Spouses and weight loss / gain

[BindsThatTie]

The exercise/diet rollercoaster is something a lot of us can connect on. It sucks when it happens but atleast for my wife, it's always a good thing. Primarily because it inevitably crashes and burns and she's reminded that she hates it and mentally accepts she's going to be a "bigger girl". And then this mental acceptance that she's never going to be a "skinny girl" anymore leads her to normalize even more gluttony which balloons her weight > to the point she feels her body is out of control with ultimately cues another diet > crashes and burns > and on and on.

My wife starting at an ultra-skinny figure needed these cycles to slowly accept her phases: I guess I'll be a "thicker" girl. Now I'm a "chunky" girl. I guess I'm going to be "fat...I'm just not going to get super fat".

Mentally she needed these cycles to slowly accept she loves the lifestyle of being fat. With each new phase, new pants, she gives in and eats more calorie dense food and snacks more, lays around more. She never used to eat fast food, but now her belly is big enough that, in her mind, "honestly, who's going to even notice it at this point? Fries sound so good right now."

But in reality, she slowly keeps growing and her will and self-control decreasing. 

[BindsThatTie]

So much of it is mental and their perception. My wife doesn't "diet" – she only exercises. And she continually gains while exercising and will say things like "look at my tummy now, how much flatter it is!".... even though she was up 10lbs and clearly fatter. Her hips were simply wider making her gut appear a little flatter. 

[BindsThatTie]

Once my wife gained around 80lbs, she started to lay around all the time and when we had to do activities, her joints started hurting. When she went bare foot, her arches weren't accustomed to the added weight and this ultimately led to her injuring a tendon in her foot. She was couch bound for months which really helped pile on even more weight. But she now tries to exercise regularly to avoid the plagueing issues of a sedentary life.

That said she has steadily gained over this entire period. She may go burn 200-300 calories in the gym, but it's really nothing in the big scheme of things - she then comes home and pigs out more than ever. So the exercising doesn't anger me like it used to.

And there's a guilty part of me that enjoys her working out with these massive 300lb women at the office gym who also continue to gain and "just can't seem to figure out why". They take my wife out to Mexican restaurants for lunch and stuff her silly and then get on the treadmill for 20min after work.    1,400cal lunch in... 200cal workout, do the math. 📈📈📈