He Said He Loved Her But Was Disgusted by Her Body, Biologically

She asked a simple question, she says, and got an answer she can't unknow. Her boyfriend of six months doesn't find her attractive. Not biologically. He prefers skinny women, he told her, and she's never been skinny.

She's not obese, she writes. Her BMI sits within the normal range. She's carrying a little weight right now and working to address it, but she'd thought of herself as healthy. That self-image lasted until the conversation.

He insists he loves her deeply, according to the post. He finds her sexy. She's got all the qualities he's looking for. His lack of attraction, he explained, is separate from all that — a response he blames on society's influence over what women should look like. He's carrying weight himself, she notes, and he acknowledges the hypocrisy.

She heard what he said. She's devastated anyway. The question she brought to the forum was whether she's overreacting, whether this is a hard truth she needs to accept about relationships.

The comments didn't think it was.

The word that stopped them wasn't "attractive." It was the other one. He'd described his response, she wrote, as disgust. Disgust that he characterised as biological, involuntary, unconnected to how he feels about her in every other dimension. Several commenters quoted the line back in disbelief. One asked how a man could find someone sexy but be disgusted by them at the same time. The logic didn't hold.

The most-liked response pointed out that six months is far too early in a relationship to be hearing this. If he's not attracted to her now, the commenter argued, he won't become more attracted later. Another framed it more bluntly: he thinks she's ugly but not so ugly he won't sleep with her. That's not a foundation.

The theory that drew the most support was that he's using her as a placeholder. He can't attract the woman he actually wants, several people suggested, so he's with someone who meets his other criteria while he works on himself. The implication: once he loses the weight, he leaves. She's the relationship he's willing to have while he becomes the man who can have a different one.

Others thought the honesty itself was the problem, not a virtue. One commenter called it negging — the first criticism, with more to follow once she's addressed this one. Another said he's done this to destroy her self-esteem, that a man who opens with this isn't safe to stay with.

The divorced-fat-guy-pushing-forty detail didn't go unnoticed. The hypocrisy he acknowledged wasn't, to most readers, a mitigating factor. It made the whole speech worse. One commenter suggested he lose his own weight before opening his mouth. Another called the situation a fork found in a kitchen — exactly what you'd expect to find there, and still annoying.

A smaller number thought the problem was deeper than his preference. One argued that his brain's been warped by pornography, that he no longer sees her as a person. Another said most men don't actually like women, and this was evidence. The thread didn't spend long on those readings. The practical consensus formed quickly: leave now, or spend years waiting for him to leave you.

She'd framed the post as a question about her own perception. Am I crazy, she asked, or is this something I need to understand? The comments reframed it. The question isn't whether she can live with what he said. It's whether she wants to.

Six months is nothing. He's told her who he is and what he thinks of her body. The forum's answer was clear: believe him, and go.

Would you stay with someone who said they loved you but were disgusted by you biologically?