[Emme]

My husband's eating is better than it used to be, but it isn't great. I actually think he is depressed (and he is making a doctor's appointment for next week), he refuses to exercise (even though we have a treadmill in the house and he put up a basketball hoop outside), and he gorges on food...all while he keeps saying "I am so fat"...literally.

For example, last night I had 2 oreos, and he polished off 10-12 with a glass of milk. He is always hungry and scavaging for food even if we just ate, and he always eats right before bed. He is about 60-70 pounds overweight and I am trying to help him by suggesting that he eat other things or not as much of something, but there is a fine line between trying to be helpful and being a nag. Any suggestions/advice? I feel like I have tried everything and I want him to be healthy.

[NiteNicole]

You can't nag someone into taking better care of himself. I have had "well meaning" people trying to "help" me my whole life and here I sit, nearly 300 pounds. I truly believe you want the best for him, but from his end it probably just feels like nagging and criticism.

Who does the grocery shopping in your house? And are you currently on a plan? If you do the shopping, you could tell him that YOU are trying really hard to stick with YOUR plan and it's making things difficult for YOU if you have to buy Oreos and junk. Just don't buy it. For you. If he wants it, let him go get it. That is the deal my husband and I have now. I think it is terribly unfair for him to give me a list of chips and chocolate while I'm trying really hard to stay away from those things. If he wants them, he is welcome to go shop for them and keep them in his home office.

You can also ask the he walk with you, or tell him that it motivates you to walk if he does as well. For me, it is harder to skip walking when I know my husband has already done it. I don't want to be the lazy one!

You can only change yourself, no matter how much you may want to help him and fix his health issues. You can only do your best and talk about YOU and YOUR issues and hope that some of it resonates with him or makes him feel uncomfortable enough to follow your lead.

Good luck. We have a bit of that going on in my home, too. My husband has gained a lot of weight in the past few years and while I am always trying (and often failing) to make changes, he just sits and eats bags of candy and complains. I truly worry about his health more than mine but the more I suggest he make changes or insinuate he might want to do something, the more he fights and pouts. Now I know how my mom must've felt, trying to get a teenage me to go to WW!

[Emme]

Originally Posted by NiteNicole

Who does the grocery shopping in your house? And are you currently on a plan? If you do the shopping, you could tell him that YOU are trying really hard to stick with YOUR plan and it's making things difficult for YOU if you have to buy Oreos and junk. Just don't buy it.

I do the grocery shopping and buy pretty healthy things...the oreos were left over from a cheesecake that I made for a Christmas get-together, otherwise they would not have been in the house. I don't buy junk food because I know I'll eat it.

He knows that I am working hard on eating right, but even when we only have all healthy things in the house, he still manages to overeat whatever is in his site. And if we are out running errands he might run through Taco Bell and get 4 different things, but I don't say anything because I'm not his mom.

I do ask him to workout with me and the summer is better because we do go for 5 miles walks, but the winter is a different story. We bought the treadmill so we can get fit during the winter when we can't go outside and walk, but he hasn't stepped on it yet and we've had it for two months.

[Jesse Taylor]

Unfortunately, there's next to nothing you can do other than lead by example. You're right, your not his mother and you can't nag him. If he's suffering from depression, ride it out until his appointment. If he's prescribed meds for the depression, they may balance him out and his eating will level off. Holidays can be a bad time for even the happiest people. It's even harder for those that aren't happy. I'm grateful tonight is the last night of the holiday season. I can't wait to get back to normal life.

[Rana]

He might also have something physically wrong with him, rather than just being depression.

I know that I was feeling the same way but feeling out of control with my body right before I realized I had to treat my PCOS (it was the insulin resistance that was causing me to be depressed, eat sugary foods to get "up" again, crash down, and so on). Until then, I thought my PCOS was just an infertility issue, not a whole body issue.

Maybe he also needs a full check up, with a blood sugar test and A1C included.