Sex, Love, and Dating on a Weight-Loss Journey | WW USA
We polled 1,163 of our loyal members to find out what it’s really like in a marriage, on the apps, and in between the sheets as they navigate the ins and outs of a body journey.
A weight-loss journey can be an act of self-love: a vow to our bodies, a commitment to our health, and a promise to our future selves. But what happens when you’re on this transformational journey while you’re in love (or looking for it)?
We asked 1,163 of our members to open up for our first-ever (in 62 years!) survey about love, sex, and dating. They spanned generations (18 to 65+), status (dating to divorced), and weight (maintaining their goal weight to wanting to lose 150+ pounds).
What we found: heartwarming reflections, heartbreaking stories, and dating anecdotes that made us wish couples therapy was free. We also found that conventional wisdom, cultural chatter, and even scientific research hasn’t really painted a complete picture of how weight actually intersects with love.
For instance, much of the science conducted around this sphere is decades old–released before the rise of dating apps, before a certain pandemic rewired our collective brains, and before a new class of medications called GLP-1s practically changed everything about weight loss.
It’s a lot to unpack. But we at WeightWatchers often tell our members that the weight-loss journey is not linear. You’ll have ups, downs, plateaus, and total wins. It’s messy, rewarding, life-changing. Just like love. Let’s get into the data.
Yes, “Happy Relationship Weight” Is a Thing
Our survey found that 55% of people experience weight gain linked with good old-fashioned love. But only 34% say it's easier to lose or maintain their weight when they're single. That might have something to do with the support our members say they’ve gotten from their partners. As one member says: "My husband motivates me when I get discouraged about not losing weight when I feel like I have worked so hard for it . Going through menopause can make things extremely stressful, but he is my cheerleader helping me stay positive. 💕"
No, They’re Not a Magic Pill, But….
GLP-1s were the dark-horse surprise of our survey. Everything we thought we knew about life on GLP-1s isn’t wrong, but it’s not totally right either. Here, the facts:
The Dating Diaries: WW Edition
As one member bluntly puts it: “Dating while losing weight is hard.”
Today, so little dating happens outside of an app, and that’s part of the problem. It starts at the profile level: 64% of our members say they don't feel comfortable sharing full-body pictures. And 67% say their weight significantly impacts the number of matches they get.
Cue the Sex and the City theme song. Here are your quotes, straight from the trenches:
“My last real date was a couple months ago, and we had great conversation, and then he said he didn’t think we were compatible. Although I keep full body pictures online, everything is telling me it’s because of my weight. I’m not just going to tell everyone I’m dating that I’m on a weight-loss journey. That’s my personal experience. So yes, I could tell them, ‘hey I promise I won’t look like this in a year’ but I need someone to love me at every stage.”
"My worst experiences have been lewd comments made by men who ‘appreciate’ a curvier woman, but in a kink or fetish type of way."
“I haven't dated a lot while heavy because I don't feel attractive and if I'm not comfortable with myself, I don't want to be looked at by someone else. When I was at my skinniest (and unhealthy after losing 60 pounds in around 7-8 months on keto), I was hit on regularly in public and now at my heaviest (201 pounds) I am not looked at.”
“I’ll be ready to start dating again once I feel confident in myself. I wish my weight didn’t affect my self-esteem, but it does, so I’m trying to lose the weight and fix part of the problem. If I can fix the physical, then perhaps I will be able to also fix the mental.”
“I don’t date anymore. I feel it’s more beneficial to focus on me and my needs than to worry about dating.”
But not all hope is lost…
“No one has ever made bad comments about my weight or being larger. If I mention that I am trying to lose weight, most men have always said, ‘why? You look great, I don't think you need to lose any weight.’ But they have all been very supportive and encouraging of my weight-loss goals.”
How to Have Sex on a Weight-Loss Journey
Step 1: Just do it.
Our members prove that what happens between the sheets still happens regardless of weight–and in fact, it just gets better on a weight-loss journey. 
Say what?
We’ve all been on the receiving ends of unwelcome remarks about our bodies. Here, women (and men!) share the good, the bad, and the downright awkward moments they’ve experienced.
The pressure
“I want you to lose weight so I can be proud to walk into a room with you.”
The judgment
“He questioned whether I should order a whole sandwich after I had our first child.”
The cheap shots
“[He] talked about my back fat and called them my back boobs.”
The brutally honest
“You’re too overweight that I can't get on top of you any longer when having sex—we barely fit together.”
The downright cruel
“You will never achieve success.”
The expectations
“When he picked me up at the airport after a two-week work trip, he said, ‘I would have thought you would have lost some weight.’”
And…the positive
“He said he would love me forever, regardless of weight, size, or looks. He married me for my heart, not my body.”
And Now: The 25-Year Success Story
WeightWatchers member Maria has a special message for her biggest supporter: her husband.
—Maria, –184 lb* and her husband, Ben
“My husband is amazing. There has never been a time where he’s asked, ‘Should you be eating that?’ Or ‘Don’t you think you need to lose a little weight?’ He always made me feel beautiful, no matter what size I was. That allowed me to go on this journey for myself. The motivation was not because my husband’s going to leave me because I’m heavy. Or because my husband doesn’t love me. Or because my husband’s not attracted to me. He always made me feel beautiful. And he makes me feel beautiful now. When I ask him, ‘How do you feel about how I look now?’ He says, ‘Babe, you’ve always been beautiful. You’re beautiful now. But I’m not going to say, you look better, because for me, you’re always perfect.’ He supports me in everything.”
*At 6 months, participants in a clinical trial of the WW Points® program lost an average of 12 lbs (5.4% of body weight).