How to diet when your SO is not???
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You do you.0
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If you want the snacks he's having while you two are watching TV why don't you skip your fruit juice gummies and unsalted nuts and snack on what he is having? You could just pre portion it out for yourself to make sure you stat within your calories. Nuts are calorie bombs and even fruit juice gummies from the health food store are just little balls of sugar so you probably have a decent amount of calories to play with. (Note that I'm not saying either of those things are bad for you, but if you're choosing to snack on them when you really want to snack on something else I feel like you might be better served just eating the equivalent calories of what he has instead)
In the end, as you say, he has trouble putting on weight whereas you're trying to lose it. You two are going to eat differently. Just focus on your goals and do what you need to do!0 -
I went through that. It was hard. But I was determined.
Even if you don't have someone around, eating yummy foods that you can't eat, it's going to come up. The whole world isn't dieting and you're going to have to face situations where you have to say, "No, thank you" to a donut while a bunch of others eat them.
It's hard. But you can do it! And it gets easier to say No as you go along. A lot easier.
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As I do all the cooking my SO eats what I eat, but just a larger portion. I weigh everything so this is made easy for us. Granted doing this he has managed to lose 14lb without trying since we moved in together a year ago, but he also still snacks. There is no unhealthy snack type food in our home, as I've struggled with binge eating in the past, except for items I dislike or am allergic to, so he will eat those in the evening or something healthy. My main advice is that you have to work out "your way" though as that is what is going to help you maintain a healthy lifestyle; I dont think of myself as "on a diet" or as "eating diet food", I eat what I want in moderation (under 1300cals 7 days a week, 1500 if I am socialising).
Pizza is a true love of mine. I always plan when I have it though, usually once in 2 weeks, often on a weekend and ALWAYS within my calories. I have taken to making my own using tortilla wraps, tom and garlic puree and whatever toppings I fancy. But I also found supermarket ones that are around 600 cals (I therefore eat the entire pizza) and just cut back on cals at breakfast/lunch/snack that day to make it work. Restricting food options when I started out this lifestyle change 2 years ago often made me more likely to binge/ fail so I dont do it now! But again I found a way that works for me.0 -
I live alone, but I've come to the hypothesis that diet foods are for (eternal) dieting.0
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I have been living with my partner for a while and have really focused in on losing weight over the last month.
However, I'm finding it really difficult to diet and stick to low GI and minimal saturated fats during the evening when he comes home from work and at weekends.
Where I am overweight and uncomfortable in myself, he is considered underweight but struggles to gain anything, leaving him stuck at 8.5-9 stone.
At weekends I buy myself a bag of fruit juice gummy drops and a small bag of unsalted nuts from a health food shop, whereas he stocks up on sweets and crisps and gorges on them whilst we watch films/programmes together.
It doesn't bother me that he's eating them, I just find myself overly tempted to join him, and have occasionally broke my meal plan and felt guilty for sharing a pizza when it's too late to cook or having a triple chocolate cookie.
Our best weekend was when I made a bowl of Graze Pepper Popcorn and a minimal calorie Hot Chocolate for us to share as it was much healthier than me craving crisps and chocolate and we could share this as a treat.
How does everyone else deal with this?
Do you have recipes or certain snacks/meals to share with one another? Do you sit in seperate rooms? Do you go exercise whilst they munch ahead?
Ordinarily, people who eat low GI eat more fats. When GI goes down, fat and protein go up. Also, check science because saturated fats are ok for us now because Science.0 -
DeguelloTex wrote: »I eat what I eat and she eats what she eats. I cook and eat the portions I want. She eats the portions she wants.
pretty much...0 -
I currently see my boyfriend on weekends, and I just eat less than he does. He has quite large dinner plates, so I usually opt to have my food (if it's a casserole type dish) in a smaller bowl - it looks like more food than it is. He usually fills the plate. I have bought some smaller plates for him for when we have chicken or steak or whatever. We also usually have ice cream at night, I have one scoop (in a small tea cup) and he has three in a bowl. I don't generally cook anything different, just take more veggies than he does.0
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But it is so unfair, isn't it? Only after coming to MFP I understood why my husband gets to stay skinny and I don't. If I ever reach my goal weight, I will only be allowed 1450 kcals at maintenance! So unfair! I do plan to let this go after my eightieth birthday though, so it is not 1450 kcals a day for life.I live with a DH and two lean, very active teenage boys who consume any food that gets in their path. If I ate whenever anyone else in this house was eating I'd very quickly be so huge I'd be unable to move. So I just don't do it. Period. I know the biology/science of it -- they're all men and they can eat much more than I can. That's just the way it is. So I've had to learn to be ok with them eating when I don't. When I cook we all eat the same things, I just eat a lot less than they do. They snack a LOT and I don't. Such is life.0 -
Alyssa_Is_LosingIt wrote: »DeguelloTex wrote: »I eat what I eat and she eats what she eats. I cook and eat the portions I want. She eats the portions she wants.
