would not be happy with being blamed for it. At all

Absolutely. And neither would I expect him to find me attractive in the same way, I know I wouldn't if he had put on that much weight. Its' not fair to suggest that we should all feel the same about partners no matter what changes about them.

The rest is a different matter altogether, but on that point alone, he is allowed to have his own feelings.

Please wake take the initiative.
Go and contact a sollicitor. check what you are entitled to and what happens re the place you are renting (i.e. Are you on the tenancy etc...).
Protect yourself (e.g. get a bank account with your name if you only have a Joint account or are you sure all your savings are safe - not saying that he would touch any of those but if he is serious about leaving you, you also need to be serious about standing up on your two feet, on your own).
Then again, arrange some counselling for yourself to try an de make sense of what is happening there. In particular, do you want to stay in a relationship if your 'D'H is using threats to get what he wants whilst being happy to change the rules when it suits him??

ginnybaker on page 3. Your post really stood out for me. When there is an emotional connection attached to food, its incredibly difficult to change things. Its literally changing a habit thats hard wired into the brain.