My husband’s wedding ring was too tight. After ten years of marriage, I had it enlarged with an extra piece to accommodate his growing weight. I don’t know who was more dismayed, but as the years rolled by his weight ballooned to heart attack country. I cooked less. He ate even more.

I found empty take-away bags in his car, and glared at him. He still ate more. Eventually, he was diagnosed with early onset diabetes – no big surprise there. After 23 years of marriage, the penny finally dropped with him. It was lose weight, or learn to inject with needles for his growing diabetes problem.

He stopped drinking, his love of rum doing nothing for his blood sugars. He refused red wine, champagne, and stoically sipped glasses of water every time we went out. He slowed down as he ate, no longer the man who bolted his food like a starving Labrador. He learned to place his cutlery down between each bite, and learned to chew carefully; actually tasting the food I had prepared. Special dinners became an occasion where I would have my glass of wine, and he would drink the contents of the water jug on the table. Quickly, the weight began to fall off. His belt needed another hole, then another. I downsized shirt sizes for him, looking at my new, slimmer husband with new eyes.

Then his wedding ring began to slip off. Some mornings I would find it on the floor beside our bed. The other night he came home, and his white gold ring simply fell off his finger as he emerged out of the car.

It was time to re-size! In a week’s time the phone call came to collect the ring.

The local jeweller called out from behind his workbench: “Tell the man who wears the ‘wedder’ that he is back to his wedding size, I removed the extra bit that had been added in.”

And so it was. Last night I placed the newly polished, smaller ring on his finger once more. He’s gone to work today with a new shiny ring on his finger; a skip in his step, a slimmer, trimmer silhouette of the man I married.  Wearing a wedding ring may not work for every man, but it sure works for us.

I love the complete circle, I love the commitment, and I love the man who grins as he slips it on his finger.

Patty Beecham is a wife, mother of two, writer, thinker, ideas person, communicator, and a do-it-now-girl, who is also a Funeral Photographer. Introducing Patty’s work
Patty’s Blog accounts during the Brisbane 2011 Floods were widely publicised.

Contact Patty on Twitter @Pattycam

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