^^+1
You and your SO are two separate people. You do not both have to be "dieting."
Just eat less food than your SO does.
True. I'm 6'2" and my girlfriend is a foot shorter than me. Why would we eat the same? Unless you're trying to force him to diet then just stick to what you're supposed to eat. You can't eliminate calorie dense foods from the world. You just need to decide if this is important to you and do it.
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How does everyone else deal with this?
Do you have recipes or certain snacks/meals to share with one another? Do you sit in seperate rooms? Do you go exercise whilst they munch ahead?
Neither my dh nor dd need to lose weight. Dh will always need more calories than me to maintain his healthy weight. Dd needs a different amount of calories too. I don't have to eat exactly what they eat nor do they need to eat the same as me.
Our breakfast and lunch are not always eaten together or the same thing. We eat dinner together.
After dinner, people disperse to various places in the house. We don't sit together all night watching TV and eating. I do exercise in the evening usually but not to avoid people snacking in front of me.
I often have popcorn for an evening snack. Dh will eat some of my popcorn sometimes or eat a bowl of ice cream or chips
It hasn't been a big deal most days. I haven't changed my diet much. I have food I love every day. I eat portion sizes that are appropriate for my goal or eat something I like that fits my goal better. Sometimes just seeing the calorie count of 7 chips makes them less attractive than a big bowl of popcorn or a sandwich.
The day I made chocolate chip cookies and dh brought home caramel apples as a surprise was challenging but I chose cookies. There will be other days for caramel apples. I changed my thinking from "Food is here. Must eat it." just because it was there to "these things are not rare and I can plan to have them tomorrow or next week if I want".
We only eat out once a week for lunch and I choose what I want in advance. We grocery shop once a week and I make the list. I plan and prepare meals. I pre-log my food for the day. Most days things go as planned.
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I pack my own breakfast and lunch and prepare my own snacks. Mrs Jruzer makes family dinner and we all eat it, more or less food depending on each person's predilections. Pretty simple.0
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I certainly understand the struggle!
My boyfriend is on a bulking plan, so we are literally at the opposite ends of the spectrum food-wise and goal-wise. He requires the extra calories and I most certainly don't - so we tend to make our own dinners and eat our own foods *together* if that makes sense. We both respect eachothers individual lifestyle and I really think that's the only way to succeed with it. Respect the fact that your boyfriend is going to indulge and in turn, he needs to respect that you need to be that little bit more 'strict'. I know it can be tempting to lean toward doing what he is doing- and it's totally fine to do that on occasion - but make sure you are logging those times and try and allow it into your daily calorie's. It can be done, you may need to tweak other meals here and there - but there is no reason why you can't both share a pizza together! 0 -
You have to make the decision to stick to your guns... but there's no reason why you can't have a piece of pizza or a cookie too.
My husband is obese and hasn't done much to change his diet at all in the 2.5 years I've been on MFP (ok he tried for a few months, lost 10 pounds, gained it all back). He snacks on ice cream, cheese, crackers, cookies, chocolate, basically anything, at night when he watches TV. But I don't have to eat that stuff, and he doesn't have to eat my snacks. We don't share snacks anyway because I log everything I eat, so I get my own.
I make the same dinner for everyone (most nights), but that includes anything from meatloaf to burgers to pizza sometimes. I ask him what he wants, and if he actually wants something, I'll make it, I'll just make a lighter version of it, and I'll have a smaller portion. I just weigh my portion and make sure it fits in my calories and try to have something delicious at every meal so I'm less tempted to eat 'junk' after. I very rarely have snacks after dinner and no, we don't sit in different rooms. He eats right next to me while we watch TV.
I usually don't exercise when he's home, but I'd just hop on the exercise bike while we watch TV and he snacks... not a problem at all.
Bottom line is that you have to make the choice for yourself to lose weight and be healthier. I've lost 80 pounds, and I have kids too and a lot of snacks and treats and 'junk' food in the house at all times. You just got to want it hard enough.
No kids here,but this works for us. I like to make a nice main dish,then have a low carb veggie & green salad.DH might have 2 helpings of main dish & small sides. Mine is the opposite.Works pretty good.0 -
Accurately weigh and log your food and stick to your calorie goal.
You have 4 basic choices (and any combination and possibly others). 1) make something that you want that fits your calorie goals 2) eat what he is eating but in small enough portions that it fits your calorie goals 3) just don't eat it 4) eat what he is eating and lose weight slower.
