My husband sat me down to talk about me “letting myself go”, and he’s not totally wrong. I’ve gained over 30lbs of pure fat in the last two years from a terrible diet.
I know it’s easy to get angry with them over this but I want to 1) meet him where he is 2) without being too mean to myself. He didn’t tell me to lose weight or anything, but it’s obvious he’s less attracted to me than he used to be. He is still wearing the same pant size he was at 24 (despite a covid fluctuation which he mentioned and took action to drop).
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Honestly if the conversation was respectful and focused on my health and not about my appearance, I’d get my shit together.
My husband has brought similar things up with me before. We generally try to eat pretty healthy but I do have sometimes resort to junk food if I’m feeling like crap. Then it’s like I’ve opened the flood gates. If I have junk food one day, I’ll feel like crap for having had it and then I get myself more junk food the next day to self-soothe. Before I know it, it’s turned into two weeks of me eating all junk.
The way my husband brings any of this stuff up (our diet, our lifestyle), it is usually focused on our behaviors rather than our appearance. He’ll say stuff like “hey you’re eating a lot of instant noodles lately… are you okay?”
Basically everything he says that correlates with the “weight” talk is aimed around him being concerned about a negative habit he sees me falling into, and not about my physical appearance. He also goes out of his way to remind me: “doesn’t matter how you actually look; you look so gorgeous to me because of what I think of you. It’s like I have permanent beer goggles when it comes to you.” (He doesn’t drink alcohol). So I am 100% confident that when he talks to me about my health, it is actually about my health and him being concerned for me and not about his physical attraction to me.
I would never be with someone who said something like this to me. If it was physical health, that would be different (you can’t do the things you enjoy anymore). But people grow and change and part of marriage is wanting to grow old together. I don’t see this as different than not being attracted because your hair started getting gray or something. If minor physical changes impacted attraction, I wouldn’t feel loved.
My ex (who had OCD problems) called me fat. I hadn’t changed weight but couldn’t loose in a year despite REALLY trying. Broke up and it became easy!
Honestly: your home should be both a safe place for you and a safe place helping be more healthy. Get both of you on board.
You can’t succeed if, like my ex, he pushes you towards his favourite unhealthy food. Or if you have to cook two meals. Or if you are alone in planning and managing the diet.
I really love that my current partner likes cooking, watches his cholesterol, focuses on fiber. It’s a breeze to eat healthy! 🥰
There are 3 views people have of physical attraction and romantic relationships.
I believe one of the main criteria to match for a marriage is making sure you belong to the same view.
View 1: If you love someone, it doesn’t matter what they look like.
View 2: If you are asking someone to be sexually monogamous with you, you owe it to that person to be physically attractive.
View 2 splits into 2 types:
Type A of View 2 is forgiving of things outside your control, but unforgiving of things within one’s control. So, significant weight gain is frowned upon. But stretch marks from pregnancy are fine. What is “within control” also varies here.
Type B is not forgiving of things outside your control, and will expect more drastic measures like plastic surgery.
It is useless to get romantic advice on this point from someone who does not share your view on this. All that matters is are you and your partner on the same page with this. Any mismatch on this will lead to a lot of pain and heartbreak.