TW: weight
I genuinely love my partner so much but from the beginning I always kinda felt like I loved him more than he loved me. At no point would I ever dream of commenting on him or his body but early into our relationship he’d make comments about me. I used to weight almost 170lbs and got down to 130lbs within 3-4 months because of an eating disorder, initially I mentioned the weight loss but not how I lost it. On our first date as bf/gf he asked if I had plans to lose more, I didn’t but I felt ashamed to say that and spitballed 5lbs, he told me to go more for like 15lbs. For the next few months, he’d say things about how he wants us to get fit together and workout, and how he wants us to get all muscley and in shape. I was at a healthy weight for my height, but he wanted me to be 100-115 lbs (which is between underweight and borderline underweight for my height). At like four months in, I got so fed up and told him I used to be anorexic and to just stop insisting I lose weight. Since then I can tell he’s been super apologetic about it and how he knows he was a really big jerk to me and how he loves everything about me and finds my body beautiful. But now it all just feels like a lie, I used to be so proud of my progress and how much my body has changed, and yet now I can’t see anything appealing when I look in a mirror, I just sob. I know I’m the only girl he’s ever dated and said this to and I can’t help but think I must be the ugliest girl he’s ever been with even though he insists I’m the prettiest, I can just assume he didn’t feel that way from the beginning. I wish I felt that unconditional love from the beginning so I don’t feel so horrible now because after all he’s cried with me, he’ll reassure me he loves me, but it all just feels like empty lies. What can I do to get over this? because I genuinely don’t know how to anymore and I feel my only solution is losing 30 lbs, but I also don’t want to fall back into old habits.