Obese with skinny spouse ADVICE :)

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Replies

  • geneticsteacher
    geneticsteacher Posts: 623 Member
    I have a husband that badly needs to gain weight, but doesn't have much of an appetite. We usually eat the same meals, but I have to add olive oil, cheese, butter, sour cream, etc. to his whenever I can.
  • shaunshaikh
    shaunshaikh Posts: 616 Member
    edited September 2017
    enyagoboom wrote: »
    It's taken me an embarressingly long time to figure out that I don't need my now-husband to do this with me (he is much healthier than I am generally, but has his own issues to sort out) and that while we are a team in our relationship and life, when it comes to health and fitness the only person that I'm in it for is me.

    Keep talking with each other about your goals; listen to each other, plan meals together if you want and find active things to do together if that is what makes your relationship tick. Otherwise? do all those things on your own :) You got this.

    This post is so true, it took me a while to understand the same.

  • sarahlifts
    sarahlifts Posts: 610 Member
    Find what balance?
    you can only get your self in line.
    If your are cooking for 2 make healthy meals.
    If he wants to gain some weight or you want to lose weight or even vice versa it a personal decision even in a marriage.
    Barring a health crisis we should only tend to our own bodies when it comes to weight/composition
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    HealthyKatty wrote: »
    I'm in that situation. Partner's incredibly skinny, 6'3ft and I'm there 4'9 incredibly obese. What have we been doing and what are we going to do? He knows that I want to lose the weight and doesn't force me to lose it. He tries to motivate me to eat healthy whenever and if I try to grab a brownie, he makes that face that says "Are you sure you wanna do that?" I've been meh about it lately, but I'm starting to put a huge effort into it. No junk food, healthy foods (vegetables and meats) as much as possible. We work out together. We tend to experiment what works and what doesn't. We keep a record of the meals we like to eat. Since he's trying to gain and I'm trying to lose, my calories are around 1,200 and his are around 1,600. So normally we have the same meal, but he adds in something extra. Basically just be honest with yourselves and motivate each other! :)

    He's going to need way more than 1600 calories to gain weight. The lowest a sedentary male should go while dieting to lose weight is 1500. The calories he uses to merely exist are probably in the neighborhood of 1900...

    I'm 5'10" and my maintenance calories sedentary with no exercise is around 2400...I exercise regularly, so they're more like 2800ish and up to 3,000.
  • genghis54
    genghis54 Posts: 123 Member
    some men like fat,!!!
  • vivemme
    vivemme Posts: 6 Member
    I'm 200lbs 5'4" female and my guy is 6'3" 170lbs - He is my opposite. He has no fat, I have too much lol. It's nice to know he'll love you regardless of fitness. He says all that he cares about is my health and confidence and well, unfortunately my weight still affects both my health and confidence in a negative way. As for eating, oh yea it's different!
  • RaeBeeBaby
    RaeBeeBaby Posts: 4,246 Member
    As another poster said - you have to do you! Make whatever changes you need to reach your own goals and if he's on board with eating the same things, then don't worry about whether that means he'll gain or lose. If he's still hungry he'll eat more but you don't have to.

    After nearly 40 years with a skinny man I can attest to the fact that people have very different metabolisms. I have struggled to weigh less than him our entire married life and I finally do. Biggest change for me was to stop eating the same portions sizes for dinner. I felt like I was being deprived if he had 2 servings of _________ and I had only 1. Changing that mindset was a huge step in the right direction.
  • whosshe
    whosshe Posts: 597 Member
    linsey0689 wrote: »
    Okay so I know I'm not the only one out there with this problem. I'm obese and my BF is on the edge of normal weight to underweight according to his BMI. He is very thin, 5'7" and no more than 120 normally 115. I'm obese, trying to make the scale move in my favor. Who else out there is in the same situation? And any of you have any good advice to find the balance?

    I feel ya sister. I do 100% of the cooking and what I do is make us the same meals except I make one serving for me and like 3 for him. So far I have lost 40lbs and he is the same 6foot skinny man. This has worked well for us. Sometimes I just make two different meals. I don't mind, I love to cook.

    He's super supportive of me losing weight even tho he likes 'em chubby. Too bad for him he's stuck with me now lol

    My advice (like many others on this thread) is you do you boo boo. If you want to lose weight just stick to your calorie goal.
  • bbell1985
    bbell1985 Posts: 4,571 Member
    Francl27 wrote: »
    Same meals. He can have more, and then there's snacks and desserts.

    Honestly... it's really not as much an issue as people are trying to make it. The only hard part about it is keeping in mind that you can't eat as much as a man, period.

    This.

