would you have a relationship with a woman with a large tummy?

This encourages me somewhat because I have thought that because of the weight and other health issues I wouldn't last that long.

overweight people outlive both normal weight and obese people, according to some of the research on the subject matter

My husband loves my fat tummy. He does. I told him I'm going to work out and he said he loves my body. He doesn't want me to loose the belly at all.

So yes. There are men out there that like chubby bellies, buts, etc.

You really need to move your body, not for the purposes of losing weight (that might or might not happen as a collateral), but for the purposes of enjoying life and being healthy. Moving your body yields better health regardless of size.

You would not be able to be a diver or play professional tennis, perhaps, but you can swim, walk, and do milder kinds of yoga.

Swimming is especially forgiving. Having a tummy would not stop you from swimming. Fat makes you buoyant!

Also, you would see in public swimming pools that women of all ages and shapes go swimming. Even disabled people in wheelchairs or with walkers (I sometimes go to a pool with disabled access via a ramp and special plastic wheelchairs). So you will see that this is one kind of activity that will always be with you into your old age. Just start and continue on. Would help joints later in life, too.

Overweight people can also dance!

Read this blog:Dances With Fat | Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness are Not Size Dependent

It is brilliant. Another brilliant one: The Fat Nutritionist. Read about what she calls "normal eating". Works very well.

Also read about HAES (health at every size) - an approach to health that is more humane, practical, and... evidence-based than weight reduction focused program. So read that.

Do not view exercise as a way to counteract the calories from food. View exercise as an enjoyable activity instead.

Honest answer?

I think it depends. If you dress well, like your job, are confident, well-groomed, etc, I will overlook a lot.

Also depends on the extent of the stomach issue.

Saw my regular hairdresser and thought of your question.

She is a young woman with one daughter in elementary school. She recently remarried. I saw her husband's picture.

She: a cute face, HUGE bum, flabby arms, significant tummy, stretch marks on her breasts. Full sleeve tattoo on one arm and more tattos on her chest.

She is sexy. Her low, deep voice is sultry. She moves about all day long, on her feet all day long. She dresses without trying to hide her fat - sleeveless tops and low necklines. She is curvy - she is not like one big ball of fat, but instead she has a very feminine shape.

The husband is a skinny tall young man without a cell of fat on his body.

So... everything is possible.

My husband and I come as close to having the same basic body type as two people of the opposite sex can come. We are both long-bodied and short legged, all gut, no butt. Both of us have lost a substantial amount of weight, resulting in some sagging, but we aren't going to change our basic body structure where we carry our weight in our middles. In addition, I have given birth to three babies, two of them quite large, so I'm going to sag even more.

It's been my experience that as long as she's doing her best to take care of her health and basic hygiene, men don't care much about whether she looks like a supermodel. Boys may, but mature men don't.

I don't see why that would be a definite no. It all depends on the person and what they find attractive, some find skinny toned people attractive while others prefer bigger people attractive. And everything in between.
I can relate to how that may make someone feel insecure about how they look though, after having three children, putting on huge amounts of weight then losing it all I'm left with a huge amount of saggy skin on my belly plus my underarms and I have wrinkly boobs now too! My stomach is really wrinkly, I look about 90 rather than 30. I can't see how my husband can stand to look at me, I won't undress in front of him any more. But he says he loves how I look but he wants me to be happy and confident in myself.
He doesn't like what he looks like but I love everything about him, the things he hates the most are the things I love the most because they make him him.

Neptune, my husband tells me I'm beautiful too, and every morning, I greet him with, "Hi, handsome." His work uniforms are a combination of blues and greens. I think he especially looks good in blue, and when I told him that the other day, he seemed really flattered. He's not built like a swimsuit model, but blue suits his skin tone. In fact neither one of us is "Hollywood beautiful" I don't think. We're middle-aged, growing gray, and shaped like Weebles.

I do understand about physical attraction, but I also believe that we should look beyond that. If I were holding out for someone who looked like Brad Pitt, or my husband were holding out for someone who looked like Angelina Jolie, neither one of us would have found our soul mates yet.

You're quite right
I think you're attracted to who you're attracted to. Whether its looks or personality or both that won you over, doesn't really matter as long as you're both happy. I think people get more wrapped up in their own appearance rather than what others look like. I know I am bothered by what I look like! My husband thinks he's ugly but I love him for everything he is, looks, personality, his bravery, even his stinky farts. Sad maybe, but they make me laugh lol I even love his funny toenail!

I noticed that too.

The question was: would you have a relationship with a woman with a large tummy?
Most female responses are variations on the theme that it shouldn't matter.
I can't help what I find attractive or not. Speaking for myself I prefer a woman who takes care of herself. I find fit and thin women more attractive than obese women....there is a wide range between these two body sizes because chemistry counts for a lot too.

