Chapter 2 - ups and downs

The ongoing calorie reduction worsened her mood, and Jack noticed that she was more irritable than she used to be. Even though she was proud of her weight loss, she constantly complained about being hungry. Once again, Jack kept quiet. But something had changed since then then. She wasn't dealing with her cut back meals as well anymore. When they had dinner, she would complain about still being hungry. One day, after she had pushed her plate over to Jack and waited for him to finish it up, she said "Dammit, let's get some onion rings and ice cream." And so she did. Soon, it would be a frequent occurrence that she ordered more food after she had "finished" her half. When they made dinner at home, he noticed that she made bigger portions than she used to, compensating for her smaller portions. Her body was claiming back all the carbohydrates it lacked, but Jack would still get his second helping. But afterwards, she would get another helping herself. And poor Jack sometimes even got her leftovers of that.

So it came as no surprise that he gained almost 15 kilos over the course of four months. Everything about him was softer, bigger, and he had developed a round, chubby belly. Some clothes got remarkably tight, and he had to replace all his skinny-fit shirts that he used to wear. They looked ridiculous with his round pot belly sticking out, spanning the fabric and pushing its buttons. His jeans, too, became too tight as he had gone up two sizes. His colleagues couldn't help but comment his weight gain, and joked that he was getting pregnant. He would have been upset about all these things, but strangely his sex life benefitted from it. Emma seemed to appreciate his extra weight. At night, she snuggled up to him, and put her arms around his tummy. When they had sex she grabbed and pushed it, and made comments about him being more dominant.

Finally, he noticed that she had started gaining some of her weight back as well. At the peak of her diet, she had lost 12 kilos, as she proudly proclaimed, still short of her 15kilo goal. She had lost most of her love handles, and her belly showed barely any curvature. But also, her thighs and boobs had become smaller, a fact that Jack had difficulty adjusting to. Somehow he couldn't help it, but he preferred the chubbier Emma.

But since she had started to compensate her half-portions by doubling, and sometimes even tripling them, the weight crept back on. He noticed how her body became softer again. Slowly, her belly, thighs and boobs grew in size again. Her face started to look round, too.

But as much as it delighted him, her mood decreased even more. She wasn't talking about her weight and diet as often anymore, and when she did, she said she needed to cut down more on the food, passing more over to his plate. This way his portions increased even more. But then she would feel hungry again, getting second or third helpings, which had a detrimental effect on her weight loss. The fact that she was packing on the pounds even quicker than she had shed them depressed her. After six months, she had regained her old size. All the clothes she bought to celebrate her new skinny self didn't fit anymore. A few weeks later, the old clothes that she used to wear before she started her "diet" were getting snug. Belly, boobs and legs, they all pushed the boundaries of the fabric.