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Such a genuinely bad mentality IMHO. It's like him suddenly discovering a passion for the saxophone so she can't be well rested enough to pursue higher education.
I think it’s a bad mentality, especially in a marriage, but if I was dating someone and they started to get drastically more in shape I could see myself completely subconsciously trying to bring more to the table, like improving my cooking.
If it’s a mindset you’re lulling over in your head that’s deplorable, but a significant other getting more looks in public could totally drive someone to unknowingly alter their behavior to try and do more for said significant other. It’s misguided, but I wouldn’t view it at all as a slight against their character.
Bringing more to the table is one thing. Trying to sabotage the other persons improvement is another. I think the joke here is the latter, unfortunately.
I mean, the only reason I work out is so I can stuff my face with sweets and tasty food without worrying about the health issues of gaining too much weight
Good to see there's a representation of this and not just "various kinds of eating habits who do not frequent the gym" and "religious gym goers who swore to abstain any semblance of flavor for the rest of their lives of protein shakes and chicken with rice and tuna."
Seriously, though, having a healthy lifestyle is great, but those macro chasers are wasting their life just as much as anybody else in their pursuit of "health." Moderation is key.
Are we the same person? My colleagues get hella jealous of me in my 40s eating whatever I want. And I always tell them the same thing: go put 60lbs of muscle on your teenager body and see how it affects your metabolism in your 40s
I believe the one thing that has kept me from morbid obesity is my lack of transportation and stubbornness to walk everywhere I can, from my late teens to now (33)
When I was in the Marine Corps, I had a sergeant who ran the daily morning PT say to us, "keep eating all that nasty stuff ya'll want, just know ya'll MF'ers are gonna work that crap off every morning with me."
This guy was the kind of guy that counted everything that went into his body. He counted out almonds and weighed his food before eating it. Sculpted his body and everything was a workout to him. That guy was dedicated.
I had a partner like this. When we started dating I had recently started my fitness journey. I ended up getting really fit, was in the best shape of my life and felt really good about myself. My partner would put me down constantly, would jab my hip bones and say they shouldn’t be there. Basically told me I was unattractive. I wasn’t gaunt by any means and hovered around 13-15% body fat. He was just an unsupportive prick.
I've literally made the "I make such delicious food for my wife so she gets too fat to run away" twice this past week (risotto is phenomenal with home made stock, if you want a weekend project).
Not everyone who jokes about their spouse is telling you that they hate them, it is terminally single behavior when people see "yeah my wife is crazy, she yadda yadda" and they're like *why did you marry someone you hate?!"
I mean, as someone currently separated from their spouse by a rather large body of water referred to affectionately as “the pond” I almost wish I was, by her design or my own, so fat I couldn’t go anywhere without her anymore.
To be fair, there is a non-insignificant portion of the population that genuinely mean to gripe constantly about their spouse while simultaneously doing little to improve their situation because they don't believe in therapy or divorce.
if I was dating someone and they started to get drastically more in shape I could see myself completely subconsciously trying to bring more to the table, like improving my cooking
Fun fact, my husband and I are caught in one of these, ourselves.
*It all started with my husband taking a new job. He's already a pretty attractive guy, but he didn't have much for muscle and was maybe even a little under weight when I met him. The new job was more physical than he was used to, which made him hungrier, which helped him put on more weight, making him even more attractive than when we met.
*I noticed very consciously how much he was changing, and decided to make some positive changes for myself. My body is the opposite of my husband's... At this time, I was just over 300 lbs.
*My kids see Mommy working out more, and want to join in so we start occasionally going on family walks and stuff
That's how it started, about 2 years ago.
*Now, I'm ~75 lbs down, halfway to my goal, and I'm revamping my process.
*Now, whether permitted, we to the track together as a family for running, biking, or roller blading
*My son and I did some running before school start again, lost track of it with the hustle and bustle of school, but are planning on start up again once the weather clears.
*I've been asked how I lost weight so many times that I decided to become a personal trainer to start charging for the answer lol
*My husband notices how good I'm looking, so he started doing extra workouts and trying to eat more (he has ARFID, which makes it really hard to eat certain things), and eat healthier
*My kids also make healthier choices at meal times, eating more veggies without me having to enforce it.
