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

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How much weight are we talking about?

OP here. The most she has gained is 40lbs but she will gain 5 or 10lbs, lose the weight with a diet, and then gains 20lbs. It’s a constant cycle the last six months.

Maybe she is just more comfortable at a higher weight.
Can you just tell her to get some clothes that fit her now, drop the dieting, and just focus on living her life? Tell her that you don’t mind the 20 lbs, but you miss her being the fun, active person that she was when she wasn’t obsessed with her weight and dieting.

OP here. She isn’t. She is the one that brings up how much weight she gained and gets mad and goes on a diet. Then she is god for a little while and starts slipping and gains the weight back.

Oh. I’m sure that has nothing to do with your implicit judgement of her.

Wow - so much pent up hate and vitriol toward the OP (who is male) in this thread. Some of you must truly hate your husbands- or is it all men you hate?

Pp here. I am not hating on anyone. I’m just saying that I’m sure she is aware of his judgement of her eating, and that is probably part of what’s spurring her diet. Even if he isn’t saying anything.
In general, I don’t think that men are as attuned to what other people are thinking without being explicitly told. Unless it’s about sex.
So, yeah, OP saying that he isn’t happy with his wife’s weight, but she doesn’t know because he hasn’t said anything is like a woman saying that she doesn’t like sex, but she is sure that her husband doesn’t know because she hasn’t said anything. Unless someone is a great actor/actress, it’s bullsh$t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP -- I read what you said about what you have observed. Some advice.

First, do NOT bring up the weight fluctuations. She knows, and she's already thinking about them all the time. The most important thing you said is "I see you tormenting yourself and even when successful with your diets, you're not happy. Maybe you should see a professional to try to get at the underlying issues and who can help you with underlying strategies to cope. It makes me sad to see you unhappy."

You are NOT her dietician or exercise coach, or even her shrink. Many food issues come from a desire for control, and having someone else trying to control you just makes it worse. My DH was a saint when I went through a period of extremely disordered eating when we were dating, and he never said a thing because he knew I had to figure it out myself. The one thing he did do is realize that I was the most crazy when I was particularly starving, so he'd just say "hey, let's go out for lunch today. I feel like cheeseburgers". For some reason, if he said we should have cheeseburgers, I would eat one at the restaurant, and I would be a lot less crazy for a while because I actually had food in me. But he never said 'you're too thin, why are you doing that, just eat food, you have a disease, stop that, let me take care of this for you, etc". Because I would have doubled down.

I think this is good advice. Wait until she brings it up next time and try the "I see you tormenting yourself..." line. See what she says.

Also - would she be open to reading a book about habits together? I love Atomic Habits and Tiny Habits. Her late night snacking is a bad habit that she is capable of changing. It might spur her to make a change.

Ultimately, only she can make any changes. You just have to figure out the best way to support her.