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?

Your wife has always been bigger (16-18 is bigger than average , 22 is likely obese )

She starts excercise regimes and gives up.
Running a half marathon is a nice goal but as you say a pipe dream.
Having a baby hasn't helped her weight but isn't the cause .

She must know , she has eyes and mirror even if she never sets foot on the scales . Buying larger clothes for a start ,

She's at risk of Diabetes , Heart Disease, high cholesterol levels , OsteoArthritis in hips ,knees,spine .
Her feet are doing a lot more work .

WL jabs seem to be hailed as a miracle but apart from the cost there are side effects .
You can support her , and you are doing . You cannot do it for her . She needs to see her GP

At the moment you have a lot going on with a new baby , she will be feeling knackered and invisible .

I am losing my post menopause weight (not with WL jabs ) I am determined not to carry it to my grave .

Are you sure you can’t afford mounjaro? Your comment about her being on maternity pay seems to be suggesting that she would have to cover 100% of the cost herself, rather than treating household income as shared….

it’s really life changing and incredible for so many people with weight issues

Most couples have income as joint money .
So if the OP is working FT and the OPs wife is on MatPay ......well you do the maths

I'm not sure why you think I said it was easy?

Don’t be daft, many have separate incomes. And as he’s thr majority earner don’t you think his putting it down is not going to have her not do it.

there was nothing supportive about his reaction. A supportive reaction would be let’s educate ourselves together and make a plan, maybe for when you go back to work and I will ensure you habe sufficient money, even if I have to cut back.

Oh yeah really shocking. I've never seen a post on MN where someone speaks negatively about their partner before....

Sounds like she has disordered eating and is depressed. I think the reason you're not seeing results from support or any intrinsic motivation is because disordered eating and depression don't really work like that.

So, her BMI is over 40 and this should mean that she's eligible for WLI and support on the NHS. She needs to go to the doctors and, if possible, you need to go with her. Chances are that she does have something like sleep apnoea or other 'qualifying' conditions. In any case, they can refer her to a supportive programme. If she can't manage that, then there's a compliance issue and they will need to make other referrals for that.

As it happens, my BiL (who's quite a bit older than your wife) was overweight for years and it was killing him. He's always been an eater. He got WLI through the NHS and, for the first time ever, started to exercise - began with walking short distances, then built on that, and he's just run the London Marathon (full).

It is hard supporting someone who basically has a psychiatric condition. It's not a choice they're making. I know this because I suffered from disordered eating and was anorexic for years. My DH couldn't help except by helping to source the things that I needed to help myself.

Ah, but this is a man, complaining about a woman! Disgraceful! Women complaining about men is absolutely fine.

Exercise is good for mental health, toning the body, and gaining strength, improving balance, etc. However you have to do an awful lot of exercise to loose any weight! The best way to lose weight is to reduce calorie intake. Can you help her prepare healthy snacks? Go shopping together and discourage unhealthy or too many snacks? Can you sit down and plan the whole food shop together planning both meals and snacks?

It’s easy to put weight on but very difficult to lose it (as people know) especially if motivation isn’t great or you have a baby. It’s easier to complain about it. She’s clearly unhappy about it and probably has been since before you met. Her hormones will be all over the place too if your baby is only six months old. You can support her, but only she can make it happen.

The practical things you can do:

Weight loss injections. Tell her you’ll pay.

Gym membership/yoga studio/ whatever exercise she fancies. Again you’ll pay and look after the kids when she is there.

Tell her (and show her) you love and fancy her- nice flowers. Meals out at healthy places (sushi?).

Fantastic post! OP please listen to this and take heed!

There's nothing supportive about any of your comments AT ALL. So why don't you just go to another thread youl find more palatable. What's the point of even commenting if you're not going to say anything helpful or of relevance. You're just wasting your time, the ops and everyone else who is subjected to reading it whilst you derail the thread and make it all about you.

That’s a rather one-sided post, don’t you think?

If your wife has always been on the larger side she is unlikely to be able to maintain a healthy weight through lifestyle and willpower alone. That's just a fact. Obesity is a chronic disease for most of us; once we have become obese the body fights to maintain it's weight. I'd suggest MJ is worth trying with a view to to a long term maintenance dose if it suits her. We dont take people off blood pressure meds or diabetes meds because they're stable with normal results, do we? MJ is a huge opportunity to change her lifestyle for the better and you both need to stop thinking she just needs to 'try harder' with weight loss. If you both think of it as chronic disease management using the most effective tools available she's likely to get better results. Once she's lighter it will be so much easier for het to be active, with and without the baby.

