The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.
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Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.
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Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.
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Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).
Jump in the discussion.
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Late last year I posted a comment here asking how I could convince my girlfriend to start eating more. Now, I'm posting an update.
Frankly I was annoyed by some of the replies to my previous post that said I should "enjoy my slim girlfriend", or that implied that I was making more of a problem out of it than it actually was. She actually lost more weight and now weighs 98 lbs. It took several months of patient intervention for me to convince her that yes, I do actually want her to gain weight, and yes, I absolutely would still think she was pretty if she weighed 120 lbs. Recently she finally caved and went to her doctor for a formal medical opinion, and he backed me up on this by telling her that she was at risk of osteoporosis and anemia if she didn't change her diet and gain weight. My cause has also seen some support from her older sister, a very intelligent woman whom she trusts a lot, telling her that she needs to start eating more red meat. So in theory, at least, I've been able to convince her that her ordinary diet and habits aren't healthy or sustainable.
The problem, at least as I see it, is that even with this realization it's been hard for her to break her habits. We go out to brunch and she still eats her little vegan salads. I tell her she should add some chicken or other protein to the salads and she declines. She still consults the app on her phone that counts all her calories for the day. It's hard for me to figure out what the line is between pushing her to be healthier for her own sake, and being outright controlling over her lifestyle. Do I just put my foot down and confront her, pushing her to be serious about her health?
I mean, at the end of the day, she's only your girlfriend and it's none of your business. I can't pretend to know your relationship, but imagine if you will she came to you and started taking a deadly serious and negatively slanted interest in something you did? Pathologized how much you played video games, or arguing with people on the internet, or watched porn? If you don't actually do any of those things, replace it with something you do do.
snigger do do.
I guess my point is, even if you are right, you're still just a boyfriend. Probably the latest of many, others of whom never had a problem with this before. This is more of a fight for her family and doctor to wage.
That said, my wife had some eating disorder adjacent behavior that didn't stop until we decided to have kids. After putting a baby in her 6 years ago they haven't re-emerged even slightly.
Not that I'm suggesting you rush anything.
This is a very pro-anomie sort of take. If my video game playing was eclipsing all my other recreation time, or my porn watching was impacting my sex life, or arguing with people on the internet was filling me with bile, I'd want the people in my life to bring that shit up. It's 2025. 'Just a boyfriend' isn't a thing. The title doesn't mean they're family, but it is definitely not a sign they're not serious and heading in the direction of either a lifelong relationship or proper marriage.
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I find this comment bizarre. They've been going out at least a year, and probably considerably longer considering this was brought up as a concern a year ago. At what point would you suggest that a concern for another person's mental and physical wellbeing becomes one's "business"?
I'd also suggest a girlfriend would not be out of her lane to have concerns about any of the examples you mention (porn, gaming, the insanity of constant online argument). There are of course various ways to bring these things up, some much more strident and ineffective than others.
You are free to have your views of course but I disagree.
7 months ago, but who's counting?
I donno man, everyone is different. Some people have a very "There's no ring on this finger, it's none of your business" attitude, some people have a "My last relationship was 5 years and we've only been together 7 months, who are you to get all up in my business" attitude, some people are moved in and married inside a year, for others a year is still well within scoping this other person out and how long and how serious the relationship is has been more of a slow climb of a smooth gradient than an on/off switch. More over, CriticalDuty might not even be on the same page about the level of concern and commitment (and control) that is appropriate at this point in the relationship.
But like I said, I can't presume to know their relationship, it was just a perspective I hadn't seen yet, so I thought it was worth giving.
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