    In my last relationship, I had lost my weight already. The man I was dating was a 6'2" marathon runner who lifted. I am a 5'4" 140 lb power lifter. Our meals had to be "his and hers". If he was having eggs cooked in oil, toast with butter, and veg sauteed in oil...I had egg whites and the veg. Just one example. My meal always took a little tweaking. If I had the same meals as him all the time, I'd gain weight.
  • hydechildcare
    hydechildcare Posts: 142 Member
    HealthyKatty wrote: »
    I'm in that situation. Partner's incredibly skinny, 6'3ft and I'm there 4'9 incredibly obese. What have we been doing and what are we going to do? He knows that I want to lose the weight and doesn't force me to lose it. He tries to motivate me to eat healthy whenever and if I try to grab a brownie, he makes that face that says "Are you sure you wanna do that?" I've been meh about it lately, but I'm starting to put a huge effort into it. No junk food, healthy foods (vegetables and meats) as much as possible. We work out together. We tend to experiment what works and what doesn't. We keep a record of the meals we like to eat. Since he's trying to gain and I'm trying to lose, my calories are around 1,200 and his are around 1,600. So normally we have the same meal, but he adds in something extra. Basically just be honest with yourselves and motivate each other! :)

    My Husband is also extremely helpful. We keep the junk food I like out of the house. He prefers nuts, granola, and chocolate with nuts in it for snacks ( I am not a fan of nuts) We eat the same dinner. Though when he eats beef then I cook fish. He just eats more that I do and when we go out to eat he will get his fried foods and I will find the healthier options for me to eat with out eating to much.
  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,252 Member
    Chef_Barbell wrote: »
    We eat the same things. He eats more, I eat less. Sometimes.

    Yup!

    We were both overweight. My wife lost her weight first. I started about 5 years later.

    There is nothing you have to do that differently, just eat within your calorie budget.
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
    enyagoboom wrote: »
    linsey0689 wrote: »
    Okay so I know I'm not the only one out there with this problem. I'm obese and my BF is on the edge of normal weight to underweight according to his BMI. He is very thin, 5'7" and no more than 120 normally 115. I'm obese, trying to make the scale move in my favor. Who else out there is in the same situation? And any of you have any good advice to find the balance?

    I could have written this post fifteen years ago and let me tell you from this side of it: the balance is you do you. Being supportive of each other doesn't mean you have to do the same thing; the boards here are filled with proof that everyone has to approach their health goals individually.

    It's taken me an embarressingly long time to figure out that I don't need my now-husband to do this with me (he is much healthier than I am generally, but has his own issues to sort out) and that while we are a team in our relationship and life, when it comes to health and fitness the only person that I'm in it for is me.

    Keep talking with each other about your goals; listen to each other, plan meals together if you want and find active things to do together if that is what makes your relationship tick. Otherwise? do all those things on your own :) You got this.

    I agree that having to do everything together is not really the point of a relationship, especially food-related things.

    My husband has always exercised, I have not. He's lost some weight as I've lost mine, but he's still overweight. I'm a vegetarian, he's not. We have one kid who's veggie like me, and another who's an omnivore like him. In spite of my best efforts over the years, he really only like salad vegetables. The same applies to our kids.

    I have found a cooking schedule that works for our family. We eat together as frequently as we can (my husband's work schedule is erratic and it's not always possible for all of us to eat together), but we're often eating different things. I don't mind this. I'm not cooking multiple meals every day, and I make good use of leftovers and things like bagged salads. It's easy to vary up the protein and cook a starch and add a different side dish and have a dinner that makes everyone happy.

    I've had no trouble losing weight, even with varying dietary preferences, even with no one joining along with me. I mind what's on my plate, weigh and measure it, and let everyone else help themselves to what they want.

    The funny thing is that my husband and I don't even share our exercise habits. He's an evening exerciser, and I'm a first thing in the morning person. He just grumbles when my alarm goes off and goes back to sleep.
  • yung_baller_86
    yung_baller_86 Posts: 25 Member
    totally feel you! my partner is 6"1 probably 180lbs, Im 5"3 and the same weight, but was heavier than him a few months ago. I need to lose another 30lbs, and he wants to bulk up a little more - but honestly he's in pretty perfect shape.

    We only really have dinner together during the week, and whatever we eat on the weekend, usually out. I've been consistently losing weight at 1400 calories on weekdays and maintenance calories on the weekend.

    When we cook our healthy weekday dinner, we divide the entire recipe into 3; I have a third of whatever we make, which is around 500 calories, and he has two-thirds, plus some extra carbs. I put everything into the recipes tool so I know what I'm eating. He wants to gain muscle, I want to lose fat, so we simply cannot eat the same, which is what we were doing when we first started dating and why I gained 40lbs in a year. Sigh.

    As others have said, your partner should be eating a lot more than 1600cal. Maybe mention that he should be eating at least 2500cal... but at the end of the dday, that's him - let him do him. You do you, just understand that you shouldn't eat like a 6ft male if you're not.
  • DaisyHamilton
    DaisyHamilton Posts: 575 Member
    My husband is 155 at his heaviest, typically closer to 145, and 5'11. I'm 168lb now and 5'4. He's very very slim. I usually make him something and give myself a healthier version. Like when we have tacos I fry his shells and he gets extra beans and cheese. My tortillas aren't fried, more veggies and salsa, significantly less beans and cheese
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