Can You Help Me Motivate My Wife?

MiguelX66
MiguelX66 Posts: 24 Member
in Motivation and Support
Hello, I am new here.

My wife and I both need to lose around 20 pounds. I needed to lose more at first, but I have already lost almost 20 over the last year.

After the New Year my wife was tracking her food and calories, but now she has already stopped because she has not seen weight loss yet. I told her that I started tracking my food here, but she said she will eat healthier and not bother.

She goes to the gym several times a week, but has a weakness for certain foods (as do I) and portion sizes are not well controlled. I told her not to expect big results quickly, and that tracking the food will help over time, but she said it is too much work.

Any advice on how I can get her to reconsider? Or to at least control the portions? She does have a food scale but has not used it in a long time.

Thanks.

Replies

  • sissiluv
    sissiluv Posts: 2,205 Member
    Since this is your wife I'm guessing you're living together? In which case you can probably help contribute to food portions by helping with the cooking. Likewise with the shopping. I found that as soon as I started contributing to that, my mom found the motivation to eat healthier as well, whereas before it was all too easy to go to the processed carbs in our household.

    In the end though, most of the motivation lays with her. Horses and water and all that.
  • meganbook
    meganbook Posts: 71
    Weight loss is extremely mental. It's hard to motivate people who don't believe in themselves. I've heard these excuses many times: "It's too much work to log!" "Well it's a homemade recipe so there's no way to track" "I don't need to track when I'm eating healthy foods!" Truth is, people's idea of "healthy" isn't always ideal. Ordering a salad at Applebee's seems like a great idea, but a closer look at the cheese, dressing, deep fried toppings, it turns into a diet nightmare.

    This is not a diet, it is a lifestyle change. MFP is not magic, it's science. She's not going to see crazy results over night. She has to be honest with herself. My advice: give her a challenge. Tell her if she can log everything, every day for two weeks you'll give her a reward (you're married...be creative :-P ) If she does this, two things will happend: 1) She'll start seeing weight loss and it will motivate her to keep going 2) If for some reason she isn't losing weight, she will at least start seeing a pattern of her eating habits, and hopefully this will start getting her portion sizes under control.

    This website is an amazing tool, have her start reading sucess stories on blogs and look for friends to add (she can add me! I love to motivate!). People on here are awesome and will encourage her along with you. Hope I helped!
  • Merithyn
    Merithyn Posts: 284 Member
    I think that the best thing you can do for her is to continue doing what you're doing, make better choices while grocery shopping and cooking, and encourage her to exercise with you. Whether she's logging or not, if she's eating better and moving more, she'll end up losing weight.
  • aprileko71
    aprileko71 Posts: 11 Member
    I've only lost 2# since I joined but what I know for a fact is you HAVE to measure your portions...at least until you can visually guess correctly...and I only do this when I am not able to use my food scale. It takes longer to measure every oz of cheese, every oz of meat etc, but I also thought I was eating healthy until I began to see I was over-estimating my portions. I think she will definitely see results doing this. Exercise is great too and its great she is already doing this, but you can't out exercise a bad diet. :)
  • MiguelX66
    MiguelX66 Posts: 24 Member
    My advice: give her a challenge. Tell her if she can log everything, every day for two weeks you'll give her a reward (you're married...be creative :-P )


    I like that. She will like it too, I am sure. I will have to think of something good! :)

    Thank you everyone for your advice.
  • princessrtk
    princessrtk Posts: 28
    And to add my two cents...let her do what she wants to do. Keep doing what you're doing (congrats btw) and when she is ready to come back to tracking she will. Some girls just like to do what they think is right...and usually will see the error of their ways. I know this first hand. : )

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