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?

Nope, your standards for this woman are on the floor, girl.

What don't you understand about they can't afford it? It doesn't pay for itself at all and it does nothing to change a person's lifestyle so you either keep on paying for it or you come off it once you've lost weight and then pile it all back on.

She’s got a 6 month old baby. My weight has only just started to shift and my baby has just turned 3!

For allowing a mum to have a rest when her husband gets home

I dont think so

Shes a bigger woman who has gone up a couple of sizes after having the baby - like most women do

The follow up posts dont make it seem like her health is the main concern, it seems like the op wants to complain about her being lazy 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

It will fix it. You said she is always talking about food and not being able to stick to it. Mounjaro literally stops the food noise so that you don’t think about the food.

it won’t make her lose weight, but it will make it easier for her to stick to a diet because she won’t have cravings in the same way.

encourage her to look at the Mounjaro starting xxx pages. She wouldn’t get it in time for a May start date but nothing stopping her joining us on that thread anyway, we can offer her some support.

People who don’t struggle to loose weight can never truly appreciate the struggles of those who do. Its not just a case of eat less and move more because while of course that works, for many it is almost impossible to stick to.

For many years I lost 10lb and gained 12. Repeatedly. Food noise is real but I hadn’t heard of it until 2 years ago. I though I was going mad when my brain was going ‘what can I have, I want something sweet, I want something savoury.’ I would find myself looking in the cupboard or fridge, walk away and the a few minutes later be back. I didn’t eat a packet of biscuits in one go or anything like that but I grazed. The only difference whether it was healthier food or junk.

I started mounjaro in October 2024 and it took me about 15 months to loose 4 stone. Then 5 month to loose another 7lb. I have gone from a size 22 to a size 16. I have just over a stone to go to get to a healthy weight. I have been plateauing and recently switched to wegovy due to cost. Being on WLI has been life changing for me. I feel so much better for having lost the weight.

Is she getting a full nights sleep every night?!
Because that’s the thing that’s made the difference to me and my little one has only just started sleeping through at 3!

This shows you have a lack of understanding of what Mounjaro is.

Weight loss injections don’t magically turn calories into thin air, or melt away body fat. They suppress your appetite to help you eat in a calorie deficit. If you continue to eat in a calorie surplus you’ll still gain weight, even if you’re taking the injections. Therefore the injections are a tool to help you lead a healthy lifestyle. Much like the points system with WeightWatchers or a meal plan created for you by a dietician. They’re just tools, but the hard work still comes from you and you lose fat the same way.

Yes there are ‘horror stories’, but there are also horror stories about Slimming World causing people to develop eating disorders, and ultra low calorie diets such as Cambridge giving people gallstones. These injections have been used and researched for a long time and, whilst there are side effects, you have to weigh up whether they are better or worse than the side effects of obesity.

There are no medals or prizes for loosing weight without any tools to help you, because if you lose the weight then that’s all that matters surely?

Being supportive would mean sharing your concerns if asked but supporting whatever she decides is the best approach for her, not insisting she loses weight but then policing how she does it and shaming her for using WLIs.

Wow there are some horrible rude women on here give youre heads a shake have you got hubby's who do absolutely nothing for you so you can't bring yourself to help this man who actually wants to help his wife feel better about herself.
You sound like a good supportive kind honest hubby to youre wife.
Have you tried the walk boards at home I have one there great .. she has to want to lose weight like really want it patience thinking long term it really is a mindset x

Food and snacks are expensive. Especially if eating on the go, takeaways, eating out, it all adds up and levels out in my personal experience.
What don't YOU understand? Do you think food and snacks and slimming world etc come free?

A clothes size is not an indicator of health...smaller people suffer all the same health challenges/ ill health issues.. larger people just have stigma added.
***
The solution is pretty basic here find movement that your wife enjoys and support her time to do it, eat plenty of fruit and veg. 95% of intentional weight loss fails and leads to larger gains. Focusing on that is unhelpful.

People vary in size and body shape.

Moving and eating healthy foods like fruit and vegetables etc etc is the way ..improving physical and mental health.

Fight weight stigma and avoid weight cycling...proven harms

Obesity significantly raises the risk of multiple serious health conditions. Please don't try to claim it doesn't, that's unscientific ideological nonsense.
95% of weight loss does not fail. That is a misinterpretation of a bad study.
Weight cycling is also not demonstrably bad for the body. It's better to try to lose weight and cycle through the same stone losing and gaining than not to try to lose weight and gain subsequent stones without losing any weight in between.

I am a few years older than your wife, but can completely understand what she is going through. I have had disordered eating since I was 15 and have been diagnosed with BED. I imagine my case might be more extreme than your wife’s, but the psychology behind it might be similar.