John

My question would be, does one have to find a partner physically attractive before a relationship is a possibility? My husband and I fell in love on the internet and telephone, from thousands of miles away, before we even met face to face. We'd only seen a few photos of each other, and that was only for the purpose of showing that we were actual people and not trying to pull some kind of stunt. Therefore I don't think physical attraction played much of a role. But we are definitely soul mates. So how important is it whether or not we find them attractive?

I personally am primarily attracted to the sound of the voice in a man, and much less so to various visual characteristics. So I can see how you would fall in love using the telephone.

Hubby is sitting beside me while I'm online. I told him about this thread, and here is his pronouncement:

"If that (meaning the size of a woman's tummy) is all a man is interested in, then she wouldn't want him anyway."

I love that man.

Could it be that the anger and self-esteem issues are caused by people forever judging them by their body type?

I would not think it would be too much of an issue, depending....I mean a morbidly obese woman, yes, although some men find this attractive also. But just being chubby or carrying weight there and not having a flat stomach, generally I would not think would matter to most guys....no one is "perfect"....and anyone who thinks they are needs a reality check...
Also if it is a matter of loose skin due to weight loss, won't your body eventually kind of reform to this new shape? If not, I know they have surgeries for such things. We have someone in town who lost a huge amount of weight due to having a gastric bypass, and he had to return to have skin removed.
If it helps, I have been overweight to some degree or another my entire adult life, ranging from a fairly slim size 9 up to a 22 and everything in between. I am 5'7". I carry most of my weight in my butt and thighs rather than my stomach though. I have started to get a gut from when I had a hysterectomy about 7-8 years ago. When I went to leave the hospital, I discovered that the pants I wore there, I could not even begin to pull over my hips and stomach. I had to send my friend who had come for me to Kmart to buy me some sweats! Some may have been swelling, but it has never been the same and is flabby, and I get self conscious about it, particularly if my husband touches any part of me that I have deemed fat.
But I guess what I'm saying is, I've never been super skinny, well except when I did drugs but besides that. And I have never, ever had the slightest amount of difficulty getting a man to seem interested. Certainly I am fatter than I was way back in the day when I was single and in college, and have not been with anyone but my husband since prior to our marriage nearly twenty years ago. But I wasn't particularly thin then, either, and I never had a guy seem inclined to not want to take me to bed over it. Nor had a man request I put my clothes back on. Lol.
What an awful thing for your dad to say. You should be his princess and the apple of his eye.
He must have a lot of money to attract a woman who is of the age to be his daughter. Maybe if he has so much money to waste, and this bit of flab disturbs you (and only if it disturbs YOU) he ought give you a few thousand dollars to have it surgically removed. Otherwise he needs to f off.

Also, don't you suppose some people are attracted to skinny people and some to fat people?

To be honest, there are things which I find attractive in men. I like a man who is bigger and taller than I am, or at least, that is my preference. I find brown eyes attractive, although my husband has green eyes just like me. He has brown hair and a medium skin tone, although he tans much, much easier than I do.

I do not find a man who is extremely obese or thin attractive. My preference is for a guy who is tall and tends toward a heavier set build. My husband is 6 feet tall and weighs about 260 lbs. This is generally what I am going to be attracted to, it is just a natural, internally set preference. If my husband gains or loses weight, I remain attracted to him.

I haven't ever liked the appearance of someone with ribs, hip bones, or shoulder blades jutting out. That is disgusting. I would not like to have to touch someone and feel bones right beneath their skin. Yuck. But I will say this....if my husband ever became ill, and lost a lot of weight, and was thin and bony, I certainly would not leave him, and would reassure him. I would probably still find him attractive, because it was HIM.

What I've heard is that they've done some sort of study and found that like is attracted to like. Meaning, you're generally attracted to someone that has a similar body type or facial features as yourself. My husband and I took this perhaps a little too far -- we've been asked if we're siblings before

All this talk of "I can't help what I find attractive" is beginning to bug me. Personally, I think the whole mentality of "I have to find the person physically attractive, or no dice," should have been outgrown by third grade. Of course some people are more physically attractive than others. But why should that make a difference? Aren't we mature enough as adults to realize that looks aren't the most important thing about a person? Are people who are not Hollywood attractive somehow less qualified for relationships? Should we turn somebody down for a relationship because they have a birthmark on their face? Because their nose is too lumpy? Because they have the wrong eye color?

So what if you DON'T find them attractive? Does that make them less of a person?

