Help! I have an enabler!

happy_heart_jen
happy_heart_jen Posts: 30 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Food has been my first love and comfort for most of my life. I am actively working to change the relationship that I have with food. My significant other is constantly bringing me home chocolate and chips despite all of my efforts to vocalize what my goals are. On one had there is support and on the other food! How do you all deal with something like this????

Replies

  • agrant85
    agrant85 Posts: 92 Member
    I'm in the same boat. My husband can stand to lose quite a bit of weight himself, but he loves food. He's very supportive, will work out with me, will let me buy whatever foods I need in order to eat healthy...but then wants to go out to eat all the time. This morning, he wanted to go to breakfast, so I made him go to IHOP, so I could see the calories on the menu before I ordered. Then tonight, I cooked dinner, we ate, it was good....but 2 hours later, he says he is hungry and goes and orders pizza. It's 9:15 pm now and his pizza just got here. I'm being strong and resisting....even though I really want to go eat some!! I'm not sure how to deal with it other than really using my will power and discipline to say no!
  • Lyadeia
    Lyadeia Posts: 4,603 Member
    I used to deal with this all the time. Instead of trying to change the other person (which won't happen anyway!) you just really need to focus on yourself. When you get to the point that you are able to pass up the foods that you are brought, perhaps they will see that you are not eating it and refrain from bringing so much to you.
  • SwimFan1981
    SwimFan1981 Posts: 1,430 Member
    I just don't eat it....
  • DavPul
    DavPul Posts: 61,406 Member
    what he brings home has no bearing on if you eat it or not. i have the same weakness when chips ahoy get brought into my house. but my wife is not my enabler. i am. if i eat the cookies it's because i chose to, not because she bought them.


    tumblr_mhebktbTBn1r9cqm9o3_250_zpsfe4926e4.gif
  • marcenepea
    marcenepea Posts: 364 Member
    I prefer to believe they really want to help. Unfortunately it puts them in an uncomfortable situation. If they agree you need a diet they are saying your fat. So they can't be the first to admit it. In my situation... my poor husband had heard sooooo many times how I need to lose weight and then I don't. That I think it made him a bit gun shy. He can eat whatever he wants and doesn't gain any weight, so he doesn't quite understand my struggle.
    Finally I had to sit him down and really let him know how important this was for me. Not just "I need to lose alittle weight I'm going on a diet" but really let him know. He had heard the "I'm going on a diet" thing before. I weigh 199 and that just isn't healthy for me.
    If you are really serious and you sit down and explain to him your goals.. I think he will do his best. Just remember You slip up on your diet (or as I prefer "new lifestyle") just as he will slip up on the support. Just be honest and blunt about your needs and listen to his honesty. Its a learning curve for all of us.
    You can do this... and with a partner who is supportive it can be alot easier.
  • SwimFan1981
    SwimFan1981 Posts: 1,430 Member
    what he brings home has no bearing on if you eat it or not. i have the same weakness when chips ahoy get brought into my house. but my wife is not my enabler. i am. if i eat the cookies it's because i chose to, not because she bought them.


    tumblr_mhebktbTBn1r9cqm9o3_250_zpsfe4926e4.gif

    I love her!
  • Factory_Reset
    Factory_Reset Posts: 1,651 Member
    My husband sabotages me too!

    Oh wait, wait, wait....nevermind, I LET him stuff things in my mouth.

    Carry on
  • marcenepea
    marcenepea Posts: 364 Member
    what he brings home has no bearing on if you eat it or not. i have the same weakness when chips ahoy get brought into my house. but my wife is not my enabler. i am. if i eat the cookies it's because i chose to, not because she bought them.


    tumblr_mhebktbTBn1r9cqm9o3_250_zpsfe4926e4.gif


    So very true..... doesn't make it easier but it is true.
  • jboss1989
    jboss1989 Posts: 25
    This seems to be extremely common...I am trying to use it as more of a tool to increase my self-discipline. I'll eat something healthy right before my boyfriend gets home from work at night, inevitably with pizza or breadsticks or chips or something. I'll try to make sure that when we eat out, we go somewhere that has decent choices for me, and mostly just try to say no, both to what he offers me, and to going out to eat. Saving us money too! It's hard, but I actually kinda like it, as I can see myself getting better and better at resisting his junk food.
  • OutDaWay
    OutDaWay Posts: 40 Member
    If you want a cookie ..eat a cookie. If you want a slice of pie have a slice. It's better to have a small controlled single portion than finding yourself blowing your diet completely out of the water with a stop @ the bakery or burger king.

    But I do agree just because someone brings something in the house doesn't mean it needs to be ingested. If worse comes to worse .. have the bad food put somewhere else and not in the normal pantry/kitchen area.
  • quirkytizzy
    quirkytizzy Posts: 4,052 Member
    If you want a cookie ..eat a cookie. If you want a slice of pie have a slice. It's better to have a small controlled single portion than finding yourself blowing your diet completely out of the water with a stop @ the bakery or burger king.