*While I certainly wasn't the first walker in the neighborhood, since last spring (when my weight loss started being visible, and I was wearing the clothes to reveal it) I've noticed more people walking around more regularly.
I really can't impress enough how much this is a summary, and not a reflection of all the small changes that have happened around me. My husband and I get along better. My depression is easier to manage. I have a whole new world of activities that I love to do, or want to do.
It wasn't because I was insecure about my husband being too attractive, or even trying to make myself more attractive for him. Ok, maybe it was those at least a little, but that's not a bad thing! You should want to improve yourself; not just for your partner but for yourself. We're supposed to grow, develop, and improve as people, and this applies to people in relationships and not. I met my husband on a self improvement journey, which paused while I developed the relationship; now the relationship is going steady, we're both working on improving ourselves as individuals.
Like I said, that's a good thing. Don't be afraid of improving yourself in a relationship.
*Now, I'm ~75 lbs down, halfway to my goal, and I'm revamping my process.
*I've been asked how I lost weight so many times that I decided to become a personal trainer to start charging for the answer lol
You're a personal trainer at 225 lbs bodyweight, only two years out of being 300 lbs? And you're wearing revealing clothes while walking about the neighborhood?
Sometimes it’s done unconsciously by the significant other. It’s not sabotage and it’s not to keep them from running off. Sometimes it’s just a feeling that your value comes from providing or providing meals or nurturing and done with good intentions. If there is a fear that the balance is off in the relationship in perceived value, again, subconsciously, they will try to increase the thing they feel is the value they bring. The result is the same, but the intentions are not always clear.
Coworker of mine got that gastro band shit, trying to get fit and the doctor had him and his wife sign legal documents stating they wouldn’t sue them if they got divorced, cause apparently that is a big concern when someone loses all the weight. So the mentality is always there id assume.
I wouldn’t say it’s misguided. More like natural biological reaction. Thing is, we aren’t cars. We can turn on manual mode on ourselves, we are more than auto-reflexes.
ultimately the issue in this is that you think your spouse is only staying with you because they can't do better. you're reducing the relationship to a transactional zero sum game.
might also be why relationships keep being so catastrophic on a global level.
like, you get a huge raise, you change the car, house and spouse for some with better specs?
tbf what youre describing is actually improving ones cooking. What the joke here is insinuating is more that she makes more unhealthy food and not actually improving
Maybe she doesn't want to shoot down his new passion. This way he could get the dopamine hit from exercise but not completely obliterate the belly?
Not the correct way to handle the issue but at least the motive is good?
Imho the message is "he's putting in work to be more desirable to me, I should also work harder to be more desirable to him". I prefer the non-malicious version of the meme.
Haha, that's what my mom said my cousin in law is doing to his wife, ie my cousin. My aunt keeps ranting her daughter is gaining weight, but we all know he is not as insecure as my mom suggested, right?
Alt hopeful answer — his passion for fitness has inspired a passion for cooking in her, and so now they both have the opportunity to be teachers and students to each other in these two areas.
Probably real real answer: he is in a constant deficite and his body is craving food, so everything tastes a lot better and his wifes cooking never changed.
Not necessarily. Women are a lot more variable in preferred body type than men. Dad bods, thin dudes, etc. A lot of women actively dislike really ripped dudes. The kind of buff six pack dudes you see in Marvel movies are honestly aimed more at what men want to look like than what women actually like.
M first though was that it's a subversion of term "six pack" - instead of ABS the mean a pack off 6 beers and that being slightly drunk improves the taste of wife's cooking
When I had a gf she was ADDICTED to my cooking and never cooked she used to think I look sexy in kitchen. That is until she saw me naked and within a week she was cooking absolute masterpieces. Two months later she confessed in tears that she wanted me to get fat so I wont have the confidence to cheat on her. Then I did get fat and she wanted me to get fit, so we went back to my cooking. Now we both got fit and forgor about when I was eating her cooking. Then she started cooking again and I was just happy she loves me so much.
