Now I have to be careful how I dress....

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-14-2005
Now I have to be careful how I dress....
6
Sat, 06-25-2005 - 8:47am

Some of you may have read in some of my other posts, that I lost some weight and my husband was giving me a hard time about it. I am a petite lady who was a size 8/10 before marriage and children then went up to a 16. On a petite person that's a lot and as I get older I was starting to feel it. Feet problems, lower back problems, etc. So I finally decided I would start taking better care of myself. I started to go to Weight Watcher meetings once a week during the day when he was at work and besides it being good for me, it was also a nice social escape for me, which is probably another reason why I signed up.

Anyway, the best part of all this is that now I am able to find into clothes (hand me downs from my sister who works for Liz Claiborne!) that I normally wouldn't be able to wear. For so many years I dressed in baggy t-shirts and jeans but now I feel like I had a transformation I sometimes thinks of that movie Roseanne Barr was in, called She-Devil. I felt so good about myself that I was actually more motivated to put makeup on more often. But leave it to my husband to get upset that I am looking good and to say that I am obsessed with looking good. So to avoid any problems I'm been toning it down and just wearing my baggy old clothes when I'm around him but when he isn't around I try to wear some some nicer stuff, fitted t-shirts and capris, etc.

I feel so stupid now that I lost weight because all that did was give him yet another excuse to say mean things to me. He said to me that he knows I'm planning to leave him, the girls are older and I've lost weight. I have to hear this as I am trapped in the car driving him to the train station. "I wanted to say if I leave you it won't be because I gained weight." By the way he is overweight, and is starting to have diabetes issues. I've tried to push him to eat better (I try to cook as healthy as possible) and he says he will try but he doesn't make a very good effort. (He once told my 12 year old DD that she was eating too much turkey bacon for breakfast and to have something sweet like a brownie instead). I wonder if he feels I am controlling him by encouraging him to eat better.

I am tempted to let myself go again, but I feel better physically, my back doesn't hurt as often and I don't walk over as hunched over as I used to, so I guess if I have to wear my baggy clothes as the trade off so be it to keep the peace. There are women that are far more dangerous situations so I guess this is just anothe petty thing that I have to suck up for the sake of peace.

BTW, We are going on vacation for 2 weeks (I am dreading that too) out to Vegas and California. I would like to ask him if he would be ok if I could wear some of the nicer clothes my sister gave me, but I am worried about setting him off if I ask.

Thanks for listening.

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-06-2003
Sun, 06-26-2005 - 6:07am

Hi bhappy,

Your making positive strides in your life while he sits there and vegatates. Sounds so familiar. I was married for 27 years. Besides him being an abusive, useless arrogant idiot, we did have the children's interests first. The last couple of years of the marriage, the intensity of the abuse escalated. I couldn't figure out what the heck was going on in his head. Well, he made a comment to me one day that I have never forgotten...you have made yourself a life for when the children leave, I have nothing. I think that worked at him more than anything else.

Your husband is sitting there, overweight with health issues coming on...here's you doing something for yourself, losing weight, looking good. One the abusers want is for you be as miserable as them. If you are not, there is something wrong with you.

You have to realize, anything you do positive for yourself will create havoc. If this man truly loved you and saw you were looking better, he would be encouraging your new found self-esteem. Instead, you are now posing a threat to his lifestyle and his way of thinking.

DON'T let yourself go because of him. But remember, by taking these positive steps for yourself, you will see more resistance from the other side.

Terry

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-08-2005
Sun, 06-26-2005 - 5:44pm
Cam hit this one right on the noggin hun.
5yrssm 
iVillage Member
Registered: 05-04-2005
Mon, 06-27-2005 - 12:56pm

Oh, BHappy, my heart goes out to you.

My ex was the same way. He would put me down about how I looked. When we met, I was super skinny (too skinny, in fact). So after I had my first baby, I had gained weight and so did he. Well, my weight was baby fat, so with breast-feeding, it came off fairly quickly, and within three months, I looked decent again. I was not, however, skinny like I was pre-baby. He took every opportunity to point this out to me. He called me fat. Told me he could not believe that I was going to go swimming in that baithing suit because I looked like a beached whale. Etc, Etc, Etc. It was a nightmare. Anything I did to better myself, he took as a personal attack on him. While I was in law school, he told me it was a waste of my time. When I got a job after graduation, he told me it was a dead-end job and that only the people who couldn't do private practice were prosecutors.

I don't know what to tell you. I just know that you are improving your health and your self-esteem. Don't let him tear you down. You're looking better and feeling better. Why would you go back to feeling awful for him?? Please do not. Keep getting better for you.

Hugs and prayers,

LAF

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-28-2003
Mon, 06-27-2005 - 1:06pm
When did you say you're planning to leave him?
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-14-2005
Fri, 07-01-2005 - 11:20pm
I keep asking myself that question all the time, and ask God that he give me the strength to hang on until the day that I leave.
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-28-2003
Sat, 07-02-2005 - 2:11am

Honey, if you're already thinking about leaving and you know you should, that's God telling you.

Therefore, if he's already been telling you, seems to me like the strength is already there.