how do you stay healthy when your spouse has bad eating habit’s and does not prepare the food’s you need to get healthy?
Hey Ira-
I can understand where you are coming from. When making a transition not supported by the rest of the family, reaching goals can be hard. Lots of people losing weight or gaining muscle have to have extra hard because they have options before them.
Its much harder to eat your rice, chicken and veggies when there is a pizza on the table.
First I’d suggest trying to get your wife on your side. Working together means you can workout and eat healthy together. Having someone to help push you and hold you accountable goes a long ways.
If she doesn’t want to do that, you’ll have to put some extra effort into eating healthy. Prepare your own meals ahead of time and be sure to stock up at the store. Be sure to crowd out on your food so you dont have room for the junk.
Best of luck.
I think I understand your dilemma Ira, I have had several husbands share this concern with me. Ultimately it comes down to dialogue with your spouse. You need to express your concerns about your health and let her express her concerns about how she has learned to cook for you.
Don’t blame just share. For example,
Honey I am concerned about my health and I have been reading that deep fried foods can lead to being overweight, and various diseases. I was wondering if there was something we could do to make a change in the foods we have chosen to eat?
Avoiding the talk is an injustice to both of you.
Having the support from those who live with you is important to help you reach your fitness goal. I believe education is a big step in helping her making better choices when preparing the meals. Try educating and helping her understand why you want to cook healthier meals. You can ask if she would be willing to commit to at least one or two healthy meals per week. And the other times, just practice portion control to make sure you keep your calories to a minimum. Once she sees you reaching your goals, she may change her ways because of your example.
Why don’t you try cooking some of those meals. Maybe she doesn’t realize how easy and tasty it is to have healthy food. Or maybe she isn’t sure how to cook healthy meals. It took me a long time to cook healthy. Maybe try going into Pinterest. There are some wonderful recipes there that are healthy that you can try. Create new favorites. Make cooking healthy fun and interesting.
When my wife and I moved in together after we got married, I realized how terrible her eating habits were/are. She never really learned how to cook. It’s weird because her Mom is an okay cook, but she never cooked with my wife and taught her anything about meal planning or preparation. Her family also has weird eating habits. Her brother will not eat vegetables (except potatoes). Her father will not eat any kind of lettuce. Her mom hates chicken! As a child, my wife refused to eat anything except ice-cream untul she was about 4 years old. She was also significantly malnourished and underweight as a small child. Her parents told me this one time, and they were laughing and joking about it (WTF!!!). Growing up, I think her Mom didn’t want to cook very often, and so her Dad would just grill hamburgers about 5 nights a week.
So, I had to learn how to cook within the first year we were married, because she would not put out much effort to learn how. 12 years later, I cook about 95% of the meals now. It’s kind-of a thankless job, but it is better (and cheaper) than eating fast-food and junk-food all the time and weighing 450lbs and dying of a heart-attack at age 50. I also have type 1 diabetes and need to count carbs for everything I eat. That makes it extremely difficult some days, especially when my wife brings home cookies, cake, ice-cream, chips, non-diet soda, etc.