Help. My Wife Can't Lose Weight!

[WannaBeBig]

I haven't posted here in a long while, but when I do I always get good tips.

Heres the problem. My wife had our child almost 18 months ago and she is still 50 lbs overweight.

She has been dedicated to cardio and weight lifting for the past four months and haven't lost any weight. She does one hour treadmill 5 times a week, lifts with me 3 times a week, and watches her diet.

I feel sorry for her because she works at it so hard but the scale aint moving and I don't know what else to tell her. It looks like she's doing everything right.

ANY ADVICE PLEASE?!

 

[Sassy69]

Easy place to start -- what does her diet look like?

 

[makedah]

Has the doctor ruled out thyroid problems?

Does she know EXACTLY how much she's eating or is she estimating/guesstimating?

 

[WannaBeBig]

Yes, she has he throid checked, no problem there.

And she inputs her meals into some software she purchased, so I know shes monitoring her diet well.

However, she has reshaped her body. At first I couldn't even see her collar bone, but now they are showing and shes more shapely. But the scqle haven't moved.

No matter how I compliment her, the bottom line is she wants the scale to move and her dress size to go down!

 

[WannaBeBig]

TOSS THE SCALE!? Are you trying to get me killed? I said this is my 'wife." Maybe you're not married, but you never toss anything that belong to The Wife, unless you plan to live the next few days in hell! (LOL)

But seriously, I will post her meals within 24hours and hopefully you can analyze it for me then. So please check back.

 

[makedah]

If she won't toss the scale, maybe she'll switch to a tape measure. But hey, if she wants to drive herself nuts on the scale, it's her party!

 

[Sassy69]

You should bring her back to basics...."weight" is not a correct measure of "how fat you are". Body fat % is the most relevant number. Weight is simply how attractive you are to the earth as your mass is related to the force of the pull of gravity. "Weight" can be made up of many things --- muscle, fat, big hair, heavy makeup, etc. (just kidding )

The scale is one data point, but let's remember first that muscle weighs more than fat. Additionally she may be somehow retaining water. Water is not fat, but it still weighs alot and can make you "look" fat. Other ways to measure improvement are how well the same pair of pants fit over time -- its a relative measure of "volume", albeit somewhat subjective, its still somethign that adds more relevant data besides just weight.

Also its one thing to eat certain things, but as I'm constantly learning on this board, there's more to nutrition and health than just putting stuff in your mouth and pounding away on a treadmill. Other factors can be sensitivity to certain things (e.g. wheat, gluten), eating too many carbs, not eating enough, eating at bad times, etc. etc.

If you want to get down to the root of the problem, start digging. Obviously somethign she's doing isn't working so let's see what we can change and try to get results.

Let's see the diet.

 

[Sassy69]

You should bring her back to basics...."weight" is not a correct measure of "how fat you are". Body fat % is the most relevant number. Weight is simply how attractive you are to the earth as your mass is related to the force of the pull of gravity. "Weight" can be made up of many things --- muscle, fat, big hair, heavy makeup, etc. (just kidding )

The scale is one data point, but let's remember first that muscle weighs more than fat. Additionally she may be somehow retaining water. Water is not fat, but it still weighs alot and can make you "look" fat. Other ways to measure improvement are how well the same pair of pants fit over time -- its a relative measure of "volume", albeit somewhat subjective, its still somethign that adds more relevant data besides just weight.

Also its one thing to eat certain things, but as I'm constantly learning on this board, there's more to nutrition and health than just putting stuff in your mouth and pounding away on a treadmill. Other factors can be sensitivity to certain things (e.g. wheat, gluten), eating too many carbs, not eating enough, eating at bad times, etc. etc.

If you want to get down to the root of the problem, start digging. Obviously somethign she's doing isn't working so let's see what we can change and try to get results.

Let's see the diet.

 

[smoknjilly]

i also say...toss the damn scale!

Ive lost 6 inches off my bod in the past year and I weigh the same...

 

[TEXgrl]

i agree with tossing the scale, i think i actually weigh the same or maybe only a few pounds less than i did when i got serious about working out only 4 years ago. i'm 3 sizes smaller, however, and much less flabby than i was back then. i sometimes get caught up in the worries about what the scale says, and i always come back here, and get those worries put to rest.

i agree with the tape measure advice as well, i saw the most progress measuring myself about every 6 weeks, especially in the beginning.

get your wife on here and have her read for herself.

another thing i wanted to ask was, with the cardio, what the intensity? is she walking the treadmill at a fast clip, or simply trudging along at a slow pace? how much weight is she lifting? is she challenging herself, ie, lifting heavy?

oh, yeah, and i feel CERTAIN spatts can tear up the diet!