Help this chubby office rat (and his wife) get motivated and active

December 17, 2009 2:10 PM

I'm more sedentary than I'd like to be, and I'm putting on weight. Please help me get motivated to work out, and help me encourage my wife to join me. More details inside.

My wife and I work week-day jobs with fairly set schedules, getting up before 6am to prepare and head to work. She gets home between 4 and 5pm, I get home around 6pm. She's on her feet for much of her days, and has an hour commute there and back (2 hours total per day). I sit at a desk most of the day, yet still feel done with the world by the end of the day. We both get home, and we're pretty content to sit on the couch, but that's doing neither of us any good.

I'm over 6 feet tall, and my wife is about a foot shorter than I am. I used to be on the lean side, while my wife has always been a bit overweight. I love her as she is, but I'm a bit concerned for her long-term health, and I'd worry less if she were more fit. She's lost some weight from being on her feet most of the day, but I think that she won't lose much more that way.

I've had a desk job ever since I've been out of college, and I've done nothing to keep active on any sort of regular basis, so I'm putting on weight, and I don't like it. At first, it showed as just a little tummy pudge, and she comments that she likes me to have some meat on my bones, but my idea of "meat" is that it should be muscle, not fat.

I love walking, jogging and hiking, and she's fine with a bit of walking, but is concerned about trying to hike and looking fat, sweaty and gross (a concern she's told me, not something I'm implying). Jogging is unpleasant because she's busty, and no sports bras do enough to make jogging comfortable. We have access to a community pool, but I think my wife has some concern for being seen exercising in public.

We've had a gym membership, and we own a Wii Fit. We've talked about getting equipment for home, but we haven't used what we have already, and I'm just worried that anything else we get will go unused. We've gone on walks, but they're usually short, and I don't feel like I've gotten any exercise. My strides are naturally long, so I slow down and let my wife set the pace. Every now and again I'll go jogging by myself, but I feel like I'm excluding my wife, and I feel both judged and like I'm judgmental. (I'm probably over-thinking this, but I figured I'd share the bulk of my thoughts, seeing as I'm anon.)

I understand that if we ate less, we wouldn't gain weight, but I don't believe we're eating excessive amounts. My eating habits haven't changed since college, when I didn't actively seek out exercise, I just walked a few miles every day. My thought (perhaps misguided) is that if I start walking a few miles every day, I could get back to my old weight.

Additional thought-dumping, possibly just a useless tangent: my wife's parents are overweight, and her mother will comment on me being "the skinny one." I've gained 20 to 30 pounds since marriage (and I'm not saying because of marriage, I've gone from being a college kid to a working adult from then to now), but I feel awkward mentioning this, so I don't.

To wrap up: what can I do to get motivated to work out, and how can I help my wife feel comfortable joining me? How can I motivate her to push herself and maybe get a bit sweaty in the process? Thanks, hive-mind!

posted by anonymous to Health & Fitness (22 answers total)

I feel for you- My wife and I are in the same position. We are fortunate enough to live close to skiing and climbing, so skiing this winter, climbing next summer. Honestly, I HATE gyms. I really hate exercise altogether (I know, awful). I'm not sure how old you are or where you are located, but I really like tossing the frisbee. It's fun, you get a workout, you can do it for an hour or 2 and not know you are doing it. You may break a sweat, but, hey, at least it's something.

I hate running also, but I do it. It takes a good amount of time, like a month or so, to finally get a rhythm going for me. I've found if I haven't run in a while, I have a much better time jogging for 5 minutes and then walking for 5 minutes for a couple of weeks. This way I don't strain anything and I slowly build up.

Sorry to sound so negative, but I also hate dieting. I love to eat, and I've really only found that I could continue my diet if I were doing what everyone always says- burn more calories than you consume- though that only really happened a couple of times in my life when I was running and climbing 5 or 6 days a week.

I don't know if you are into "adventure" sports (ugh I hate that moniker) but climbing's really fun. If there's a climbing gym in town, go and check it out. My wife, who is a little heavier as well, loves to climb, but feels very self conscious. She's also really driven so when she got back into it and realized how out of shape she was as compared to 2 years ago, it really pushed her hard to get back there.

