Dear Flower:

That was cruel of his mother, to tell him  that “she didn’t love him anymore now that he was fat”. I assume you expressed empathy to him for having suffered such cruelty.

And he believed her, that he was not worthy of empathy, or love unless he is not overweight. So I suppose any time he gains weight that is dangerous, for him, and maybe he is alert as to how much he weighs. And then, he may be alert about the same in others, his empathy limited to the number on the scale.

He will make a lot of progress in the empathy department, toward himself and others, when he resolves this issue. Nothing you can do anything about.

Going back to your original post, you wrote that when he broke up with you, “he started to list all the things he didn’t like about my appearance (my hair color, my weight”- so there it is, the weight issue.

Cruelty often leads to cruelty. It is a shame.

anita