My husband is a big man, and I am a big woman, but we didn't seek each other out on that basis. It's not that we were "attracted" to each other for being big. It's that we couldn't care less because we know that what's on the inside of the person matters far more. If a man treats me good, I'm not going to kick him out of bed because he's bald or something.

Yeah, it's kind of a hot button issue for me. Maybe I've had too much "I don't like you for no other reason than that you're big" in my life.

my bff and her H are like that in terms of facial features and the color scheme - both very fair skinned blue eyed blonde with similar features. You'd think "siblings", very true. But he is much taller than she is.

He's a keeper!! What a fab man :-)

And it's true what he said. A real man takes in a lot more than looks :-)

I find my partner quite interesting with his views. When we met (we were friends for a long time first) he used to tell me all these things that his at the time g/f did that annoyed him. Crumbs in the butter etc and also that she put on weight was just a couple.

We've been together for a fair few years now and we've both put on weight in the last couple of years. Not huge, but I am deffo the same as his ex now. I asked him if it bothered him because it bothered him in the past and he gave me an emphatic no! Said that there was so much more to me, and that we get on well (for the most part!), that I make him happy that weight is just not a problem. It was the right answer, even if it would've been a case of pot kettle black had he said otherwise with his own weight gain!!

Oh, and I also leave crumbs in the butter and he couldn't care less about it. A person forgives flaws a lot easier if they actually like them. He and his ex had so many resentments that the little stuff really got to each other.

I've heard it termed in words using, I expect my partner to stay fit, for me to find satisfaction in the relationship. I've heard it termed before, that if she doesn't care about herself, how can she care about me?

Lovebird, I am WITH you about how uncomfortable this mentality leaves me, feeling too.

I've been on the bigger side, I've been on the slender side, and yet...what type of boundary setting on a relationship, is what I just wrote all about?

It bothers me to no avail. Then again, would I really want a man in my life that has that type of mentality?

I am afraid, my answer is NO. ((and that's from the slender me..))

If it makes any difference, I wasn't particularly sexually attracted to my husband when we met. I mean, I thought he was funny, and I liked hanging out with him, and we liked to talk on the phone. But initially, there was definitely no "spark" for me. My husband is very normal looking, slightly tall, slightly heavyset, with brown hair. I did not find him at first to be particularly attractive nor did I find him unattractive. My husband looks a great deal like Jack Black. I am not kidding. There is a definite resemblance, and I am not the only one who has noticed it.
I started dating him because he was funny and very sweet to me at that time (we have gone through struggles but are hanging strong after nearly twenty years). He was actually somewhat shy, initially, but once warmed up he was very funny, and very, very smart. I got a kick out of him. It was quite apparent that he was quite taken with me.
After dating for some time, I became more attracted to him. But we were always more "friends". It seemed awkward, but I was aware he wanted to go to bed with me, and I allowed this, and wanted it, because I adored him and his companionship so much, and I didn't wanna lose him.
At some point, within not too long of a time, I developed a fondness and physical attraction for him. It has never waned, other than briefly when we have a spat.
We have spent nearly twenty years together, have two kids just out of the house and in college, and are empty nesters now, I am 42, he is 46. Actually, if you count the period of time we were together before marriage, it is over twenty years.
I am just saying, just because the first sight of a guy (or woman) doesn't make you quiver with lust, doesn't mean they never will, and that it is not worth messing with. Of course, he didn't gross me out, either. But I guarantee you, 100% honestly, I didn't find him insanely hot and intend to screw him the first time I laid eyes on him.
And I promise you that I do now. Lol. And I took getting married quite seriously, and intend to remain with him until death, and I've been a good and faithful wife, I haven't ever strayed, although I have succumbed to a lustful thought now and again, but I've never acted on such a thought. Nor do I intend to.

People in movies or magazines are all made up and photoshopped to achieve some unreasonable standard of beauty. If anyone is so shallow they would only want a supermodel, why would you want them? What a horrible person!

If you could not become attracted to someone as you grew more and more fond of them, how would arranged marriages have worked, back in the day, your spouse was picked out ahead of time, when you were children.....and usually they work at it.....often they are quite affectionate and loving. They are managing to have babies....they are liking each other just fine! Lol.

A very shallow person indeed would be the only ones who would focus on appearance only. If my husband were disfigured, hurt, became ill, etc....of course I would still love and want him! He is mine....I would hope the feeling is mutual.

Also I think it is really unfair that supposedly men are interested only in appearance, and women more on the personality....what a crock, really. Why would anyone assume that a man does not love as deeply as a woman?

People have flaws, and people who cannot accept something so miniscule about someone - is going to have a hard time having a life-long partner

There should not be a problem, I've dated large women and they are just as beautiful and caring as anyone else.