We have hijacked the original thread, and for that I"m sorry, but I have to tell you, Shama, that I was in many icky abusive relationships with icky unsupportive men, and when you lose this weight once and for all, he'll be on to something else to be mean and controlling with you about. I urge you both to get some counseling, and if he won't go with you, you should go yourself.
He is probably afraid of losing you, once you lose weight, he will feel threatened that you may gain more self-esteem, and he doesn't want that! He wants you right where you are: fat and insecure so he can control you and feel powerful about it.
I speak from unfortunate experience, but I was lucky enough that I never had children with any of the monsters I had chose to include in my life and it was much easier to break off those bad relationships (it was harder to realize that I kept chosing the same type of man, but that's a long story! ). Anyway, please get yourself some counseling or try to get your mean husband in counseling with you.
I am sorry to be so blunt but I know what I'm talking about here!!!!!!!!!! I understand you are married and you have 4 children and no job, and you love him. But it's not fair to yourself or your kids to go on letting him treat you this way and you DO need help learning how to deal with it. Just making up your mind and/or losing weight isn't enough to break a cycle of abuse (and the way he treats you IS abuse, don't kid yourself).

Thanks Sydney and everyone,

Thanks for the advice, and I am sorry for taking over the thread, I should have started one on my own. I just want to put this behind me, it will go away with time. I am considering counseling, maybe if I go he might too. I apprieciate everyones concern, but I would rather be discussing a more upbeat subject. I guess I let the cat out of the bag and I probably shouldnt. So I just want to say the support is unending and I appreciate you all with all my heart, but I need to get past this, thank you all again, you have helped me immensely.

Sincerely,

Shannon

I understand that it's uncomfortable to discuss a bad marriage, but you got a guy with a big control problem there and I'm seeing all kinds of red flags here. Non-physical abuse is just as bad as physical abuse, and make no mistake, he's an abuser. Keep these two things in mind:

1) If you continue to allow him to treat you this way, your children are learning that this is the way they should act in their own marriages. Your daughters will learn to accept abuse and your sons will learn to dish it out.

2) If he isn't forced to confront his behavior, he has no chance of owning it and becoming a better person. For the sake of his own morality, he needs to be held accountable for his actions.

Shannon

2berners, I appreciate your concern, I just dont want to dwell on this any longer. It was my fault for bringing this to the forum. Its too deep and I just dont want to think about this anymore. I'm going to do something about this, I promise. Again thank you.


Shannon

Good luck. Vent again if you need to.

Regarding the first and second topics of this thread...

I just wanted to say that bad behavior often masks a good person... it happens to all of us, and we all have one in our life somewhere. It's not always the answer to throw the baby out with the bathwater! People can learn and change...as you do the same.

Even the best, most decent-hearted people need to be taught the most basic things sometimes ... as awful and hurtful as the outward crap can be sometimes, it's because they are operating out of their own lack of something...much like what we were talking about in the beginning of this thread.

Shannon, I'm glad to see you're moving on with your eating plan...positive self-esteem is the most empowering thing!

We need to remember in all aspects of our weight loss efforts that some will be our lifelines, and some will be our anchors ... but our efforts are for ourSELVES anyhow!!