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Should your S.O./Spouse have a say so if they feel you are too thin or too large?

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Replies

  • jjpptt2
    jjpptt2 Posts: 5,650 Member
    MeganAM89 wrote: »
    tomteboda wrote: »
    I don't condemn narrow and highly exclusive meteics of physical attraction. That's your business.

    But where I'm from, marriage is a life - long commitment. We promise to "love, honor and cherish one another for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and health, so long as we both shall live"

    If you really don't mean those words, you have no business saying them in the first place. Draw up a legal roommate agreement, because you want a temporary relationship.

    So this pushback isn't about some arbitrary declaration of physical attraction. It's about the very nature of marriage and life - long commitment. No one is misunderstanding those who say "I'll divorce my spouse if they're a single pound overweight". There's no misunderstanding that. Commitment to another person means a great deal more to me

    For crying out loud, I'd the worst thing my husband ever did was become overweight, I would have cried for joy and considered myself the luckiest woman on earth.

    ...a marriage is a legal contract. Vows mean different things to different people but that is a fact.

    I'm married and I've been with him for ten years and I plan on staying with him for the rest of my life. But we both know that there's a chance something could go wrong and sorry, but if that's the way it goes for us and we're no longer happy in our relationship and it can't be fixed then it will end.

    I refuse to let the fact that we married one another stop us from being happy down the road.

    In terms of what I bolded, I actually think that's exactly what the issue is here. This is MyFitnessPal, a website/app where the majority of people come to in order to lose weight so of course most people will be very offended when someone says, "if my spouse gets fat and won't exercise then I'd leave him," because then the thought is, "...but I'm overweight so you must think I'm a worthless human being."

    That's exactly what I was about to say.
  • STLBADGIRL
    STLBADGIRL Posts: 1,693 Member
    edited April 2017
    ...a marriage is a legal contract. Vows mean different things to different people but that is a fact.

    I'm married and I've been with him for ten years and I plan on staying with him for the rest of my life. But we both know that there's a chance something could go wrong and sorry, but if that's the way it goes for us and we're no longer happy in our relationship and it can't be fixed then it will end.

    I refuse to let the fact that we married one another stop us from being happy down the road.

    In terms of what I bolded, I actually think that's exactly what the issue is here. This is MyFitnessPal, a website/app where the majority of people come to in order to lose weight so of course most people will be very offended when someone says, "if my spouse gets fat and won't exercise then I'd leave him," because then the thought is, "...but I'm overweight so you must think I'm a worthless human being that no one wants to stay married to."[/quote]

    So in other words you are saying, I vow to be married to you until you get fat? And although I think the divorce rate is tooooooo high, I don't think one should not feel that they are stuck in a marriage forever. But I do believe in a marriage you should exhaust all possibilities before calling it quits.

  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    So let's say I developed a serious gambling habit because of some trauma that I refuse to deal with and instead would rather burn through all the savings and go into debt by running up a bunch of credit cards at the local casino. My SO is understandably upset about this and has brought it up multiple times, encouraged me to get help for the underlying problem, and is even willing to pay for a counselor. Except that when I say I'm going to my therapy appointment, I actually go to the casino instead and lose even more money.

    Is my SO a bad person to lay it down and say "I have given you time, I have paid for therapy, and I have told you that this behavior is destructive to our relationship and that if it continued I would have no choice but to end things. This has continued for months and you have racked up even more debt. This relationship is over. I will have no further contact with you."?

    So this, in your mind, is reasonably analogous to gaining sufficient weight to be, say, a BMI 25.5?

    Yes. By that point it has already been discussed more than once and consequences have been made clear.

    I was actually specifically asking Spottlight, since I am trying to move away from the discussion of what you would do, as that seemed to be bothering people.

    But okay. I disagree.
    And not losing weight successfully does not always mean you are not trying. It's simple, but not always easy.

    I don't accept that.[/quote]

    Okay. I disagree.
    I would like to move away from the focus on a specific person, so since others are bringing up hypotheticals (and don't seem to want this thread to be over, which I think would really be the best), let's talk about it hypothetically.

    Didn't you just criticize me literally six minutes ago because you think this is all theoretical and that there's no way it could possibly be like this in an actual relationship? [/quote]

    No, I was responding to a specific thing that Spottlight brought up that I thought had to do with past comments by people other than you.

    Also, not a criticism at all. I think it's much worse to believe that someone would kick out someone they loved for becoming BMI 25.5. In fact, I think that means it was never really love, it's not consistent in my mind with what I understand love to mean.

    And you haven't said you've actually done this, so I am not criticizing you. I think we'd all be more comfortable if we could talk about this in the hypothetical and not make it about what someone supposedly did do or would do.

