Wife is sad about being overweight but doesn't make any effort to change

[T92]

I am 34 (male) and have been married to my wife (32) for 3 years, together for 12. We have one child who is 6 months.

My wife has always been on the larger size. She was a size 16/18 when I met her. I found her incredibly attractive and for the first couple of years her weight wasn't an issue for either of us.

She has fluctuated up and down over the years but has steadily been gaining weight for the past few years. She is currently a size 22.

She constantly moans about her weight now and has done for years. She went to the gym before our wedding but lasted 3 weeks, she regularly does Slimming World or calorie counting but gives up after a couple of weeks. I fully support these endeavours and cook healthy, offer to go for walks with her or take the baby whilst she goes alone etc but she does very little, if any, exercise apart from walking around the supermarket. Our diet isn't outrageous but she snacks a lot and is constantly talking about food. She keeps saying she will 'start on Monday' but never does. She keeps saying that she's just had a baby which I understand but I am the one that takes him for long walks in his pram after I finish work. She has taken him once.

She is constantly asking me if I still love her and fancy her. I do and to be honest, our sex life is as good as it has ever been but there is no getting away from the fact that she is obese and unhealthy.

She came downstairs recently and said that she wanted to run a half marathon next year. I was a little sceptical having run one myself recently and told her that it was a serious undertaking for a non-runner. She got upset and said I didn't believe in her and I should be supportive. I was honest with her and said that she never sees things through. I explained her constant moaning about her weight and lifestyle is hard to listen to when she makes no effort to change.

I came downstairs the next day and apologised and said (truthfully) if she put her mind to it, she could run a half marathon and I will support her but she has to take the training seriously... that was a month ago and she has been for a couple of walks and complained about a sore back and hadn't mentioned it since, kind of proving my point.

I love my wife dearly but her lifestyle and inaction are causing me concern. I genuinely think she wants to change but feels trapped and that she has too much to do. She is a fantastic Mum but I am hands on too, I do all the housework and I will take the little man out for hours at a time on my own and she will generally spend that time sat on the sofa doomscrolling. I get she needs a break but then she complains she is unproductive and the cycle continues.

I'm appealing to the women of Mumsnet, how can I support her?

If you really want to support her then find the money for WLI, and fully support her taking them. None of this bullshit about the easy way out.

I’m 46
3 kids 14, 10, 7
biggest I was a 22 pushing 24
smallest size 12
currently 14-16
wishes to be a 12!!!!

I’ve done all sorts over the years but find slimming world works for me can’t afford MJ, but you do have to commit to the class and go! Has she got any friends to join her or would an online class suit her better? There’s online membership with groups online - only thing being they aren’t as person as so many people log on

You sound hugely supportive tho but ultimately she has got to want to help herself with this.

having a baby is a big change for your body tho and when you’re exhausted you want convenience and sugar it’s so hard.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4205264/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

Although weight regain following successful weight loss remains one of the most challenging aspects of body weight regulation, evidence for an adverse effect of weight cycling appears sparse, if it exists at all
https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/CIRCOUTCOMES.122.009348?utm_source=chatgpt.com
Despite weight regain, BWMPs reduce cardiometabolic risk factors with effects lasting at least 5 years after program end and dwindling with weight regain

You need to widen your sources.

Mounjaro is life changing. I was similar to your wife but older. In 46 and have always been overweight and yo-yoed between a size 16 and 20 occasionly a bit more. The more weight you are and the more cycling the worse you metabolism is.

I'm now a size 10/12 after starting Mounjaro and losing 5 stone
Like your wife I was always “moaning”.
My husband is super fit triathlete/swimmer and always he always said if I exercised I’d lose wait. I started swimming with him as I was feeling extremely tired and though I was “just unfit” and built up to doing 1km swim 3-5 times per week and I felt better but lost no weight at all.

My take away is that you cannot fix the underlying issues and any diet or WLI is a sticking plaster but Mounjaro is a lifesaver.

God,a man is trying to do the right thing and asks other women ,anonymously, for best ideas so he doesn't put his foot in it,and you call him despicable : good job youve not read the AIBU posts really criticising their husbands,without op's care and concern to help his wife

Yes, this is an old paper (2014), and it has a lot of limitations because of the designs of the included studies and the outcome variables that were selected. Among other issues, it does not consider the mental health aspects of weight cycling (which should be included in any health risk-benefit analysis), nor the fact that weight cycling induces profound metabolic dysfunction that reduces the ability of the person to lose weight. In the field (I work in it), it is clear that weight cycling has an overall harmful effect relative to people who do not attempt to lose weight.

Obesity is a metabolic disease. It's not a moral issue.

That does sound a bit judgy tbh and so does your other response about WLI.

I agree medication doesn’t fix the underlying issues but it is easier to keep weight off once lost (not EASY but EASIER) than to lose it. For one thing, exercise and general activity becomes much more manageable at a smaller size. And it will help her self esteem and things like back pain which in turn may reduce her reasons to comfort eat.

You say she’s on maternity pay and “if she wants to” and I realise things are tight but this should be a joint expense as it is for her health - her losing weight will benefit you too and the baby. Will it be affordable- not just for her but between the two of you - when she returns to work?

