People gain weight in a healthy relationship.

FACT:
Research shows that being in a stable, happy relationship can lead to gradual weight gain, especially in women. Experts say shared habits, emotional security, and relaxed routines naturally contribute to this increase.

Ever wondered if gaining a little weight after finding love is actually a good sign?

That’s the intriguing claim made in a viral reel posted by Dr Manan Vora, an orthopaedic surgeon with 5,58,000 followers on Instagram. The video has already garnered 10.7 million views.

In the video, Dr Vora says that women can gain weight in a healthy relationship because their bodies finally feel safe and loved.

“Did you know that women can gain weight in a healthy relationship? Yes ladies, it’s a scientific sign from your body that you finally feel truly loved,” he says.

According to him, when women feel truly safe with their partner, cortisol, the stress hormone, drops dramatically, while oxytocin and serotonin, the feel-good hormones, increase. “This changes how their bodies process food and store weight,” he explains.

He further adds that women in stressful relationships may stay very thin because their bodies don’t relax enough to gain weight. “Their cortisol stays high, keeping them in survival mode,” he notes.

However, Dr Vora clarifies that this isn’t a test to prove how healthy a relationship is. “You can of course be fit and still be emotionally safe,” he says, adding that this is only meant to help people understand how the body responds in its own way when you’re no longer in survival mode.

“So the next time you notice some changes in your body, ask yourself, is this the weight of worry or just the weight of love?” he concludes. The reel has sparked widespread discussion, leaving many wondering – is weight gain really a sign of being in a healthy, loving relationship?

Do people really gain weight in a healthy relationship?

Research suggests that being in a stable and emotionally secure relationship can be associated with weight gain. A large-scale study tracking over 8,000 adults found that married women gain, on average, about 24 pounds (10.89kg) in the first five years of marriage. Women who lived with a partner but weren’t married gained around 18 pounds (8.16kg), while those in relationships but living separately gained 15 pounds (6.8kg). Interestingly, men also gained weight during relationships, though researchers observed fewer differences between married men and those cohabiting.

The study concluded, “Our findings suggest a positive association between romantic partnership and several obesity-related outcomes. The observed concordance of obesity could increase the likelihood that romantic partners may together pass on high-risk behaviours to their offspring.”

The researchers also noted that “targeting the shared household environment may be a promising area of intervention to establish healthy behaviour patterns and reduce obesity during young adulthood” (The study focused on heterosexual couples, leaving open questions about similar patterns in non-heterosexual relationships).

This pattern, known as “concordance,” suggests that one partner’s weight changes often influence the other’s. In fact, the study observed that if one person in a married couple becomes obese, their spouse has a 37 per cent higher chance of becoming obese as well.

Further research supports the notion that happy couples tend to gain more weight. In one study, newlyweds who reported higher marital satisfaction gained more weight than those who were less happy in their marriage. The researchers concluded that these findings “challenge the idea that quality relationships always benefit health, suggesting instead that spouses in satisfying relationships relax their efforts to maintain their weight because they are no longer motivated to attract a mate. Interventions to prevent weight gain in early marriage may therefore benefit from encouraging spouses to think about their weight in terms of health rather than appearance.”

In simpler terms, when people feel secure and content in a relationship, maintaining a strict diet or gym routine often takes a back seat.

Even physiology appears to synchronise in close relationships. A 2014 study on married couples’ cortisol levels (the stress hormone) revealed that spouses’ biological stress patterns influence each other daily. The study stated, “We found that spouses synchronise their diurnal cortisol slopes, such that on days when one experiences faster or slower decline in cortisol, the spouse also experiences faster or slower decline than usual.” Couples reporting higher spousal support showed stronger stability in stress-related hormone patterns, reinforcing the idea that emotional security within relationships can regulate stress responses.

However, it’s not all about the numbers on the scale. Multiple studies have shown that married people often eat healthier overall. A meta-analysis of nine European studies found that people who had never been married tended to have a lower body mass index (BMI), yet married participants reported healthier food choices. Researchers theorised that “married individuals reported stronger preferences for organic/fair trade food and regional/unprocessed food, and paying less attention to dietary convenience or dietary fat and body weight. Importantly, married men also exercised less.

Interestingly, shared exercise may strengthen this connection even further. A study from the Life and Family Legacies Study that followed 191 older couples over 14 days found that “individual exercise on a given day was associated with more positive marital events and higher daily marital satisfaction; patterns in these results were more consistent for wives than for husbands.” The authors added, “Relationships benefit from both individual and especially conjoint couple exercise.”

That said, not all studies agree on the pattern of weight gain. A 2018 study from the German Panel Analysis of Intimate Relationships and Family Dynamics (pairfam) found that women tend to lose weight during the first year of a relationship, then gradually gain after entering a non-married cohabiting relationship. Men, however, gained weight almost immediately after beginning a partnership. Importantly, the researchers noted that “the transition from non-married cohabitation to marriage has no significant effect on body weight.”

These findings align with expert observations on how emotional security and relationship dynamics can influence lifestyle and weight. Agreeing with this, Dr Rajiv Kovil, Head of Diabetology and weight loss expert at Zandra Healthcare, explained that being in a long-term, stable relationship often brings emotional and social satisfaction, which can influence eating habits and physical activity.

“Couples usually experience a lot of emotional and social satisfaction. Their focus on eating healthy often goes down, and many people in healthy relationships end up dining together or eating more frequently, which can increase the amount they consume,” he said.

He added that women in secure, happy relationships may pay less attention to their body image or weight. “A little bit of weight gain is often seen because they are not as concerned about maintaining a certain body structure once they feel secure and accepted.”

Dr Kovil also highlighted how lowered stress levels can impact motivation. “When cortisol goes down, and you are in a very stable, happy relationship, your motivation to exercise or maintain a very active lifestyle can also decrease. People often become a little laid back in life,” he explained.

He emphasised that food often plays a central role in bonding. “Couples bond and celebrate with food. For example, a wife may cook dishes her husband likes, or the husband might take his wife out for desserts she enjoys. This kind of shared food experience can accelerate weight gain,” he said.

Dr Kovil shared an example of a positive exception. “I personally know a close friend who was overweight and married into a family that prioritised fitness. Over time, she and her husband started exercising and trekking together. Today, she has lost 15–20 kilos of weight and runs a marathon annually. But, this is the exception; maybe 10–15 per cent of people. For the majority, bonding revolves around food, and they feel accepted, so body image concerns take a back seat,” he narrated.

He also explained the physiological aspect. “Cortisol is associated with fat accumulation and cravings for calorie-dense food. In a good relationship, stress levels drop, cortisol spikes are reduced, and this can lessen the drive to stay lean or active, leading to gradual weight gain.”

Dr Kovil also explained the contrast in stressful relationships. “In high-stress relationships, people often turn to comfort eating and energy-dense foods at abnormal times. Women, in particular, may gain more weight under stress because food becomes a form of coping or the simplest available distraction.”