Wife Has Gained Weight - How To Approach Her About It?

[Anonymous]

My wife has gained and lost weight in the last six months. I’ve been supportive because I realize some things contribute to weight that is beyond our control - hormones and getting older. I’m worried about her and I want to gently tell her that she may need help. I know this is a touchy subject and I want to go about it as being a partner and being supportive. How can I tell my wife she needs to see a professional to get a handle on her weight issues?

[Anonymous]

You really think she doesn't know? This is not a conversation you need to have.

The most you can do is offer support - ie offer to take walks together, cook healthy meals, ask if she wants to do a fitness challenge with you etc.

[Anonymous]

Best thing to do is take over grocery shopping and cooking. Or,at the least,express a strong interest in having her make healthy meals. Diet is a significant component of weight gain so if you get that part under control the problem will work itself out.

[Anonymous]

I had a similar issue with my pregnant wife. I brought it up at her doctors appointment and that seemed to help her.

[Anonymous]

Why don't you just regulate her food like you would a pet?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You really think she doesn't know? This is not a conversation you need to have.

The most you can do is offer support - ie offer to take walks together, cook healthy meals, ask if she wants to do a fitness challenge with you etc.

I disagree. Women on here post about their husbands gaining weight and every poster tells them to have a conversation about it. Why should it be any different? OP is not happy with the situation and should address it before it becomes a bigger issue. Things like this are what causes spouses to push away and it can end in divorce.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I had a similar issue with my pregnant wife. I brought it up at her doctors appointment and that seemed to help her.

Wait, what?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You really think she doesn't know? This is not a conversation you need to have.

The most you can do is offer support - ie offer to take walks together, cook healthy meals, ask if she wants to do a fitness challenge with you etc.

I disagree. Women on here post about their husbands gaining weight and every poster tells them to have a conversation about it. Why should it be any different? OP is not happy with the situation and should address it before it becomes a bigger issue. Things like this are what causes spouses to push away and it can end in divorce.

If OP ends up divorcing his wife because she gained weight, I fully support that outcome for both of them.

[Anonymous]

How much weight are we talking about?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My wife has gained and lost weight in the last six months. I’ve been supportive because I realize some things contribute to weight that is beyond our control - hormones and getting older. I’m worried about her and I want to gently tell her that she may need help. I know this is a touchy subject and I want to go about it as being a partner and being supportive. How can I tell my wife she needs to see a professional to get a handle on her weight issues?

Are you concerned because she's fat? Or concerned because she has an eating disorder? I'm confused.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You really think she doesn't know? This is not a conversation you need to have.

The most you can do is offer support - ie offer to take walks together, cook healthy meals, ask if she wants to do a fitness challenge with you etc.

I disagree. Women on here post about their husbands gaining weight and every poster tells them to have a conversation about it. Why should it be any different? OP is not happy with the situation and should address it before it becomes a bigger issue. Things like this are what causes spouses to push away and it can end in divorce.

If OP ends up divorcing his wife because she gained weight, I fully support that outcome for both of them.

I wasn’t talking specifically about the weight gain. I was talking about little issues like this building up that don’t get talked about that can push spouses further apart and lead to divorce. Many divorces happen with little things causing resentment that causes a big blow up and leads to divorce.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My wife has gained and lost weight in the last six months. I’ve been supportive because I realize some things contribute to weight that is beyond our control - hormones and getting older. I’m worried about her and I want to gently tell her that she may need help. I know this is a touchy subject and I want to go about it as being a partner and being supportive. How can I tell my wife she needs to see a professional to get a handle on her weight issues?

Are you concerned because she's fat? Or concerned because she has an eating disorder? I'm confused.

+1 Same.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a similar issue with my pregnant wife. I brought it up at her doctors appointment and that seemed to help her.

Wait, what?

+2 omg hoping this isn’t real. Op, as someone whose weight fluctuates and whose body will never be as small as it once was unless I starve myself and never stop - the whole “worried” about her thing jjst.. woof. If she was eating and exercising the exact same and wasn’t gaining weight, would you be “worried” about her? Probably not. No one was worried about the health of my sister whose diet consisted of Mac and cheese, sandwiches, and plenty of Wendy’s and Taco Bell because she has my moms stellar gene pool and stayed quite skinny. But suddenly family members are very concerned about my “health” when I start to look more like my dad’s side of the family (whose gene pool I clearly pull much stronger for) even though I had a much more varied and most would say diet that include more “healthy” foods.

My point is - the vast majority of people aren’t worried about your health when they point these things out to you. They are worried about you being fat. Because it’s pretty rough in our society to be fat, totally agree, not ideal. And we very much associate weight with health even though like you said, there are a lot of factors. I would just really try to reflect on what you’re actually worried about. It’s also fair that because we all live in this society it does impact us and attraction sometimes at first when our bodies change. I get it. And also, I would say that it’s probably a good time to start accepting that almost no one remains unscathed from their body changing over time. They are meant to change. And sadly, despite huge efforts from many people, research still shows that it’s incredibly hard to keep off weight you have dieted to lose, almost no matter what you do. So you can either continue the yo-yo or try to embrace living a healthy lifestyle for yourself and not your weight.

That’s probably the most helpful thing you can do for your wife. Because shame just makes us have a harder time to actually make healthy choices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a similar issue with my pregnant wife. I brought it up at her doctors appointment and that seemed to help her.

Wait, what?

You do realize pregnant women gain weight, right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My wife has gained and lost weight in the last six months. I’ve been supportive because I realize some things contribute to weight that is beyond our control - hormones and getting older. I’m worried about her and I want to gently tell her that she may need help. I know this is a touchy subject and I want to go about it as being a partner and being supportive. How can I tell my wife she needs to see a professional to get a handle on her weight issues?

Are you concerned because she's fat? Or concerned because she has an eating disorder? I'm confused.

+1 Same.

+2.
I’m not sure if you think she needs to lose weight or that she needs to stop dieting.