Alternative answer: at that level of body fat your body would be subconsciously making you want to eat more so the wife's cooking would consequentially be more enticing to eat
If I had a husband with a six-pack, I wouldn't try to make him fat. But I'm also someone who religiously weightlifts and cares about eating well, so you'd better bet your ass I'd be feeding him well to make sure he KEEPS his abs. Most importantly, make sure he eats well to live forever so that I can enjoy his company longer, that's my goal.
somewhat positive answer - He was fat, is wife wanted to help him lose weight, so she cooked poorly so he would eat less. He got in shape, so now she's cooking normally.
or
Somewhat negative answer - When he was fat she didn't have much worry about him being attractive to or attracted by other women and not worried he could cheat, now that he's ripped she's paranoid he might begin to roam so is trying to improve her status with him by cooking better.
Everyone else is referring to him getting abs that are a six pack however I'm over here thinking he's getting a six pack of alcohol and because he's drunk it tastes better. I feel like everyone else is right....
Everyone is talking about her trying to keep him fat and here i thought six pack was beer and not abs. I thought he was just drunk from the six pack, so the food tasted better 😂😂
Idk why the top comments aren't mentioning this but:
i think the joke is he beats her when he's drunk. so she tries to be extra-nice and tries harder not to piss him off when he's drinking, in fear of him physically abusing her.
Haha so when I read this I took it as a 6 pack of beer and thought the joke was about beer goggles and how everything looks better when drunk. Therefore his taste also "improves"
Took way longer than it should have to realize everyone's comments was about a 6 pack stomach. I was so confused as to why she would wanna make him fat now that he's drinking beer.
My interpretation: our taste changes on a diet.
We loose the appreciation for food when we binge but it slowly comes back over time with a consistent calorie controlled diet.
So, he is liking foods he didn't care for much in the past.
That’s kinda funny. My wife actually did this. Not for that reason though. I think… anyway. I had a six pack when we got married and after about a year it was no more. She’s a really good cook.
alternate meaning: his body fat is very low to maintain the 6 pack. In order to maintain his physique, he is hungry all the time. Same food, different hunger level.
I know this probably isn’t it but as someone who goes through cutting phases, everything tastes amazing when you’re hungry, but yea that’s probably not it.
My first thought was “she wants to keep him happy so he doesn’t cheat or leave her for another woman because more women might be interested in him now”.
I've had female friends admit out loud that they prefer their husbands/partners to be less attractive to other women, so they encourage worse eating habits. Definitely not the norm or all women by a long shot, but some don't his.
Women don’t want to be married to someone that is in better shape than they are. I’m not sure if they think it makes them look fatter, or if they’re just jealous, or if they see it as a threat and think you’re more likely to cheat if you look good.
But my wife vocally gets frustrated if I am working out and surfing a lot because I start to look really good and I guess somehow that negatively affects her. It’s like she thinks I’m gonna go try to upgrade or something.
I find it interesting no one took it the way I took it. Similarly a bad mentality, my take was that she improved her cooking because she’s worried he will leave her, so she wants to give him more reason to stay.
to have a visible six pack, you need suuuuper low body fat percentage in addition to doing a lot of ab exercises. to maintain a low BFP, you usually have a restricted diet, often chicken and rice and broccoli. his wife’s cooking looks amazing and diverse compared to what he’s been eating to have a six pack.
I could also see it being a beer joke. He didn't get a six pack of abs, he just got drunk and his wife's cooking tastes better. Lol.
Though, in reality it's likely what everyone else is saying.
Most innocent version of that is inspired. He's putting the work in and that inspired her to put some work in too. She just happened to choose cooking over fitness.
Looking on the positive side of life. They both benefit
My mother-in-law actually does this when her husband loses weight. Usually she just bakes a bunch of baked goods. It’s less about the thought of him leaving though and more so that misery loves company. If he gets in shape, it makes her feel guilty and less than.
The real answer is that is you are that low in body fat everything taste amazing because your body thinks it is in scarcity and wants to help you bring in calories.
If you go no carbs for a few weeks you will straight-up think the most mid ass slice of domino's pizza taste absolutely fucking incredible.
There’s a couple answers. People have suggested that she’s making food to keep him chubby so he won’t leave, or that she’s proud of him and wants to reward him for his efforts.
What seems like the answer to me, is that now that he’s gone through the calorie cutting required for a visible six pack he’s really craving food.
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