I lost 30lb while my wife lost nothing. I ate what I wanted (just had a home made chicken wing pizza for lunch), but I made it fit. It doesn't matter what she makes for dinner, I'll weigh out ~500-800 calories of it and eat it. If she makes something complicated (like a stir fry where you can't easily weigh individual items), then I either use a generic entry or sometimes she'll weigh the components for me. Since she is now on the MFP plan she does a much better job of weighing everything when she makes dinner, but prior to that I did fine with estimations.
Basically, just experiment to see what works for your situation, but there is a solution, you just have to want it enough.0 -
My husband doesn't subscribe to my healthy lifestyle, either, and that's okay.
For dinner, I cook healthy food in sensible portion sizes for me AND my husband, every night. Some nights he eats it, some nights he doesn't. If he doesn't want what I cook, he knows he must pick something up for himself on the way home from work. In that case, I pack the rest of what I cooked for lunch the next day.
Also, I do all the grocery shopping, so I control what snacks come into the house. It's pretty easy to just not buy calorie dense foods.
He can still have his junk foods, just encourage him to buy them in single serving sizes if he eats them around you, or encourage him to have them when you're not together. If he cares about you and your healthy goals, he should have no problem doing those things to help you out.0 -
My SO is the one who encouraged me to lose weight. He has been talking about "dieting" for sometime now but has been insisting we do something drastic like paleo or eat noting but salad and chicken, which I know I would fail at because I need variety. I basically told him if he wants to prepare / cook, go ahead, but otherwise we'll eat what I prepare since I do all the cooking. He's been pretty good about being supportive, but often eggs me on to eat unhealthy things - like when I worked out specifically so I could have a deep fried snickers at the fair and he was all lets have ice cream and this giant elephant ear too.It doesn't bother me that he's eating them, I just find myself overly tempted to join him, and have occasionally broke my meal plan and felt guilty for sharing a pizza when it's too late to cook or having a triple chocolate cookie.
I understand this. I caved and bought a pizza for lunch, ate two slices and brought the rest home to eat gradually over the weekend, and instead he ate 5 slices after we had a good dinner while talking about how delicious it was I needed to order from them more often. It was delicious. Thanks for reminding me. I'd appreciate it if you stopped eating it directly if front of me where I can smell it. I wound up having one as well, after I had told myself I wouldn't.
It's all about will power. It'll get easier as it goes along. At least I hope so!
Ugh. That's a drag, Cbnorris. You have my sincere sympathies.
I provision for DH +3 teens. They all eat more than me. The teens are pretty reasonable about snack food (more moderate & health conscious as they get older). I buy what they request (increasingly they buy their own) and I stay out of theirs. I buy my own and stick to that. DH complains that I don't buy enough junk food to nosh while watching football all day Sunday. He doesn't want it enough to buy it himself, or even to put it on the list, so we just tolerate his complaints. Football season snack food is tempting when others are eating a lot of it, but honestly, football season beer/wine is more tempting. We all have our demons I guess.
Meals seem easier to manage than snack food. Like others, I cook one meal & everyone portions as they prefer. I often sub spinach for the rice or pasta I serve everyone else. Once in a blue moon we'll make or buy pizza, and I have some but fill up on vegetables and treat the pizza as a accompaniment vs. main course.
You can do it. It just takes a little persistence/tenacity on your part to form new habits, and maybe a little acclimation for your SO, too.0 -
He eats what he eats and I eat what I eat. For the most part we eat the same meals but different portions. I eat more meat, he eats more of the carb-y side dish. Snack-wise, he's more apt to eat something like fried mozzarella or fast food than I am but it doesn't bother or affect me at all.
No, I don't leave the room when he snacks. I'm usually reading a book in the same room where he is snacking while playing his farm simulator on PS4.0 -
But it is so unfair, isn't it? Only after coming to MFP I understood why my husband gets to stay skinny and I don't. If I ever reach my goal weight, I will only be allowed 1450 kcals at maintenance! So unfair! I do plan to let this go after my eightieth birthday though, so it is not 1450 kcals a day for life.
LOL! You remind me of my MIL - -she IS going to be 80 in a few weeks, and says she's totally done with worrying about what or how much she eats. She's an extremely healthy, active 80 yo, so I doubt she's going to start pigging out. But I wouldn't blame her if she did!
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My husband is gluten and dairy free. The kids (almost 6 and 7) and I aren't, per se. So some meals are made for all of us and other days, he's on his own. Some snacks are his alone, some are the kids and some are mine. Others we all can (and do) eat.
His eating habits have taken a big step down the last few months. As a general rule, I assume he's aware he's eating unhealthy/badly and don't comment. I mentioned it last weekend, yeah, he's aware of what he's doing. I made a couple of suggestions, which he was receptive to and that was the end of that topic.
He's not trying to sabotage me, which is the important thing. I'm doing great on that by myself, she said wryly.0
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