Asking for a friend Your problems solved by The Midults

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie Mcmeekan Uneasy

Q:Dear A&E, I’m not sure how to phrase this, so I’ll just come out with it: my husband is tubby. He packed on the pounds during lockdown, as did I at first, but while I started exercising last summer and dropped a dress size, he’s still in full pig-out mode. When I was trying to find him in the supermarket the other day, I didn’t recognise him when I saw him from afar. I’m worried about his health and it’s also unattractive – we haven’t had sex since last summer. I tried to broach the idea of cutting back and he got defensive. I’ve tried making healthier meals, but he orders insnacksinfrontofthetvatni ht.what’sthebesta roach without sounding cruel? —

Dear Uneasy, lockdown has pre- sented us with myriad problems – little and large. One of the most constant conundrums has been this: how do you stay fit and healthy when you are permanently less than two metres from your fridge? When, if you fancy doughnuts at 10pm because you are bored and sad, you can just order them and they are delivered to your door? Yes, you may be wearing sweatpants all day, but are you really working up a sweat walking from the fridge to the sofa? Elasticated clothing is fooling us into thinking we’re immune to weight gain. Using phones to summon snacks normalises mindlessly munching on the sofa. The lizard side of our brain – the part that controls our ritualistic behaviour – tells us that comfort is everything; we are in a pandemic, we have had few pleasures or releases, so let’s be big as bears. Many of us have been Christmas eating for a year.

So, dear Uneasy, your problem is super-lockdowny because, in tanand dem with the fact that we have been at home and, apparently, always hungry, it has been difficult to break a cycle. It’s been hard to self-motivate or to shift out of a slump surrounded only by sameness. Life is very much about phases and habits; eating, drinking, obsessive thinking – the lot. And it’s been a while now, so the habits have gone deep, taken root. You did extremely well to use the lightening up of restrictions last summer to lighten up. You have broken the cycle – probably because, as a woman, you have had constant expectations of thinness drummed into you. Your husband is a bit behind. He’ll get there.

Food is so emotional. Eating is emotional – it is about comfort and punishment and reward and celebration. We eat our feelings. He may be clinging on to his snacks because he feels redundant, exhausted or depressed. You say you haven’t had sex since last summer – he’s not going to be feeling great about that either. This has not been a very sexy time permanently full tummies do not tend to make for erotic enthusiasm. Neither does depression.

But speaking to him about this is difficult – he may feel attacked but also unwanted. He might not hear, ‘I am worried about your health,’ but instead, ‘I don’t like the way you look.’ And it is important not to make food a battleground, because we need to engage with it every day.

Like all habits, only he has the power to change it. You can tease, shame, nag, control, withhold all you like, but it will make you both miserable. He sounds like he has lost sight of himself a little and this is probably what is upsetting you most. Hang tight, Uneasy. You can’t really tell what’s going to happen over the next few months of easing. You could find that once he begins putting on clothes for work or dinner with friends, it restarts his battery. The world might do the persuading for you.

In the meantime, shower him with love. Make him feel worthwhile – that he’s still got it. Go for walks together – if he does 10,000 steps, he might not want to compromise the good work with a packet of biscuits. He will find his motivation at some point – it’s been the strangest time and he’s probably feeling like a stranger to his old self. Love him. Remind him who he is. But remember that these are changes only he can make.

In a pandemic, we have had few pleasures… Many of us have been Christmas eating for a year

Do you have a dilemma that you’re grappling with? Email Annabel and Emilie on themidults@telegraph.co.uk. All questions are kept anonymous. They are unable to reply to emails personally