Good luck!
posted by TheBones at 2:29 PM on December 17, 2009

Sports are a great way to get motivated about being active. Are any of your friends in a local volleyball or softball team? Have you looked into racquet sports? Competition can really light a fire in some people and can make you forget that you're actually exercising.

We've had a gym membership

and...? You just didn't go? Getting friends to go with is a good way to do this. You end up being driven by the other person (hey, you don't want to let them down). If your wife is worried about how she looks while working out, then maybe she should be going with a female friend instead of you.

If you can find something you enjoy and make it routine, then you've got a good start. Once you get used to the idea of exercise you might find yourself seeking more (because you want to get better at volleyball, because your weekly session with friend isn't enough, etc)
posted by ODiV at 2:30 PM on December 17, 2009

Concentrate on yourself. I understand that you're concerned for your wife's health, but you can't make her change her behavior, and it sounds as though you're using her as an excuse not to improve your own health. Go running or hiking if that's the exercise you prefer. If she wants to come, she will, and if she doesn't want to come, you're being counterproductive by curtailing your activities in order to avoid leaving her out. Let her know that you're always willing to be active with her, but let her set the pace for her own exercise, and do your exercise whenever you can motivate yourself to, not whenever you can motivate her to go with you.
posted by decathecting at 2:33 PM on December 17, 2009 [4 favorites]

Your wife seems very self-conscious, so she might not be up for my suggestion, but a dance class (some variety of ballroom?) would be a great activity for the two of you to do together. I've done this before with my boyfriend (who is also somewhat self-conscious) and it was incredibly fun and a nice extra bit of exercise. Aside from something like that, I do agree that you should concentrate on yourself.

For just her, might she be interested in something like belly dancing? From what I gather, belly dancing clubs (hula hooping too) tend to be very body positive. There's usually women of all shapes and sizes happily moving to music together.

As for how to get motivated, it has always helped me to be a part of a club or to have friends that I do something active with (and I recently read an article that having a dog as a running partner is even better than running with a friend. Even if you don't want to own a dog, sometimes you can find someone who's willing to loan one out to you just for runs).
posted by quirks at 2:52 PM on December 17, 2009

Second that you should just get on and do it yourself. Going for walks together is nice and you should keep doing it, but do it for relaxation and leisure and make sure you get your real exercise in as if it were your second job.

I know from experience that trying to exercise with your partner can easily become a sort of collective action problem, where if either one of you is slightly not in the mood it doesn't happen. Sure, it's the ideal for couples to motivate each other, but it can easily go the other way, and I think it rarely works in practice. And you can't bully your partner in the same sort of way you can bully yourself to just go and do it! I love to hike with my wife, but the times I've been in the best shape I've just stuck a gym visit into my day when it suited me. It only takes an hour, whilst getting organized to go together takes far longer if it even happens at all.

Maybe you'd want to do different things anyway given your different bodies and concerns? I find lifting weights calming and meditative, but my wife finds it boring and would rather play tennis, which makes me feel clumsy.
posted by crabintheocean at 2:55 PM on December 17, 2009

Watch a bunch of the videos at crossfit.com. Whatever you think of the crossfit methodology, you have to admit the videos are pretty motivating.

A barbell, weights, a doorway pull-up bar, and some empty floor space are plenty equipment to do lots of things. The bonus of that is, you don't have to be embarassed about your body or your lack of conditioning - you're in your own garage or living room. Once you force yourself to do it at home for long enough to get in a routine, you don't care so much about what everyone in the gym is going to think, and it's easier to go.

Also, the only machine I'd consider getting (but they have them at my gym, so I haven't bothered) would be a rowing machine. They kick your butt, and I imagine the sports bra thing isn't an issue with rowing like it is with running.
posted by ctmf at 3:00 PM on December 17, 2009

Start by going for long walks together. It's social and it won't appear as though she's exercising (a concern for your wife, I take it). But really, you need to work on your diet as well, even if you don't think it's a problem. Keep a food journal for a few weeks and see exactly how many calories you're eating, compared to what you should be eating to lose weight. Exercising is great but changing your diet will have the most impact.
posted by pintapicasso at 3:03 PM on December 17, 2009

I see you already have the Wii Fit (do you have Wii Fit Plus? it's BETTER), which was going to be my suggestion. That game is the first thing that got me up in the morning to work out without outside motivation in MY LIFE. Really set a goal and see how long you can stay on it every day.

