a stubborn spouse... help!
 

How do you incorporate your stubborn spouse into your weight loss efforts? I'm tired of cooking two different meals for each meal. For example, for dinner I like to have a piece of grilled chicken, 2 servings of (frozen or fresh) vegetables, 1 serving of fruit. He likes it too only if it is fried, laced with salt, and drenched in heavy syrup! When he cooks, he doesn't make a healthy alternative for me to eat. So when I pick at my food, he gets upset. I try to explain to him that I want to lose weight. He says that he supports me but his actions prove otherwise. Get this, he also wants to lose weight! But, I don't see that happening when he eats for two at every meal! What could/should I do? :?:

Tell him to cook his own meals, and you do your own?

That's a tough one. I haven't had to deal with an unsupportive spouse (or a supportive one, because I don't have a spouse).

I feel your pain! My live-in boyfriend eats like a 5 yr. old (no offense to 5-yr. olds!) - mac & cheese, chicken fingers, peanut butter & jelly, potato chips, spaghetti, sugared cereals. He will not touch anything green - no kidding, NO VEGGIES, ever. The only fruit he'll eat is a banana. And he snacks every night on cookies, candy bars or ice cream.

So, what I do is "every man for himself" in the kitchen. He knows he is always welcome to try anything that I'm making. Usually he makes his own. We trade choosing the restaurants when we go out to eat. I try to pick a place where I know I can get something fairly healthy. He goes for places like Steak n' Shake, IHOP, or Taco Bell. We grocery shop together once a week. I can't tell him he can't get what he likes - he lives here too and he pays half the grocery bill just like me. (But it does get real hard sometimes trying to ignore all his snacks in the cupboards.)

He knows losing weight is important to me, but in the past 6 years he's seen me start and abandon several plans...so he probably just thinks, well, here we go again, let's see how long she sticks to it this time. I actually can't blame him for that.

He never fluctuates a pound one way of the other, despite his horrible diet. He says he loves me just the size I am, and he will continue to love me no matter what size I may become, whether it's bigger or smaller. Of course, with our size difference (I'm 5'9" and 199, he's 5'5" and 140) I could whomp his *** if I needed to, so it's not all bad! :D

Phantastica,
I would love to do my thing and him do his in the kitchen, but it gets tedious.

EllyMay,
Are we married to the same man??? :D Just kidding, but I swear my husband has the same eating habits! Like you, I don't/can't tell him what he can/can't eat and we also split the grocery bill. I'm 5'9", 179lbs and he's 6'3", 275lbs. He works out though, so he's pretty solid. Could tone up the midsection, but who am I to judge?!? He also says that he loves me just the way I am, but I don't. I loved me at 150lbs.... :(

Make the meals and let him either eat it or make his own.
In this day we dont have the time to be making two meals. This is something that you want in life ,he can support you or he can cook his own meals. You are trying to take care of yourself to give him a healthy mate. And thats that.
There is no in between when your trying to maintain a more healthy lifestyle.
Its like they always say either get on the boat or get off the boat either way its leaving with you or without you.

I'm with the superfreak....if he doesn't wanna eat what you are making, tough tooties.

I wouldn't make two meals. My husband wasn't happy at first with the zone meals I'm making but after a couple weeks he got use to them and now he enjoys eating all the fruits and veges. He also is enjoying the 13 pounds he's lost!

It must be so much work for you to make two meals everynight. I would try to have him either eat what you do or have him cook his own meals!.

Oh my yes. I've been there in many ways. My husband was initially resistant to any of my weight loss attempts, as he didn't want anyone to force HIM to lose weight. So, when I tried it myself, I had a few very short lived attempts. It was hard not having his full support.

This time we talked about it, and I told him this was about me and not him. He WAS very good about eating what I cooked. Sometimes it was easy to make two versions. I told him if he wanted something else when he was done eating, then he could go ahead and get it himself. Sometimes we do cook separate meals. In fact, planning one night a week of separate meals has been helpful for us.

He also asked me what changes he could make to improve food for me when he cooked. It helped that often he was grilling meat while I was making the other parts of the meal.

There were also issues about going out to eat! Oh my.

We talked. A lot.

