Encouraging and supporting your SO from a distance?

[chwdg10]

Recently, I've started trying to encourage my boyfriend to go after his personal goals he has for himself. One of the main ones being his losing about 40-50 pounds and just eating healthier foods. He hasn't actually started doing this, but he told me he would think about it. He's also already admitted that it would make him feel better and more confident if he lost weight and ate better.

All I can do is encourage him when we're texting or talking on the phone/skype. I try to give him ideas of what to eat and I try to help him come up with mini goals to get started. We've tried this before and I feel like it won't be enough. What can I do to help him and support him more? Of course I'll keep talking to him and encouraging him, but is there anyone out there who have other ideas?

[London-FortCollins]

The key to being supportive and encouraging is to celebrate the achievements, as opposed to telling your so what should be done.

Tell him how proud you are if him wanting to be fit and healthy, but remind him that you will always love him for who he is.

Once he says "im thinking of starting this healthy eating thing on Monday" "that's really great baby, I'm so glad you've decided a date to get started on this, I know you've been wanting to"

Things like that

[London-FortCollins]

The key to being supportive and encouraging is to celebrate the achievements, as opposed to telling your so what should be done.

Tell him how proud you are if him wanting to be fit and healthy, but remind him that you will always love him for who he is.

Once he says "im thinking of starting this healthy eating thing on Monday" "that's really great baby, I'm so glad you've decided a date to get started on this, I know you've been wanting to"

Things like that

[kiara_silver]

I used to be over wieght, i was nearly 50 pounds heavier and what had helped me was when i joined this group and had weekly wiegh ins. The fact that i was getting wieghed in was a push because i wanted to see the scale go down, everyone was watching. So why not try making a big deal of that? Do you guys skype? Maybe every week have a weigh in, keep a log book with all the info. Make a plan but be realistic. Say 15 pounds in 2 months? Be positive and encouraging through it, maybe even work out and weigh in with him.
Here's a few tips for him though
Water water water! Water is key and so helpful, try cutting out sodas and juice and replace with water!
Excersise is hard.. but its very important. So squeezing in even just 10 minutes would make a differance. Do a solid 10 min workout. (of course 30 minutes faster results but 10 is still something)
Diets are just for the time then, and then you gain it back or for desprete jump starts they don't last and arn't easy. So don't have him diet, just make little changes. Like don't eat after 7:30pm. Thats very helpful, and try not to have sweets during the week. And have him ask himself, do i really need 2nds?

These are things that helped me lose 48 pounds and keep them off for 2 years now. I still eat taco bell, and cake and junk food. I say start slow then maintainings not so hard. Its just getting that ball rolling and first starting, but once he starts losing the wieght it gets easier.

[kiara_silver]

I used to be over wieght, i was nearly 50 pounds heavier and what had helped me was when i joined this group and had weekly wiegh ins. The fact that i was getting wieghed in was a push because i wanted to see the scale go down, everyone was watching. So why not try making a big deal of that? Do you guys skype? Maybe every week have a weigh in, keep a log book with all the info. Make a plan but be realistic. Say 15 pounds in 2 months? Be positive and encouraging through it, maybe even work out and weigh in with him.
Here's a few tips for him though
Water water water! Water is key and so helpful, try cutting out sodas and juice and replace with water!
Excersise is hard.. but its very important. So squeezing in even just 10 minutes would make a differance. Do a solid 10 min workout. (of course 30 minutes faster results but 10 is still something)
Diets are just for the time then, and then you gain it back or for desprete jump starts they don't last and arn't easy. So don't have him diet, just make little changes. Like don't eat after 7:30pm. Thats very helpful, and try not to have sweets during the week. And have him ask himself, do i really need 2nds?

These are things that helped me lose 48 pounds and keep them off for 2 years now. I still eat taco bell, and cake and junk food. I say start slow then maintainings not so hard. Its just getting that ball rolling and first starting, but once he starts losing the wieght it gets easier. Just encourage throughout and have fun make it like a game, and dont stress over it to much just talk about it at the weekly wiegh in, ask him when he lost what did he do during the week to lose it? and encourage him to keep going!

and idk why the message posted twice sorry

[LadyMarchHare]

The key to being supportive and encouraging is to celebrate the achievements, as opposed to telling your so what should be done.

Tell him how proud you are if him wanting to be fit and healthy, but remind him that you will always love him for who he is.

Once he says "im thinking of starting this healthy eating thing on Monday" "that's really great baby, I'm so glad you've decided a date to get started on this, I know you've been wanting to"

Things like that

I want to add on that you could also try doing this with him even if you don't personally need to shed the pounds. Even though you're not physically there a lot of folks find it easier to stay down the healthy path if someone does it with them. I think getting involved in that way will show you do care about him and want to support him in his decision along with verbal encouragement, goal-setting, and even rewards.

[srigg009]

My SO isn't trying to lose as much weight but he claims that he has a stomach and wants to get rid of it, I have been giving him compliments and telling him that I can tell he's been working out and he told me that it made him feel much better. It will definitely help if when he gets started you are able to notice a difference because that will encourage him to continue, if you compliment them on the work they've done, it makes them feel good about themselves and gives them that motivation they need.

[chwdg10]

I have been trying my best lately to encourage him verbally. I've already started working on myself awhile ago (eating healthy and exercising more) and we've tried the approach to do it together before. He has a tendency to give up really easily or just gets bored with the idea really fast. Self control is a large problem here too.

The whole idea of the weekly weigh-in is good. I already weigh myself every Sunday so I'm thinking I should have him do the same. I would also like to start asking him what he ate everyday so I can congratulate him for eating the healthy foods. My boyfriend eats a lot of fast food because he doesn't have a whole lot of money. I gave him the idea to just print out the nutritional info from his favorite places and make healthier choices from that (like a chicken sandwich and parfait from the dollar menu instead of two cheeseburgers).