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My boyfriend is nearly abusing himself.
I'm 20/f, dating a 20/m.
My boyfriend is 6'2" tall, and he's about 210 pounds, which I think is pretty normal. I've never thought he was chubby or even "teddy bear" sized, just that he wasn't exactly thin or scrawny. I know he was a lot heavier when he was younger, but by the time I met him he'd worked a lot of the weight off, so his weight looks to be about average.
Suddenly, in the past two months, he's started talking about how much he HATES the way he looks, how he "better get used to not liking who he is", and how he's upset because "he'll never get to where he wants to be", physically speaking. He joined a gym (I joined with him, because I want to start eating better and excercising), but he's constantly talking about calories and pounds lost ALL THE TIME.
In the one month that we've been going to the gym, he's stopped eating all junk food and candy, and has stopped drinking EVERYTHING except water and skim milk. He's lost almost 20 pounds in the last month, and he's still saying he hates how he looks.
I tell him I love his body and that I'm really attracted to him physically (it's true), but he brushes me off. He calls himself chubby and fat and he gets so upset that he won't even talk to me about it. It's like he refuses to believe me.
Tonight he said he wasn't leaving the gym until he burned 1000 calories, and he keeps saying things like "i'm just going through things" and "I didn't know this would be so hard". I'm REALLY scared.
What can I do? I'm crying just because I'm so scared and worried about his health, safety, and happiness. PLEASE HELP my boyfriend :(
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Wow , that's not too good. First off , please try to get him away from those thoughts , get him to go somewhere with you. Even if you get too much into his private life go to his parents talk to him about it or go to his friends and ask them to sit down and talk to him or even you talk to him and see where it goes that is not going to good. You need to really show him how you feel maybe he will see how bad it's getting. Talk to him tell him he looks amazing try to boost him up , try to say what a guy wants to hear the most , try getting him to talk about everything except that , occassionally take out some food and show him or something. Don't watch him do this , he should not be so horrible in it , try to find out why he is this. My advice to you is go get help either parents yours or his, friends , family, doctors , locals , uhm or even personal trainers and also , keep trying to boost his energy up show him what he's doing isn't the best. Prove he's worth a lot more.
Good luck : )
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I usually don't answer questions like these but I've seen the end result of this if it is, indeed, a problem.
Guys can have eating disorders, too.
Guys have have self-image distortions.
Guys can have major mental problems that are, for some reason, only publicly talked about in regards to females. Because of this, it can be quite embarrassing for a guy to seek help or treatment for his body image.
I knew this guy in high school. He was overweight but he wasn't HUGE. He didn't fit in with the jocks and muscular-type guys at school but he was liked. It hurt his feelings to be joked about in the locker room while they were changing after football practice. The boys didn't mean any harm. They were just playing around with him. It still changed him.
He started doing the same thing you're describing. He began to obsess over calories and working out. Before we knew it, he had restricted his food intake pretty severely. He dropped a good 100lbs before the end of school. He was sickly looking. How he starved himself away like that...man...
But...he was a guy. What do you say? Gee, I think you might have an eating disorder here, dude. No, you say, "You've lost a lost of weight. Good job." Nobody did anything about it--but how many times do you suspect a guy has an eating disorder or problems with what he sees in the mirror? Then he started passing out. The passing out and blackouts got to be pretty bad and they wouldn't allow him to play sports any more because of it. Nobody knew he had done such bad things to his body though.
When he passed out standing up from his bed in front of his brother they took him to the ER. He confessed he hadn't eaten in days so that he could lose weight.
This problem is like any other self-image problem. This is like any other eating disorder. Nothing you say is going to fix this. He needs more help than you can offer. He needs to see a therapist on a regular basis to talk about his body image and what has caused these mental problems lately.
Eating disorders can be spurred by many things. Sometimes it's things you don't even think about as causing a problem with self-image. It could be a lot of stress at school or at home. It could be the death of a loved one (even a beloved pet). It could be new experiences and feeling overwhelmed. It could be comments from other people. It could be past memories brought up recently through anything (innocent conversation or a dream, perhaps). It could be so many things that he might not even be aware of it either.