    I don't see how you can say that you want me to believe you really would do that and want that to be the topic of conversation, but expressing my opinion about it is mean.
    (However, I'll note that I think the "I'd kick the fat partner to the curb, and what I mean is anyone overweight at all" thing was brought up intentionally to make a point about how awful and unacceptable it is, always, to gain weight, to slam overweight people as not being worthwhile acceptable partners at all. Many, not all of us, have been overweight, even though of course we ultimately lost it, or are in the process of doing so. Many of us also have overweight partners who we love. So that disagreeing and saying "that doesn't seem like what someone in a committed relationship would really do" is being called the mean position is rather ironic, IMO.)

    Again, what I have said about my relationships with my partners has never been about you, and I sure didn't make it up just to irritate you.[/quote]

    I didn't say you did. I think expecting no response or only a positive one is unreasonable.
  • Therealobi1
    Therealobi1 Posts: 3,262 Member
    Nope we can't force people to change but do we just abandon someone who is going through the worst thing ever

    then why are we forced to accept?

    No one is forcing you to do anything.
  • katrina6823
    katrina6823 Posts: 70 Member
    edited April 2017
    I've been with my partner 3 years and gained about 10kgs a year since we started dating :/ 25kgs roughly. now I'm making the change to turn that around because we both love being outdoorsy active people and I can't keep up anymore. My partner always told me he never noticed my weight gain altho I love him for it I know on the inside he's lying. Now that I've lost 11kg he said to me the other day your guts looking smaller. Should always talk about your health goals together but wording is everything it is never ok to call your partner fat!! If you want your other half to lose or gain weight then support them! You can't expect them to succeed if you sit there and eat a big juicy burger or pizza whilst they have a salad with no dressing, make good choices and do it together!! That's what has helped me most on my journey my calorie intake is about 1200 and my partner needs about 3000 but we still eat the same stuff just different portion sizes. And he saves his junk days for when I'm not around :)
  • heiliskrimsli
    heiliskrimsli Posts: 735 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    No, I was responding to a specific thing that Spottlight brought up that I thought had to do with past comments by people other than you.

    Also, not a criticism at all. I think it's much worse to believe that someone would kick out someone they loved for becoming BMI 25.5. In fact, I think that means it was never really love, it's not consistent in my mind with what I understand love to mean.

    And you haven't said you've actually done this, so I am not criticizing you. I think we'd all be more comfortable if we could talk about this in the hypothetical and not make it about what someone supposedly did do or would do.

    I don't see how you can say that you want me to believe you really would do that and want that to be the topic of conversation, but expressing my opinion about it is mean.

    Either you attack because this is all hypothetical and you claim that I don't really mean it because it hasn't happened, or I tell you that in fact it has and you attack because I'm mean and you're more comfortable talking in the hypothetical.

    You want to ask me if I've stopped beating my wife next?
  • heiliskrimsli
    heiliskrimsli Posts: 735 Member
    edited April 2017
    STLBADGIRL wrote: »
    STLBADGIRL wrote: »
    Wow is that what you got out of that? What planet do you live on? You asked me what if they do not want to lose weight and you give them months and they don't lose weight but gain more weight...I shared with you a true story (never once in this whole thread did I state that a partner should keep his mouth shut - NEVER) My point is some people weight gain is a result of something else that manifest itself through extra weight. Deal with the root cause with the person YOU LOVE.

    I asked you what then, and you told a story that had no resolution. Did the guy break up with her? Did she fix her issues? Did he just stop bringing it up? What actually happened?

    Also, you can't fix someone else's "root cause" when they're lying to you about their own effort.

    The point wasn't the resolution - I say that because there are many stories on here with a resolution and it didn't broaden your view...so I don't know why this time it would be different. The point I was making is that he paid all that money for PT's, gym memberships, and classes, when that wasn't the REAL issue. Once a person has a healthy mind, they can start being healthy in all other areas of their life.

    And what I'm saying is there's a limit to how long I'm willing to wait for someone to actually work on their issues. That limit is not measured in years for me.
    But if you must know the resolution to the story. The husband found out he had an aggressive cancer and died within 3 months at the age of 33. Good thing he didn't dump her, because she took GOOD care of him in his final days, She was there for him when he couldn't walk a few steps away to use the bathroom, or bathe himself, or do something so simple as feed himself. She learned how to cook healthy foods for him because his diet had changed dramatically. She gave up the sweets and ate what he ate to support him b/c she knew that the new diet was adjustment for him. And although she lost her husband, she learned how to eat healthy and prepare her own meals and lost a great amount of weight.