So now, 4 months later, he's actually come around to the point where he has started to count calories too! Though I'm not exactly how that happened, I'm thrilled. Things have gotten MUCH easier.

PM me if you would like a sympathetic ear or some more strategizing!

I'm with everyone else that says have him make his own meals. If he doesn't like what you're making, he's not a little child, he can go make his own food. It probably wouldn't KILL him to actually eat healthy as well ;) Skinny or overweight, eating healthy is good :)

Then again, I'm not dealing with an unsupportive spouse either. My husband is there supporting me and eating it with me. Although it does eat the candy bars where I don't ;)

My fiance has by no means been unsupportive, but he's rather picky. And if I tell him ahead of time dinner is something like chicken and broccoli, he'll complain and pressure me to make him something else. But he's also admitted that if I've already started cooking, or just make it, then he will eat it. Like many others have mentioned, he has come around to eating healthier. And after I lost a significant amount of weight (the last time) counting calories he started to count and lose too.

Now I am back to counting, and he just focuses on eating reasonably for lunch as he knows I will be cooking a dinner with healthy portions and calorie counts for each half. Sometimes he modifies what I make, like adding cheese or other things to make it a little tastier for him (afterall, we are usually eating half each of meals and he is quite a bit taller than me so he can stand to eat a bit more). I also think about adding little spices to things (he loves anything spicey) so that the meal is more like a treat for him even though I know it's low calorie. And we've compromised on vegetables. I will sneak them in; like peas and corn mixed in with the rice, or the meat. There are ways that it can be a tasty and fulfilling meal for your significant other and still be healthy for you. Especially if you can talk him into taking a bigger portion than you :)

Good luck with it, I know if you are honest and talk to him he will support you (either by eating what you eat, or making his own or modifying for himself). My fiance doesn't look that overweight, and he's pretty close to healthy for his height, but when I started to lose the weight he started to get more concerned about himself and eating healthy is a bigger part of that than losing weight so maybe your man will get a little introspective as well.

My dh was really difficult at the beginning of the year when I started, and did some insulting-to-five-year-olds behaviour, like having tantrums, insisting on cakes and desserts (he never used to eat them before) and just generally being difficult.

He was really worried, that although I wasn't overweight or obese, but morbidly obese, that I would be disappointed when my weight loss attempts failed, or worse still, successful and leave him.

I didn't make it an issue, I just cooked our meals, and let him do what he wanted, there is only one meal he has refused to eat, and that was a crab meat stir fry and it was disgusting!!! I couldn't eat it either!!!!

He is now my biggest supporter, and is so proud of me, it's really amazing how much he's changed. And he has lost 10lbs without even trying!!!

I'm vegetarian, and I am the primary chef in the family. I cook meals, and if Hubby wants some meat in addition to the food that I cook, he makes it himself.

Sounds like your sweetheart likes to add-on to what you cook, rather than refusing to eat any of it.

So you can cook your food, and he can add more to it -- add the marinade, add the cheese, add the salt. Adding a few things won't make him do a lot of extra work, and it will help you cook one meal.

Also, I'm confused about why you have to be the one to cook two meals. Is that just the division of labor in your house? Maybe if it has been your job in the past to cook meals for him, you could switch chores. Like if he usually does the laundry, you could say, why don't you let me do the laundry, and you can take over the job of cooking for yourself?

Yeah, what she said. :D

And if (a) he really wants to lose weight, and (b) he keeps eating fried food covered in salt, etc., rent "Super Size Me" and make him watch it.

LOL!!! We've seen "Super Size Me"!!! Hey, I think I might watch that again! Darned MickeyD's! :dizzy: The funny thing is that he says he wants to lose weight too and will ask me about counting calories and stuff, but his actions just prove otherwise. He has more clothes in his closet that he can't fit than I do!!! I hate to put his business in the street, but oh well! :devil:

Make the meals and let him either eat it or make his own. ... That's what I would do.

Glad I don't have no problem with my hubby. He eats every meals I cook! Recently he told me that he had high blood pressure. So far, I haven't add salt in the cooking lately but I keep Lite Salt on side if needed. I am the only one that cook every meals by my choice. Hubby doesn't complained at all until he would tell me he want some etc. I would cook for him. He's bad cook!! Glad I have a wonderful husband for 8 years!