How I Frustrate My Husband, Part 1
(I’m guessing this could be an infinite series here, so I’ll put a part one knowing that inevitably someday I’ll come back to fill y’all in with a part two, three, four, etc. )
A little story for ya Ags…
I’ll call this one:
The Time We “Went Paleo” and Then Accidentally Kept Going for 6 years and its Subsequent Consequences
But first, a short back story…
Our first married football game! Tailgates became the diet downfall…
About seven years ago, Shel and I were engaged and had our wedding set for the following summer. We were chatting with his best friend from college who said something along the lines of, “if you think you want to lose any weight, do it before the wedding. I didn’t, and now I hate looking through the wedding pictures.” He had been overweight before they got married and then afterwards had started paying attention to diet, added in some exercise, and no longer really resembled the man in the photos. I think we maybe both shrugged it off…
A few months after we got married, Shel did ask me what to do, how to eat, to learn more about food to improve his health and lose some weight. He wasn’t ready before the wedding, but realized that not having any consideration for the food he was eating PLUS drinking was starting to have an effect on him. So here we were in the middle of football season discarding all fried foods and bread to try out this paleo thing to see where it got us. I’ve mentioned it before, but the plan was to try the month of November, but quit at Thanksgiving. We got to Thanksgiving and I was ready to dive back into my previous sandwiches and spaghetti and cereal way of life, but he wanted to keep going. Obviously, I kept up the recipe research to keep up our veggies + protein + hard boiled eggs + green smoothies way of life and help my husband on his health journey.
The most fun wedding. (Bubbles are blinding)
Fast forward 5 months, he had lost about 70 lbs. I lost probably 8 or so, but the point was that we both felt GREAT. And we hadn’t had any of the processed stuff in our house in so long, that we just never went back to buying it. By that point, during my reading into foods to include/not include, I came across a lot of research that basically formed the way that we still eat today and definitely fueled my passion for learning the WHAT and the WHY behind foods we include in our diet. Also, spoiler, by the time we got to our first wedding anniversary, he no longer looked anything like the man in our wedding photos. Thanks for the solid advice Nick.
One year post-paleo. Heyooooooo ;)
Backstory over, but the point in all of this was that in searching for foods for my husband to eat/not eat to become healthier, stop the track he was on that could have led to heart disease or diabetes, or any number of health issues, I read a LOT. I started to rely on certain blogs to get my nutrition info. It turns out though that food isn’t the only thing impacting our health. It’s the easy things like exercise and sleep and the people you spend your time with, but it’s also some more invisible or automatic things that we don’t think of when we think of overall health. Chemicals in our home, skincare products, breastfeeding, what our food storage containers are made of, hand soap, birth environment, laundry detergent, healthy bacteria, our clothing, kids’ toys materials, the list goes on and on.
I’m easily susceptible to a rabbit hole just like most people, but when I fall down the health rabbit hole, I fall deep, and here’s we start to see the frustration from my darling husband who puts up with me and (honestly) trusts me with the health decisions for our family.
Conversation example:
Me: “So I was listening to this podcast…”
Shel: “Of course you were.”
or
Me: “I was reading this blog last night and…”
Shel: *eyeroll*
It’s understandable. A good portion of my fun facts I share with him on the DAILY start with either of those phrases. I’ve learned to rework my statements if I really want him to pay attention or take stock in whatever new revelation I’ve made regarding monounsaturated fats (good for you!) or the importance of an organic, non-toxic mattress (we’re trying this one right now!) or reducing our waste by ordering toilet paper made from bamboo, wrapped in paper (I give a crap about the environment).
So, although he’s frustrated, he definitely trusts me to be the guiding light on health-based decisions for our family, especially now with two littles, and I trust HIM to research anything related to technology or automotive and be completely in charge of our outdoor Christmas decorations. :)
Do you have moments that induce the automatic eye roll from your partner? What’s your give and take on making the important decisions in your family?
3 years later with a little more balance.
Disclaimer: some links in this blog may lead to small compensation for me. The money goes to keeping this site up and running!