I’m sure you’d rather she lost weight without them, I’m sure she would too, but it hasn’t happened and she’s going the other way. At size 22 the health implications of her weight far outweigh any health implications of Mounjaro.

Also as a pp says, the way you lose weight with Mounjaro IS by eating less and more healthily, it’s not a magic pill that lets you eat loads but lose weight anyway. It just makes it a hell of a lot easier to eat less because you don’t want to.

Nice appeal to authority but working in the field could be literally anything.
Here is a more recent paper
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/landia/article/PIIS2213-8587%2826%2900037-9/abstract?utm_source=chatgpt.com

I know obesity isn't a moral issue. I was obese for 16 years until mounjaro. I lost and gained the same stone many times. If I had never tried to lose weight I would have steadily gained and done much greater harm to my body. HAES rhetoric is harmful. I know several women who stopped trying to lose weight when they started following the bopo movement and instead of remaining fairly static or gaining very slowly they all gained a LOT as they mentally took the brakes off. It's so destructive.

I am a lab researcher. I can't access the fulltext of that paper at home, do you have it? But even though it's published in The Lancet, I am cautious, because working in this field shows it has a massive problem in that it is hugely politicised and full of white-hat bias. Much of it is driven by the "obesity is a moral failing" mentality that one sees on this thread and the fact that standard weight loss approaches simply do NOT work in the long term (as you experienced). The advent of WLIs has been a complete game changer, and the field and social mentality have yet to catch up.

That's neither supportive, nor true. Do you not have enough joint income to support her having mounjaro, or are you simply saying she'll have to pay for it herself and is on a low income due to mat leave? If it's the latter, you are financially abusive.

Agree- 100%. Mounjaro is life changing. There's some right nonsense out there from people who are scare mongering.

It's not normal to do all the housework etc when you work FT and your partner is at home. I appreciate that she looks after the baby during the day but babies sleep a lot. It sounds as though the OP is doing far more than his fair share and is trying to be supportive to his wife.

Do you work OP??
You do too much she sounds lazy! She’s going to be fat if sat on her backside on her phone all day and you’re doing everything in the house. Has she always been like this?

I have struggled with my weight the last few years OP. I have lost two stone over the last year or so and what I did to help with this was:

1. start going to gym again at least twice a week, and upping walking etc
2. would have high protein with salad or veg for main meals
3. protein shake and fruit for brekfast
4. started getting my hair done and brought some new clothes to give myself the sense of investing time in me.

im still overweight but feel like a whole new woman already. Bascially free up as much time as possible for her to exercise and have time for herself out of the home, buy in lots of high protein foods and fruit/veg. Go for walks together.

If they can’t afford it , then they can’t afford it. What do you expect him to do? There aren’t many magic money trees. 🙄

Look up metabolic dysfunction and insulin resistance.

I completely agree!!

MN drives me mad sometimes!
Most have no idea what it’s like to literally not be able to afford something.
One person said the wife should buy one less family sized cheesecake a day - like fat people just sit there eating massive cheesecakes every day. So offensive.

The wife is a competent adult who if she wanted to and could afford WLIs, then she can make that decision for herself.
It’s not for OP to encourage her to use a long term medication, that can make long term weight loss more difficult and can have side effects, and so I don’t know why posters keep banging on about it.

She also has a 6 month old so chances are she’s BF - I’ve not seen one person who are pushing the WLIs ask this, in which case she can’t use them.

WLI’s also reduce your appetite and can have side effects such as nausea, stomach upset, hair loss etc - I’m not sure someone 6 months postpartum should be messing about with their body like that.

I’d be focusing on eating good whole foods, getting enough sleep and walking/getting fresh air.
Once she stops BF or her body has recovered fully, then she can research it herself.

Ultimately she needs to take more responsibility for her own health and it’s not fair posters are blaming OP or trying to guilt him into buying something that they can’t afford or the wife can’t or doesn’t want to take.

'She also has a 6 month old so chances are she’s BF'

She isn't.

Funny how before WLIs no one worried about the long term implications of obesity.

Has she been checked for pre diabetes or even type 2 diabetes OP? Pregnancy can bring it on I believe. If she has it, her appetite hormones could be all over the shop.

This wasn't my post but I just wanted to add that this is exactly what i was told at weight loss clinic by nutritionists who specialise in obesity. I was told the body feels the relief of the weight loss in terms of easing of weight on the joints and circulation improvement etc. It makes sense to me, if you spend one quarter of your adult life at a manageable weight it's got to be better that no time.

There is an argument that weight loss includes muscle loss and weight gain rarely includes muscle gain and I can see how that's an argument for not weight cycling but it's also terribly defeatist to say that there is no point trying to lose weight because of that. The terrible harms that HAES proponents suggest are caused by weight cycling are not evidence based and the difficulty in maintaining weight loss isassively overstated. Even if you regain 50% of weight loss it's still a net positive.

I'd see if she can get her iron levels checked. They are very often low after having a baby and low iron can cause difficulties resisting impulses around food, weight gain and low energy / low motivation.. You want ferritin of at least 100 and transferrin of at least 20%.

I completely disagree with you and your closed-mindness. He's asking for advice to not upset her, clearly in a difficult situation.

Hes online to shame his wife

Its you who is being closed minded. Wise up.