The simple answer is you can't do anything (other than stop putting her down).

You can support your wife to be who she is, but who she is depends on her, not you.

I take on all the housework, all the life admin, and all the unseen stuff she probably doesn't even realise and do as much as I can with our son and I do it with a smile because I love her and she deserves the world.

This is largely irrelevant because it's what most of us do all the time. It's called normal life and it would only be relevant to the advice offered here if you weren't doing those things.

I think Mounjaro would be perfect for her. I know you said it wouldn’t address the underlying issues, but sometimes the reason people can’t motivate themselves to do things, is because the task is simply too big, and it becomes overwhelming. With Mounjaro, people become motivated as they see the weight reducing. It drives them to continue, and then they become even more motivated as they see all the things they can now do eg running a half marathon.

Do all the housework do you, aye.

No it isnt 😄

She is happy in general, shes had 3 kids

When she wants to get on the mounjaro she will - until then she needs love

The husband isnt concerned about her - hes annoyed that shes gained weight and doesnt do enough for his liking

Its a classic mn man shaming his wife online thread

This is a female safe space

Coming to women to shame your wife for not exercising enough is particularly wrong

I totally relate to your partner OP, I'm not as heavy but very unmotivated and constantly hate myself for my weight. It's incredibly difficult to understand even for me. Negative feelings make me want to eat, a weight gain makes me depressed which triggers the overeating and so on. The most important thing for her now is success in one way or another. I spent a lot of money on CBT and a weight loss clinic and it's the only reason I'm ok now. Exercise is a tiny element of it, the biggest issue is food. Whats more important is her mental mindset. Talking about running a half marathon and then 'failing' is going to make this worse. Aiming for a brisk 30 minute walk 3 times a week is achievable. At her weight exercise is really hard so long sessions aren't going to work. A goal of eating a certain amount of protein a day would help, smaller portion of carbs. Eating little and often and having protein before hunger and cravings set in.

I think she needs an expert to be honest, a weight loss clinic or therapy. Then WLIs. Think of the long term savings in snack foods and the massive health benefits and weigh it against the cost.

It sounds as if she has just put any real efforts on hold because although you can't afford WLIs atm, she knows it's out there and it can help her eventually.

FWIW I think you were right about the half marathon. She isn't going to manage do that and she would just be setting herself and u realistic target which she will fail to reach. Running when you are overweight can result in different problems elsewhere with joints and so on.

While exercise is good, the best way to lose weight is through diet in any case.

Im afraid that although you are the person who is in the best place to help and support her, you are also the person whose advice she is most likely to be irritated by. She needs to find a weight loss group or club.

Running around after 3 kids all day, whilst on mat leave, not even as a sahm, she deserves to rest when she can!

Good for the op, taking the youngest on a walk every day after work - can the wife live and have a bloody rest

I can understand where both you and your wife are coming from OP.

It is really easy to snack, eating tasty food is fun, you get a immediate reward for opening that bag of crisps, unhealthy choices are all around you every day, it's so so easy to give in and really hard to stop.

On the other hand the complaining I would have no truck with, nor the unrealistic goals like the half marathon. It's almost like saying these things absolves her from doing the hard work to lose weight.

It is hard and you say no to things a lot and you're logging things on an app every day and calculating how many calories you've used exercising and you have to continue with this for months!

But you have to be in the right mindset to do it. If you're not, it doesn't work. From what I understand WLI help with that as they help to turn off the food noise. If she's not battling with her head that's half the effort gone, the rest is admin really.

I hope you two can work it out together.

You sound very supportive @T92 Don't listen to the posters putting you down. Many women on MN really hate men and don't think they can do anything right.

I have struggled with my weight all my life and my DH is tall and slim. He is always very supportive of me but he now knows, as do I, that there is little he can do except listen to me and support whatever I want to try. Just keep supporting her and loving her without any criticism. (Which I know from experience can be hard).

Odd comment but I do, aye.

Cleaning
Laundry
Cooking
Baby bottles
Car maintenance
Garden maintenance
DIY

Wife looks after baby and I look after her and the house the best I can