In my case, it started with losing a healthy bit of weight with weight watchers when I was a teenager, getting lots of compliments and then thinking “hmmm what if I restricted my calories even more, I’ll lose even more weight and I then get even more compliments”.
Before you know it, you’re restricting yourself so much that you start fantasising about food and eventually give in and binge.
You say to yourself that you’ll start again on Monday and diet even harder to make up for your binge.
You start the diet again, restrict yourself too much, binge and then say you’ll start again on Monday. Thus, the cycle begins and is really hard to break.
Your weight goes up and down, you feel amazing when you are losing weight and everyone tells you how great you look, then inevitably you cannot keep up with the diet and so you put your weight back on, often putting on more than you started with. You know that people can see that you’ve put failed and put weight back on, so you get down about it and feel even less motivated and don’t want to go out.
If you restrict your calories too much, your body will fight against your willpower to make you eat, to survive, and your body will win.
Diets never actually work in the long term, the diet industry is only there to make money.
Eventually you get so despondent with the whole thing and lose hope. You come up with these great ideas to motivate yourself and lose weight, but when it comes round to doing it, you can’t.

I have previously had partners who have encouraged me to lose weight, which only exacerbates the situation.
The guy I am with now handles it perfectly, he assures me that I am amazing at whatever weight I am and puts no pressure on me and is well aware of my disordered eating history. He never comments when I gain or lose weight. This gives me the headspace to work on myself and, ironically, makes it easier for me to get a handle on my eating.

All of this is a roundabout way of saying that diets and big intentions don’t work. The only thing that will break the cycle and work long term is small, manageable changes. There is no point in her making any change that she cannot sustain for the rest of her life.
I also stopped weighing myself and scrutinising calories too much as this can lead to an obsession, but that’s a personal preference.
Eat sensibly in a small calorie deficit, don’t never deny any food but eat in moderation, walk about more. That’s all it takes. It honestly will get easier the longer she does it, the hard part is starting.

I don’t know if this was the advice you were looking for, but I hope something in there might help.
I read a fantastic book which helped give me some insight into why my diets never worked and helped me to try and break the cycle - ‘You Are Not a Before Picture’ by Alex Light.

I can’t comment on weight loss injections as I haven’t used them but they will be pointless if she doesn’t also create permanent, healthy changes whilst on them.

We will have to disagree. The studies I read make clear that weight cycling causes harm as does weight stigma. Fat people have the same illnesses as thin people but are treat through prejudice and treated later.
The good news is that they do not die as prejudice demands...they confound the stigma and live longer with the same conditions than smaller bodies. No matter the hate that is pressed on them.

What do you mean it does nothing to change a person's lifestyle? What an ignorant comment.

🤣 HAES propaganda nonsense. What studies? You mean you've watched tiktoks and YouTubes of fat people saying this and it suits your worldview so you accept it to be true!

In place of the jabs, she could try a Berberine supplement - it works in a similar way to the jabs but is more natural which of course means it’s not as effective as the drugs but should slowly help if she tried it long-term.

and tell her to eat as much protein as she can too

She sounds like a perfect candidate for weight lifting as jabs. She's self-medicating and dopamine seeking with food and junk. Mounjaro will stop that, she will lose weight and be much better able to exercise
Can't believe neither of you haven't already thought about it

She's only took the baby out for a walk once in his 6 months of life? That's what stuck out to me

To me you sound lovely and genuinely concerned not judgemental but SHE needs to be the one to take action.
I’m also fat and sugar addicted so I sympathise. But I’m 47 and it’s so much harder to shift the pounds. Through near-daily short walks and Pilates I’ve lost over a stone in about 6 months though so I think anything she does consistently will help.
I use an app for the Pilates/indoor walking routine (for when I don’t have time for outdoor walking). That might work for her? I wish her luck, and you, as it’s so sensitive a topic to bring up.

Mounjaro would actually save you more money than you spend . I saved more on food bills - honestly . I would encourage her to go for a walk together - romance , time
together. Tell her you love her and will always do but will support healthy living if that is what she wants. It will only happen when she actually wants to do it though. Well done for support and sensitivity .

The risks - which are surprisingly few - need to be balanced against the enormous benefits. That balance estimation should be done with a medical professional.

Discuss with her if any of the following would help.

A running buggy - for sole /joint walks
Joint long walks - discover new areas, trips out , geo caching, treasure trails
A Bike and a baby trailer
A regular Mother and Baby Exercise Class
An at home workout plan - loads on instagram
A gym membership. You can book the classes or diarise regular workouts for her to remove friction
A new hobby that is active - netball, tennis , nordic walking , anything she might like
An online coach for diet and exercise
A personal trainer that comes to house
Zoe App membership , you can follow along too and help with preparing healthy food
A joint plan to run couch to 5k together or similar and then graduate to a half marathon running plan.
Pilates Class
Walking fitness app
A smart watch
Noom app
Lighter Life

You are definitely not a feminist and you definitely don’t care about female solidarity.

You have been rude to multiple women on here, simply because they’re not a man hater and don’t share your opinion - how is that solidarity or a feminist.