Originally Posted by Petite Powerhouse:
Very true. It's hard to even get my BF to admit his weight. He only told me what he weighed after I told him what I weighed—and this was after we had been together 12 years. He figured that he owed me the same level of trust, but he did preface the number with "but don't laugh."

My husband and I have been together for 22 years now and he still hates to admit when he gets below 165.

Rose Rodent~ I am seeing weird images in your post :dizzy:

YES!!!!!!! I really wish I had his metabolism!! My husband is 6'5" and weighs about 195. When I first met him about 7 years ago, he weighed about 165-170. Once he joined the Air Force, the daily PT he gained some weight/muscle, he was at the gym a lot. He can eat anything he wants and not gain a pound! It drives me crazy! So not fair! He's a long drink of water! ;)

Definitely, yes. I sometimes joke between us that together we make a perfect 10 because he's taller and slender like a 1 and I'm rather round like a 0; he looks at me with dismay like it's so not funny, but I'm trying to find ways to accept myself and, at the moment, fat and working on reducing it is one of the key factors of my life and I'm hoping humor will help me to deal with it as nothing else seems to.

My husband is 5'6" and weighs about 132; he's athletic and very strong and trains at a gym 3x a week, so he's mostly well-sculpted muscle with an incredibly tiny amount of fat. He's very careful with his body and during our wedding (last July) he had gotten up to 142, decided it needed to come off and made it happen. He eats anything he wants and his body just burns it up. For instance, he had been drinking soda with every meal and eating lots of chocolate and pastries and that's what caused his weight gain. By cutting down on those things, he saw immediate results. When he goes into a weight-lifting phase, he puts on muscle pretty quickly.

On the other hand, I'm 5'0" and now weigh 191. I gained weight while planning for our wedding despite attempts at diet and exercise and have been unable to take it off because with so many things going on in my life (finishing a PhD program, teaching a class, and lots of other sedentary career advancement things) that keep me from being active, I'm not able to balance my weight loss efforts very well. It definitely makes me feel bad and feel embarrassed. He's supportive of my efforts, but thinks I just don't try very hard. He might be right about that, but, he doesn't seem to understand that there is an emotional component for me about this because I've been struggling with my weight for so long.

Our biggest issue is learning how to find balance, I suppose. He's a vegetarian (except for fish, shrimp, and eggs). I'm not a vegetarian, in part because I'm hyperinsulinemic (according to recent blood tests) and have been advised to have more protein and less carbs. He never discourages me from eating meat, but I tend to avoid it lately, seeking protein elsewhere because it makes more sense in preparing meals; I won't ask him to cook meat when he's cooking and I don't want to cook separate meals when I cook (but I might have to).

Anyway, you're not alone in the being with a man who is more slender than you thing. For me, it affects my self esteem negatively only when I see how difficult it is for me to do something he can do effortlessly because I often feel like I'm failing. But, it's nice to hear that others out there have thin husbands or boyfriends, too; I used to think I was the only one that thought about these things. :)

Originally Posted by ragdoll:
For me, it affects my self esteem negatively only when I see how difficult it is for me to do something he can do effortlessly because I often feel like I'm failing.

This is a big problem for my mum. She shops and cooks for all the food and because he's blind he doesn't watch TV or see anything in passing so he doesn't know about any food he doesn't specifically ask about. When she announces she is going on a diet (and it is always a temporary thing with them) then he joins her becuase he's going to be eating the same food anyway, but because he's taller, male and doesn't even know how to make himself an additional snack even if he wants one (he's never bothered to learn, he could if he chose to) then he never cheats. She's around the food all day long shopping and cooking and she eats extra. Then they compare weight losses (even if she asks him not to say anything) and he loses 4lb a week.

Most of his weight is alcohol weight anyway, so all he has to do is stop drinking for a month or so and it all falls off without any changes to his diet, and if he's cutting down with food as well he just sheds weight at a rate of knots, not to mention that he's only got about 30lbs to lose and she has 80+. She has to do a total change of menu to lose anything vs his "just stay out of the pub". So she always sabotages herself to end the competition. It's so sad, she lost so much weight when they diagnosed her diabetic and told her if she lost weight she might be able to totally reverse her numbers, but then one nurse innocently told her that her numbers were so low she probably shouldn't have been diagnosed at all because she's so borderline so she got angry that they'd frightened her and... you guessed it, put all the weight back on.

You can see I was born to be a yoyo dieter!