    Well, it sucks that he got cancer, and at least they both did what worked for them. It's rough when young people die. I'm not going to extrapolate anything else from that.
  • heiliskrimsli
    heiliskrimsli Posts: 735 Member
    STLBADGIRL wrote: »
    STLBADGIRL wrote: »
    Wow is that what you got out of that? What planet do you live on? You asked me what if they do not want to lose weight and you give them months and they don't lose weight but gain more weight...I shared with you a true story (never once in this whole thread did I state that a partner should keep his mouth shut - NEVER) My point is some people weight gain is a result of something else that manifest itself through extra weight. Deal with the root cause with the person YOU LOVE.

    I asked you what then, and you told a story that had no resolution. Did the guy break up with her? Did she fix her issues? Did he just stop bringing it up? What actually happened?

    Also, you can't fix someone else's "root cause" when they're lying to you about their own effort.

    The point wasn't the resolution - I say that because there are many stories on here with a resolution and it didn't broaden your view...so I don't know why this time it would be different. The point I was making is that he paid all that money for PT's, gym memberships, and classes, when that wasn't the REAL issue. Once a person has a healthy mind, they can start being healthy in all other areas of their life.

    And what I'm saying is there's a limit to how long I'm willing to wait for someone to actually work on their issues. That limit is not measured in years for me.
    But if you must know the resolution to the story. The husband found out he had an aggressive cancer and died within 3 months at the age of 33. Good thing he didn't dump her, because she took GOOD care of him in his final days, She was there for him when he couldn't walk a few steps away to use the bathroom, or bathe himself, or do something so simple as feed himself. She learned how to cook healthy foods for him because his diet had changed dramatically. She gave up the sweets and ate what he ate to support him b/c she knew that the new diet was adjustment for him. And although she lost her husband, she learned how to eat healthy and prepare her own meals and lost a great amount of weight.

    Well, it sucks that he got cancer, and at least they both did what worked for them. It's rough when young people die. I'm not going to extrapolate anything else from that.

    How decent of you.

    That wasn't necessary.
  • Chef_Barbell
    Chef_Barbell Posts: 6,644 Member
    STLBADGIRL wrote: »
    STLBADGIRL wrote: »
    Wow is that what you got out of that? What planet do you live on? You asked me what if they do not want to lose weight and you give them months and they don't lose weight but gain more weight...I shared with you a true story (never once in this whole thread did I state that a partner should keep his mouth shut - NEVER) My point is some people weight gain is a result of something else that manifest itself through extra weight. Deal with the root cause with the person YOU LOVE.

    I asked you what then, and you told a story that had no resolution. Did the guy break up with her? Did she fix her issues? Did he just stop bringing it up? What actually happened?

    Also, you can't fix someone else's "root cause" when they're lying to you about their own effort.

    The point wasn't the resolution - I say that because there are many stories on here with a resolution and it didn't broaden your view...so I don't know why this time it would be different. The point I was making is that he paid all that money for PT's, gym memberships, and classes, when that wasn't the REAL issue. Once a person has a healthy mind, they can start being healthy in all other areas of their life.

    And what I'm saying is there's a limit to how long I'm willing to wait for someone to actually work on their issues. That limit is not measured in years for me.
    But if you must know the resolution to the story. The husband found out he had an aggressive cancer and died within 3 months at the age of 33. Good thing he didn't dump her, because she took GOOD care of him in his final days, She was there for him when he couldn't walk a few steps away to use the bathroom, or bathe himself, or do something so simple as feed himself. She learned how to cook healthy foods for him because his diet had changed dramatically. She gave up the sweets and ate what he ate to support him b/c she knew that the new diet was adjustment for him. And although she lost her husband, she learned how to eat healthy and prepare her own meals and lost a great amount of weight.

    Well, it sucks that he got cancer, and at least they both did what worked for them. It's rough when young people die. I'm not going to extrapolate anything else from that.

    How decent of you.

    That wasn't necessary.

    Ok.
  • jjpptt2
    jjpptt2 Posts: 5,650 Member
    jenilla1 wrote: »
    Nope we can't force people to change but do we just abandon someone who is going through the worst thing ever

    I believe in supporting people through tough times, but I also believe that people going through tough times should either actively try to get better or at least not reject attempts by others to assist them in getting better. Why must I spend my life having my soul sucked dry by someone who refuses to be helped? At some point, it's not my problem anymore. I won't let myself get dragged down into a toxic relationship like that. I refuse to be an enabler. Therefore, I didn't choose a partner who indulges in self-destructive behaviors. Sometimes...tough love is in order.

    Now there are others who would love the drama, and seek out a relationship where they can take on the role of protector, as they coddle their partner and enable their self-destructive behaviors. That's not my personality. Again, I am a big fan of supporting someone who is making effort - even if they struggle and occasionally stumble along the way. But it's not healthy for me, personally, to be a co-dependent to someone who refuses to take care of themselves. That's demoralizing as hell. To each his/her own. :)

    Sorry, but you're not allowed to have thoughts/opinions in this thread. You either agree, or you're an *kitten*.