[natu88]

I'm a very slender and petite vegetarian. I love to eat healthy and eat unhealthy about one meal a week. My boyfriend is overweight. He has gone pescetarian (eats only fish) and has been eating healthier because of me, but it breaks my heart, because every time I bring up that he should be exercising more, he gets really hurt. He says he feels ashamed. I've offered to exercise with him whenever and however long he wants to encourage better habits. I don't know how to help him make better choices to lose weight without hurting his pride. He wants to lose it, but I think he gets just discouraged and gives up on his plans. Help?

[Hopeless Dork]

Your influence, your healthy eating habits are obviously doing him a world of good. You're a living breathing example of how to live healthy and him spending so much time with you, its going to rub off on him.

No one loses weight until THEY are ready, ready to commit for themselves. You can support him in the decisions he makes but the decision to do more with his work outs , etc... has to come from him. Else he will resent you, resent himself and go back to bad habits.

Instead of saying hey you should go to the gym, i'll even go with you... say I feel like going to the gym today , wanna join me? Its a pretty day for a hike, wanna come along? If you make him feel like its some chore you are doing to make him fit... that will hurt his pride. Instead turn work outs into a couples activity, something he's doing to keep you company.

The more he does the better he will feel about himself and will start making effort on his own when he's ready.

[cuff]

Yeah, tell him you're going for a walk and you want him to come. I do this with my girlfriend a couple times a week. We'll both save our days "gossip" for our walk so we have things to talk about as we walk. So it's not completely a walk to exercise but to talk about our day too.

[Ashlee T.]

How overweight is he? To the point of being unhealthy, or to the point of just not being toned and such? Moving to a fish only diet is a HUGE step, especially if he was someone who ate alot of red meat, and unhealthy food before.

If you're super health conscious and fit, he probably feels inferior like, "I'll never be in good enough shape for her". And clearly he wants to be in better health......but for people that are overweight, the exercise part is hard.....it's extremely hard. Because they don't FEEL like working out, because their bodies are much more tired just from carrying the extra weight. They feel discouraged.

I think cuffs idea is great. Find something you both enjoy like walking, hiking, kayaking, throwing football, playing softball with a group (or other ways that can get you both activity without him having to go in a gym feeling like a slob with his fit and toned girlfriend). Find something fun you can do with him that isn't about losing weight, but about doing something fun together that happens to be good for your health too.