Help! I Eat To Live & He Lives To Eat

Bill and I are a lot alike in many ways. We enjoy the same music and movies; we have a great sex life; and we share similar political and spiritual beliefs. But, when it comes to our eating habits, we are like oil and water. He's oil; I'm water, and we would not make good salad dressing.

In fact, he hates salad, unless it's meat. I'm a vegetarian, and his idea of vegetables is French fries with ketchup. "Well, the school board says it's a vegetable," he says. ... and I'm a food and nutrition professional!

More from YourTango: 10 Sneaky Tips for Getting Him To Eat Healthier

This used to drive me absolutely crazy. Then I realized, none of us has a perfect "I agree-with-you-100%-of-the-time" relationship. There's always going to be something that bugs us about the other person.

Still, personal styles can really have a big impact on a relationship, particularly when it comes to food and eating, and especially if, as a couple, your eating styles are so different, it sometimes feels like your partner is more into food than he is into you!

We're all unique and different when it comes to our individual metabolisms, responses to stimuli, family backgrounds, genetics, customs, social values and food habits. My family sat around the dinner table until dad finished eating. However, on days when Bill's mom was waitressing, the family gobbled down his dad's dinners in front of the TV or at the table during commercials.

Even today, when he scarfs down his food and heads for the living room, it feels just like he's rolling over and going to sleep after sex, with no cuddling. We grew up with completely different lifestyles.

We all create and recreate our own brain chemistry, a product of our repeated choices. If he's stressed and gets hungry, for example, he gets cranky, downright irritable — a perfect excuse to swing by the drive-in window on the way home.

Eating for emotional fulfillment or beyond just nourishing the body can stimulate neurochemicals that set up their own "constant cravings," signaling and feeding food addictions. There are lots of reasons why people get fixated on food and can't resist it, or don't. Even past spiritual experiences, like his starving to death in the Middle ages, can resurface energetically and manifest in his feeling insecure about food.

More from YourTango: Help! My Fiance Has Unhealthy Eating Habits

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