But what I would suggest even more strenuously is for you and your wife to go to a nutritionist. I had been walking 16-24 miles a week for a year, and then started using the Wii Fit, but I was continuing to put on weight. My doctor suspected (in tandem with some other symptoms: chronic headaches/fatigue/etc) that I might have food sensitivities and put me on a completely allergen-free diet for a month. Plenty I can eat--just not certain things. I've lost 7 pounds in 12 days.

Food sensitivities aren't easy to pinpoint, but talking to a nutritionist and getting some tests done might not be a bad idea.
posted by klg19 at 3:08 PM on December 17, 2009

I understand that if we ate less, we wouldn't gain weight, but I don't believe we're eating excessive amounts. My eating habits haven't changed since college, when I didn't actively seek out exercise, I just walked a few miles every day. My thought (perhaps misguided) is that if I start walking a few miles every day, I could get back to my old weight.


Sorry to say that your thinking is misguided. If being fit and healthy is really important to you, then you need to educate yourself.

Your body composition has changed over the years, as has your metabolism. As a result of a sedentary lifestyle, you likely have a lot less muscle than you used to. This alone will mean that you are not burning as many calories as you once did. If your goal is to get back to where you were, you are going to need to work harder than you used to to get there.

Also, I would suggest more specifically differentiating weight and fat.
If you are putting on fat, you are eating more than you need to. Once you start working out, you'll put on muscle mass so you may not see your weight drop. Many people are discouraged by this as they equate weight loss with fat loss and the correlation is generally not there unless your bodyfat is quite high.

I think wanting to work out with your wife is a fine idea, but if she's not willing to overcome her hangups about exercising in public, then I agree you should not curtail your own activity to suit. Do what you need to do and encourage her to exercise in the home if that is something that would suit her more.

I will say though, that your wife would likely see more dramatic change with a positive change to her eating habits. I hesitate to say diet because a) some people are phobic about the word as it has come to by synonymous with 'temporary eating change'. What I'm specifically talking about is a permanent change to currently poor eating habits. You can exercise all you like, but if you're looking to drop fat and your diet is bad, you'll be disappointed.

cmtf mentioned crossfit. I like their methodology a lot. Not so much their right-wing leanings bug if you ignore the blog comments you don't have to deal with it. Nicole Carrol and Annie Sakamoto might inspire your wife, or they may be a little intimidating - maybe start out with some of the videos on nutrition before you check out the workouts. On the workout front, they do have scaled workouts. Everything you want is under the 'start here' menu item. Explanation of methodology, nutrition, workouts.

As for working out at home, there is plenty you can do with only bodyweight resistance.
Pushups, situps, squats, burpees, one-handed pushups, handstand pushups. Use 2 chairs for tricep dips and L-sits. If you have a bar or something else you can hang from, you have pullups, chinups, knees to elbows, muscle-ups...You get the idea. There is plenty you can use around your home if being in public is the problem.

Consider investing in a set of kettlebells. The amount of work you are able to do with these alone is massive.


I wish you and your wife all the best in your endeavours.
posted by CardinalRichelieuHandPuppet at 3:34 PM on December 17, 2009 [1 favorite]

You have not shared with us how old you are or whether you have children or other distractions at home. I will assume you are early thirties and childless. You adjust from there.

You appear to have given this a lot of thought and you are concerned both for your self and for your wife. Have you sat down, away from the dinner table, with the TV off and simply discussed this with your wife? Share with her what your concerns are. Carefully phrase the discussion around health and fitness. Your wife has body-image concerns and does not need to hear the words "weight" or "fat" from you. See if you can come to an understanding that, since you are no longer kids, you need to put some effort into being as healthy as you used to be without any thought.

If you can come to an agreement on the above concept, consider ways in which you can both be involved in each other's health improvement. Would she walk, then jog, then run with you if she could do it in a place where nobody she knows can see her? Suggest a place a mile or more form home that the two of you can drive to, go running, etc., and drive home from. Would she be willing to exercise with you if no one could see her at all? Here's what Mrs Geezer and I did. We bought a moderately high-end treadmill and a good stationary bike. We put them in a room with a television set. We have an appointment with each other, each night to exercise together. We find something on TV that we both like to watch (currently old Cash Cab episodes) and exercise. Also, we trade off as to who gets to choose which machine. We have found that we each have a favorite and we just gravitate to it without having to fight over it. We are not competing with each other for time or distance. We are supporting each other. Generally, I don't want to do it on the days she wants to and vice versa. By being there for each other, we get at least five days of good exercise each week.

