I know I may come off sounding as though I'm without hope...but really I do feel that we have a very strong marriage and a fairly good relationship "communication wise". We seldom argue about anything and we seem to enjoy a lot of the same activities.
I guess I've given the impression that my wife is not trying at all to control her weight...but that is not true. She does try to select foods that are healthy and even when eating out is selective about what she orders. She also does put a bit of effort into trying to stay physically active too, but it just seems that she lacks the committment to all of the things she KNOWS are important to control her weight.
I do believe that it works in a cycle. She has told me that she's been heavy her entire adult life (to the point that she suffered humiliation in her high school years). When we met, she had recently had her most success with weight loss and she looked and felt great. She was very happy all the time and I think she enjoyed shopping for smaller clothes and working hard to make herself pretty...partly because she felt prettier than she ever had in the past. She also was thrilled that she finally had a lasting relationship (me)....everything was "clicking" for her. We decided to get married and everthing was going great except that her father became terminally sick.
I think the stress of wedding planning combined with Dad being sick and expecting him to die made her depressed and caused her to relax her dieting/exercising routines. From that point, the downward cycle began. Almost immediately after we were married her father passed away (he wasn't able to attend our wedding which also broke her heart). While her father's death was not a surprise, it still cut deeply emotionally and then before she'd really recovered from that death, her sister died all of a sudden. She now became even more depressed and, although I doubt consciously, put even less effort into controlling her weight.
As the weight has been going back on...she no longer fits into her nicer clothes. She gave away her old "fat clothes" as she called them and she doesn't enjoy shopping for and buying new clothes that are bigger. Problem is, she ends up wearing loose fitting clothes around the house because they are more comfortable, but they are also very unattractive. When feeling fat and dressed frumpy, what would be the point of fixing her hair and makeup nice?
Meanwhile, I am her husband....but 80% of the time that we're together, she puts no effort into looking nice. I understand why, but when you add up the weight gain, the lack of nice clothing and the lack of hair and makeup beatification...I just get really turned off. When I'm turned off, I'm more apt to have a poor attitude which is like pouring gasoline on a fire.
I bite my tongue most of the time because I really do feel that the biggest problem is depression and I can't see how making her have even less self esteem is going to improve the depression. But, I feel that I too am now suffering from depression. I don't like being sad so much. I am a happy person that is being saddened by the situation that WE are in. I feel badly for my wife and wish she could get back on track for several reasons. I want HER to be happy again, I want her to be healthy for the long term...and I want to be happy again.
The pregnancy now throws a bit of a curve ball. I am hopeful that she will get excited about being a mother and break out of some of her depression (right now I think she just has some anxiety due to the fact that she miscarried only a few weeks into the last pregnancy a few months ago...one other depression event that I neglected to mention). But, I also know that successfully controlling weight during a pregnancy is going to be very difficult. I fear that she may wind up being quite a bit heavier after the birth of our child....heavy to the point that she may have difficulties physically dealing with the duties of motherhood (she has knee problems already).
I've spent a lot of time thinking about the proper approach to all of this...but I just can't seem to figure out how to get things going in the right direction. I even sometimes think that maybe some kind of weight loss surgery may be the best solution. I doubt that any doctor would recommend such surgery during a pregnancy....but are weight loss surgeries sometimes discussed and planned "incase" a C-section is necessary? Or have I dreamed that up on my own? I guess what I'm getting at is whether the doctors involved in the pregnancy may be able to discuss future weight loss measures with my wife.
Sorry again for being so long...but you all have been helping, so I'm trying to give the most information possible. Thanks again for your help.