    But I do agree just because someone brings something in the house doesn't mean it needs to be ingested. If worse comes to worse .. have the bad food put somewhere else and not in the normal pantry/kitchen area.

    This. The BF brings home candy often. It's very hard for me to stay out of it. But it helps when he keeps it on his side of the bed rather than mine.
  • newloafofbread
    newloafofbread Posts: 46 Member
    My boyfriend is just kinda absent minded more than openly challenging my diet. We went out to eat the other day and I told myself I wanted to have ice cream after the meal, so I couldn't have bread. I'm sitting there in a group of people not eating the bread and he goes, "you should try this bread! you would really love it!" Ugggh really?


    I also agree that you have to learn to just not eat it if it's there. I can do it with some things and not others. If someone came in the room with a pizza I would be all over it. But I can resist a lot of sweets and other junk.
  • jdhoward_101
    jdhoward_101 Posts: 234 Member
    My boyfriend is the type who can eat and eat and eat and stay skinny as a rake, it's so unfair! And because of this, he is constantly suggesting naughty treats, and i am such a massive lover of nuaghty treats-chocolate biscuits, bacon flavoured crisps, all manner of ice-creams, YUM! Occasionally i'll persuade him to let us have a healthy meal, but i am a very lazy cook, and when i am hungry i want food NOW, and so am all too easily persuaded into having pizza and garlic bread for dinner, or something which involves a plate full of chips.

    The way i combat this is by being REALLY good during the day and saving up my calories, so i can be more liberal in the evenings. However, i make sure i don't eat them all too late and that i am going to be doing some form of exercise, even if it's just walking to the shops and back, so it doesn't all just sit in my stomach. And if it is something super unhealthy, i eat smaller portions, or ration myself to a certain amount of biscuits and ALWAYS COUNT THE CALORIES, no matter how depressing it is!

    Sometimes my boyfriend gets annoyed with me and my eating habits. I'm not fat, but i have put on a stone which i really want to lose again, yet he doesn't seem to understand; in his eyes, you're either fat or thin and i'm not quite as black-and-white like that. Sometimes it will cause an argument when i refuse to eat the same things he does, as he sees it as me being silly and awkward. But, i stick to my guns, because i know i will be happier in the long run.

    But yes, it is VERY difficult!
  • chelseagirlfl
    chelseagirlfl Posts: 207 Member
    separate the cookies into 100 calorie portions in zip bags..have them as a small snack..or thank him and tell him you are still working on your girlish figure and carry them cookies to the neighbor nearest with kids...they will love you.
  • JesterMFP
    JesterMFP Posts: 3,596 Member
    Food has been my first love and comfort for most of my life. I am actively working to change the relationship that I have with food. My significant other is constantly bringing me home chocolate and chips despite all of my efforts to vocalize what my goals are. On one had there is support and on the other food! How do you all deal with something like this????
    When you say "vocalize what my goals are" - have you actually point blank asked your significant other to stop bringing home that kind of food?

    If so, then maybe you just need to not eat it. Any of it. Throw it out even (as much as I hate to advocate wasting food.) Send the message that you don't want it and aren't going to eat it. There's nothing wrong (in my world) with eating that kind of food if you want to, but if you've asked someone not to bring it to you, and they do, and then you eat it: you're basically telling them that it's a good idea to bring you more.

    And when you say "bringing me home" - is it definitely for you specifically, or is it just being brought home for general consumption? If that's the case, then you just need to practice self-control, and try to keep those foods out of sight, maybe in a cupboard you don't go in very often, and accept that other people are going to eat things that you're trying to avoid, but it doesn't mean you have to.

    ETA: if your food issues are significant enough to the point of being an eating disorder, I don't think it would be unreasonable to request that those trigger foods are kept out of the house altogether, and that your SO only eats that stuff away from you. I guess that's something you'd have to negotiate.
  • bluebear_74
    bluebear_74 Posts: 179
    Sounds like my Mum! I'll be trying to be extra good (because I plan to go out for dinner the next day) and my Mum will come home with KFC. How does one say no to KFC?!
  • jdhoward_101
    jdhoward_101 Posts: 234 Member
    Sounds like my Mum! I'll be trying to be extra good (because I plan to go out for dinner the next day) and my Mum will come home with KFC. How does one say no to KFC?!

    That's one thing i still haven't worked out how to do :p
  • chymerra
    chymerra Posts: 212
    you don't eat it.
    no one forces you to eat bad food, that's a decision that is entirely up to you.

    that said, change your perspective when it comes to food:

    1) food is an inanimate object that weilds NO POWER unless YOU give it power over you
    2) chocolate / sweets / junk etc are not what your body NEEDS, it's what YOU WANT. big difference
    3) your body needs fuel in the form of healthy, fresh foods and macro-nutrients. think of your body like a car: your car needs proper maintenance - clean oil, gas, run it efficiently etc. if you don't properly maintain your car it'll crap out on you. your body is the same.

Categories