Next, you need to do some light weight training. This is not for "definition" or show. This is for tone. A simple set of beginning weights (or two five gallon buckets) can get you started. Work up to being serious if you want, but start just exercising the muscles that don't get much work each day at the desk. You will ultimately find out if you like the feeling of muscle tone enough to get serious later.

Third, cut down on portions at the table. If this is not possible at dinner time, decide you will have a lighter lunch. Buy a doctor's scale and weigh yourself at the same time each day. You will see ups and downs, but you will start seeing a trend. If it is downward, you are doing the right things.

Last, assess your progress and your sense of satisfaction via simple discussions with each other. Treat this as team sports. The two of you against middle age spread.

Good luck with your efforts. Remember to keep it light and fun.
posted by Old Geezer at 3:41 PM on December 17, 2009

I want, first of all, to encourage you to let your wife worry about her own body and her own health. Overweight people live longer, as a group, than healthy-weight people, so I question your fundamental logic on the "worrying about health." She's an adult who can make her own choices--you're not her body police.

But if she is interested in doing some kind of health and fitness regime with you, maybe investing in some personal training sessions for the two of you at home? A good personal trainer can create a series of exercises that can be modified by each client for his or her own needs, strengths, and weaknesses--you might be doing boy pushups and she girl pushups, or you doing crunches and she doing leg-lifts or whatever. Set your routine to some music you both love and make a date to exercise together.

Meeting with a nutritionist to look over how you guys, both together and individually, make food choices and talking about how to put together a healthy nutritious diet that gives you maximum bang for your caloric buck might also be a good idea.
posted by Sidhedevil at 5:03 PM on December 17, 2009 [3 favorites]

Try buying and listening to some high energy music. This always makes me want to get out and exercise.
posted by anaelith at 6:45 PM on December 17, 2009 [1 favorite]

My thought (perhaps misguided) is that if I start walking a few miles every day, I could get back to my old weight

To reinforce what CardinalRichelieuHandPuppet said, walking for 1 hour at a moderate pace (3 MPH) and assuming you weigh 180 lbs burns 284.14 calories. Thats a bottle of coke. It's nothing.

Of course, you're going to work your way to being more aerobically fit, and reinforce positive choices an all that. But you're not going to loose much weight, and not fast.

There are lots of daily calorie calculators around. Basically you find out how many calories you need to maintain your weight with your activity level and current weight and "fitness level" (muscle mass). Calculate the calories you eat for a day or two and see where you stack up.

As for your wife, (while jogging bras are serious business), it sounds like she's making excuses. I say this from a place of compassion, not accusation. She's probably fought hard to feel like she is ok being herself. Pulling her out of her comfort zone, with activities that highlight the things she doesn't like about her self is something no one is going to enjoy going through. Especially coming from someone she expects to accept her, and her body, with out judgement.

All I can recommend is that you start talking positively about being healthy and fit, not that you hate your new flabs and want to get rid of them. Maybe talk about how you love fresh vegetables, and would love to cook her dinner more often with some new healthy recipes you found. Maybe you feel like your back hurts less when you do weight training, etc. Basically, help her believe that being fit is important, not to you or other people, but to herself. I can bet you once she does, being sweaty in public or flappin boobs won't hold her back.

But hey, try bikes! She won't be sweaty if she's going fast, and boobs don't factor in, unless you're on mountain trails.
posted by fontophilic at 8:42 PM on December 17, 2009 [1 favorite]

For your wife: Title Nine carries a huge selection of sports bras, many of which are sized for larger-busted women. Look at their "barbell ratings" for their level of support. There is a bra they call the "Last Resort" -- they say, basically, it ain't pretty, but it is effective. But there are others (that are prettier) and might work fine too.
posted by oldtimey at 9:06 PM on December 17, 2009

and no sports bras do enough to make jogging comfortable

if you're near nyc or are visiting any time soon, i strongly urge you to visit orchard corset in manhattan (or a place like it around you) so your wife can get properly fitted for bras, regular and sports bras. most women are wearing the wrong size bra, most women don't even know what properly fitted bras should feel like on themselves. i didn't realize i could actually jog and not feel my boobs move AT ALL until the lady there put me in a proper sports bra; she says she can and has fit ladies up to size M. do you know how big size M breasts are? they're larger than some women's bellies are when they're about to give birth!
posted by lia at 9:27 PM on December 17, 2009

CardinalRichelieuHandPuppet's advice is solid.