Try to talk with your partner about this first. Express your concerns. Tell him you feel what he is doing might be unhealthy. Tell him EXACTLY what you think is unhealthy about it.
You should talk with his parents about this problem and express your concerns for his health and overall well-being. Encourage them to encourage him to seek professional guidance and help if it's a problem.
For a last note, only drinking water in regards to fluids is a pretty darn great thing. The major thing that signaled me off to "eating disorder" is the fact that he has a specific goal to burn a very high number of calories at one particular time. It is realistic to say, "I am going to work out for 1 hour," but it is NOT realistic to say, "I am going to work out until I burn 1,000 calories." It can be pretty hard to measure "burning 1,000 calories" so it's very easy to go overboard and get carried away. Dieting (eating healthy) and exercise can be great things to improve your health but when you go overboard like he is then it begins to teeter into the danger territory. It is possible that he wasn't really serious or didn't realize what he was saying when he said that though. It could also be that he thinks 1,000 is burned in 1,000 seconds or something. You have to talk to him first.
Talk to him first and see if you can figure out if this is really an issue or not. Maybe he is just trying to lead a healthy lifestyle. Cutting out sweets and sodas isn't bad at all. Going to the gym is great. He needs to stay balanced though. Get plenty of fruits, vegetables, water, and exercise.
In the end, if it's bad, then talk with his parents. Talk with your parents. Encourage everyone that he needs to get help. Express your concerns and pray that he goes into therapy to get these things off of his shoulders. Without the help of outsiders in this situation you are probably going to "fail" at getting him well. This is a problem beyond you. Please, help him get help today by reaching out for him.
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Elliah4yuye:
her some suggestion
1.get some of his friends to sit down and talk to him aout his wait
2. get his mother or father which everone he close to to talk to him
3. get so random girls to just walk pass and say "oh you hot or I love your body, you should on a magazine" something just to make him feel good
he pushing everything you say to the side cause
he believe in his mind that your his girl-friend your suppose to tell him he hot ad that everything is okay...
so i hope that these suggestions help him...
Elliah4yue
please leave a message in the inbox....
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OK so dont tell him you are scared just act calm... buy a few books on it make sure hes doing it the healthy way leave them around. Its good that you are going with him to the gym just support him, make sure he knows that being super skinny is not appealing to any female :) solet him know he might want to TONE his body not burn all the fat,maybe gain some muscles maybe you could encourage him to use a workout dvd and some weights. I dont think men should be under 170 so 30 pounds is as low as he should go, and muscle weights more than fat so it should be fine if he wants to count calories he should go to livestrong.com and go to "my plate" its really good, some things are for members only but im not a member and it has just what i need, Technically sugars and fat have their ultimate effect on the body that are bad and nuts and meat have other effects that are good but if you want to count calories just keep eating what your eating just less////or exercise more. I hope atleast some of this helps, He needs to eventually reach a state where he feels comfortable with how he looks, sometimes my boyfriend will ask me why im working out or on a diet and be like " who are u trying to impress because im happy with how you look" but he doesnt understand that i am doing it so i can feel like im good enough for him. When he says i love you no matter what its like saying " hey i love you even though you are not perfect shape" and it does nothing to stop me lol... i think burning 1000 calories is close to too much though because as a male he should be taking in at least 2000 a day after exercise to be a healthy weightloss so if hes going to be burning 1000 make she he eats about 3000. Good Luck Hun Support him and make sure you keep an eye on him and his weight so you can keep track of these things, be happy for him when he is happy he lost pounds dont worry you will definitely be able to tell when you should worry remember if hes 1.NOT EATING or 2. UNDER 170lbs...there are other things to watch out for but those are key because he cannot be frail and under weight and he cant starve himself ---very bad obviously :) again good luck!
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