I'm glad I have this place to go and vent and where people understand. I had just started eating my lunch ~ I had chosen a pot pie this afternoon. I know that it probably wasn't the best choice, but I have written it down and figured it into my calories for the day and it put me a little over, but not too bad. Well, my husband came in and said ~ aren't pot pies fatening? Grrrrr It's not like I eat one every day ~ once in a while I like to have one.
He thinks he is trying to help, but he just makes me so frustrated. And I feel like I am going to burst a vessle or something ~ I try to explain and he is like ~ I don't need explanations, I don't need to understand.
I tried to explain anyway ~ I told him that if he wanted to help me ~ listening and trying to understand would be a big help to me. He tried then to listen, but when I got to the part where I was telling how for me, food is almost like an addiction ~ like alcohol or drugs to some people he rolled his eyes. More Grrrrrrrr
This is perhaps one of the biggest hurdles for me ~ here at home the lack of understanding. The lack of his even wanting to understand. He is an intelligent man and it is so frustrating that he won't listen and is unwilling to learn. He maintains that if I did like he did ~ I could lose the weight. He is blind to the differences between a man and a woman ~ hormones, metabolism, emotions etc......And he keeps bringing up weight loss surgery. I don't want weight loss surgery. Grrrrrrr again.
Anyway ~ thank you all for listening and understanding. I am still trying ~ not giving up. Sounding hopeful here ~ when I succeed at this thing ~ it will be thanks to you all.
Oh Gayle I think one of the most frustrating things about being overweight is how (most) people who are not in our position just refuse to understand how difficult it can be. How many times did I hear "Why don't just eat less?" or "You can eat THAT on Weight Watchers?" or "How can eating make you feel better?" or "Wouldn't it just be easier to get your stomach stapled?" and so on. Talk about wanting to roll eyes!
I know you could probably explain to your husband until you're blue in the face that the whole thing about a lifestyle change is not a long-term diet of deprivation, but rather being able to fit ANY kind of food into your eating plan (including a pot pie now and then). As for the other factors (addiction, emotional eating, hormones, etc.) I guess it comes down to having to walk a mile in our shoes to truly understand, but I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy.
I'm sorry he's not being supportive in the way you want, but you have to be your own biggest cheerleader because you're doing this for YOU and not for him (though I'm sure he'll be proud of you when you do acheive your goal).
Always remember that we're here any time you want to vent!!
My BF and I food police eachother when shopping. Meaning, I'll ask him if he thinks an item is ok to purchase and I'll check the items he picks up. The other day there was a particular item that had more than double of the calories than he thought it would have and he told me he wanted it. I checked it and told him, he was surprised and then we found an alterative. I think that is helpful for when I go grocery shopping.
If we are eating an item at home or at a restaurant though, we don't police eachother. We feel that we can have anything as long as watch our portions.
Call me childish, but glaring and saying "not helpful honey" was my way of dealing with it. Now I've lost 60+ pounds he knows I know what I'm doing and leaves me alone to get on with it (and hugs me a lot and says how well I am doing)
Col has learnt now that I can eat whatever I want, in moderation, making healthy choices. He made lots of glareable comments in the beginning, when really I could have gleefully thrown a bowl of chopped celery at him, but he's over that now!
I have been struggling with my diet and my choices lately. So I decided to take the weekend off, get some of my cravings satisfied, and get back on plan Monday morning. Yesterday I allowed myself anything I wanted.
Yesterday we went to my mother in law's house, and I know in advance that she serves food that would make a diabetic go into shock. (I'm not diabetic, but I normally try and eat low carb, and her husband IS diabetic). So I know that visiting with her, sharing a meal at her house and staying on my diet plan is nearly impossible. So I planned around it and took the day off.
Well my son decided to tell me last night that "I'm not trying to be mean, but I think you should get back on your diet". This after all day at her house, after he had a HUGE piece of cake (while I asked for only a tiny sliver), after potato salad, and many other things that he and I both ate.
My son isn't a tiny kid, he isn't excessively fat, but he has been heftier than normal himself for a few years.
It just got on my nerves. I asked him "What did I eat that everyone else didn't eat?" He didn't have an answer.
People who never had to deal with it will probably never understand. We just have to keep going and prove that we know what we are doing and whats best for us.
For most of his life DH hasn't had a weight problem. When he hit his mid 40's his ability to eat anything and stay trim ended. He gained about 50 lbs. Then at his anual dr's visit, the dr put him on a 1000 cal diet and told him to walk every day. He got the weight off and has kept it off for about 6 years. I guess he thinks that makes him an expert. That part is frustrating because he thinks I should be able to do like he did and that (or weight loss surgery) will solve all my problems. I don't think he knows much about weight loss surgery ~ just thinks it would sort of a fix everything. That he can not seem to understand that each person is different and what works for one may not work for another is also very frustrating. He has a will power that I don't have ~ I wish I was like him in that way.
I guess it is frustrating for him to watch me in my never ending battle. We have been together for 30 years this year. When we started out I was 100 lbs. smaller. He has watched my weight go up and up over time. He has watched as I have tried and failed over and over again.
In all fairness, he really isn't trying to be mean, he is concerned. As we get older, the health problems have increased (for me) and he is worried that if I don't lick this weight thing, that something really bad will happen to me and that will affect both of our lives.
I have started again a couple days ago ~ writing everything down and measuring ~ trying harder. I am hoping so hard that this time ~ I am human and it is silly to think that I will not mess up ever ~ but I hope that when I do, that I can get back up and not let it turn into a weeks, months long binge.
Yeah, men think they are experts at anything! My OH is the same, for some reason he thinks that his diet can include all manner of things and he will lose weight because he 'runs about a lot at work' (he actually seems to be gaining weight!) and that qualifies him to tell me what I should and should not be having (before I went on the VLCD Cambridge Diet) but strangely his list of 'OK' things included burgers (so long as you didn't have fries) and it was ok to eat 3-4 pound of pasta with olive oil for dinner....hmmm!
I may be out of line, but aren't you too small to even consider weight loss surgery? I mean, I see from your ticker that you want to lose 90 more pounds, but is that even really an option for him to be pointing out? Just curious.
I think the problem is that men in general like to think mechanically~if something gets broken, you fix it like a car. I bet that is why he is so quite to suggest surgery, it is his way of 'fixing' the problem rather than the female way of long term thinking. I'm convinced most men have a hard time thinking beyond the weekend so to consider anything as long term as a lifestyle change is alien to them!
From what I have read, people who do get their stomach's stapled, have a very tiny little space left for their food to go in. Maybe less than a cupful of space left. They often feel ill after eating. They have to eat low carb, in order to get the nutrients they need.
The really dumb thing about it all is that if you eat low carb (which you will have to do after the surgery anyway), instead of get the surgery, you will drop weight and really about as quickly as you would with the surgery. But of course, without the complications of surgery. Which would you choose given the two options?
What some of you have mentioned are my thoughts too. There is much I don't know about weight loss surgery. From what I have heard though, I thought that at my size I would not qualify ~ I have heard of people who had to put on weight to weigh enough to get the surgery.
And after the surgery you have to learn a whole new way of eating and change your lifestyle. So, you have to do the same thing to lose weight the regular way ~ why risk the complications of the surgery like Sherry said.
An encounter with the food police ~ Grrrrrrr
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to you, kiddo!
you on.