As for motivation, once I decided that I wanted to lift weights to get stronger, seeing myself constantly improve became motivating. Here is an article that expands on that idea and recommends an effective approach to training. The author argues that the easiest and quickest way to make the human body look different is to make it stronger, and the most efficient way to do that is to use a few basic barbell exercises and increase the weight on the bar every workout. This type of training will increase your muscle mass, flexibility, and bone density, not to mention your confidence.

When your wife sees your training and the results, and when you have enough understanding of how and why it works that you can explain it to her and help to dissolve her pre-conceptions, she'll probably decide to join you. And if she doesn't, I don't think there's much more that you can do.

So lead by example is I guess the message here. And motivation needs to come from within, bro. May the Force be with you.
posted by ludwig_van at 10:04 PM on December 17, 2009

You're going to have to set goals and accomplish them. Really one of the easiest ways to do this is to hire a personal trainer, someone who is going to push you. That is what a good personal trainer should be. You could learn to exercise on your own and do everything yourself but if you have someone pushing you it's all the better/easier. If you do hire a trainer, be careful, it's a grab bag as far as what you may end up with and you should be specific about what you expect from them.
A couple of articles for inspiration, perhaps:

Let Go of the Rock
The Phoenix Theory (note: not a real theory)
Seven Keys to a Successful Body Transformation
posted by P.o.B. at 11:04 PM on December 17, 2009

The only thing I'll say is that willpower is a finite resource. Don't try to change a whole bunch of things at once. If you are "using" your willpower to resist sugary snacks (or whatever your 'bane' food is), you are unlikely to be able to 'force' yourself to work out that evening. Change one thing until it is a habit you don't really need to think about, then move on to the next.
posted by birdsquared at 11:14 PM on December 17, 2009 [1 favorite]

As a suggestion for exercise you could do together, maybe try cycling? It's the only type of exercise I really enjoy, and finding some activity you love to do that isn't a chore sounds crucial to your situation.

It can be as good a workout as you want to make it, and you can do it in normal clothes ("proper" cycling clothes might be more comfortable if you're working hard and getting sweaty, but they're certainly not essential) so your wife might feel less self conscious.

I don't know if either of you are in a position to cycle commute to work but it's made me much healthier and happier since I started.

Even if you just go out for a while in the evenings and maybe some longer rides at the weekends, if you enjoy it that might be a really good start for both of you.

It does require a little investment in bikes - try looking on bike forums for buying advice if you don't know much, but you don't have to spend massive amounts specially if you go second hand.
posted by Dali Atomicus at 1:17 AM on December 18, 2009

The only exercise I really enjoy in Winter (and I absolutely love it) is playing Dance Dance Revolution on the Wii. Wii Fit didn't help me at all - too easy.
posted by hazyjane at 3:17 AM on December 18, 2009

If you can convince your wife to go a community pool even once - and really look at the people swimming, I'm sure her objections to exercising there would go away. There is quite simply every possible body type you can imagine at community pools and all these people of all weights, ages and abilities manage to exercise there.
posted by Kurichina at 9:16 AM on December 18, 2009

I thought for a moment that mr. crankylex had posted this. I am a fat woman and my husband is also overweight. He has issues with the weight that he is at currently and wants to change that. At this point in my life, for numerous reasons, I am uninterested in losing weight. Every so often, he makes comments about *us* losing weight, or working out, or whatever. The other day I told him that he is welcome to do whatever he wants to his own body on his own and that if he is waiting for me to join him to do anything, he will be waiting a very, very long time.

My advice to you is to make the changes to your life for yourself, by yourself. If your wife is really interested in joining you, she will. Do not take it personally if she does not.
posted by crankylex at 10:17 AM on December 18, 2009 [2 favorites]