My wife and I have been together a little over 6 years, married for 4. When we met, she already had a 3 year old daughter and she had always complained she "got a lot bigger" after her pregnancy. Before that, from pictures I've seen she was indeed very skinny, and afterwards was slightly wider at the hips but still very healthy and great looking, not at all fat. She's somewhat of a perfectionist so she always kind of joked at her figure not being as slim as before.

2 years after we got married we had our son, and she did gain a considerable amount of weight from that pregnancy, she felt like a whale and felt terrible. I can totally understand that she didn't like how she had become, but I always told her it's just pregnancy weight and that it's fine, it would drop off. Over the next year or so she did lose some weight but still was not comfortable for her. This past April we had our daughter, she didn't gain quite as much weight and after she was born she slimmed down really fast. All in all, she's probably about 50lbs heavier than when we met. She's taller than average too, so it doesn't look bad at all.

Let me just start by saying that I love my wife and we have an amazing relationship. I worship the ground she walks on and have never made her feel bad about her weight, I adore her and have always been as sexually attracted as I've always been. I always try to lift her up and make her not feel bad because it doesn't bother me at all. I even kinda like the whole big booty, extra meat on the bone body figure, and I tell her I'm crazy about her often.

The problem is that her self consciousness has created issues and it kind of turns me off. I feel she can't be herself and has no confidence which is really unsexy to me. I understand why she feels how she does, but it makes me feel like she can't be comfortable around me, even though I never criticize or pressure her, and always adore her. Some examples are like :

- She kind of snickers at compliments I give her, like I'm just trying to be nice or something.

- I've never seen her naked standing up, ever, in 6 years of knowing each other. She literally changes in the bathroom. Never taken a shower together

- she insists lights always be off when we're intimate, only the light from the TV on. She also won't do a lot of things in bed that we used to, anything she thinks will bring attention to her body

- she wears super baggy clothes always, never wears shorts or tank tops or anything that shows skin.

- she doesn't like me touching anywhere near her midsection, like coming up behind for a hug or to be affectionate.

These aren't things that I like, demand of her or anything like that, but I mean I'm her husband and it just feels like she has to hide herself from me.

I've talked with her about it before, and says she just wants her slammin bod back and when she does, that things will be fine. She's on a super low carb diet that she's good with and strict on, but besides normal household work and childcare, not any formal exercise. I'm obviously not going to tell her to exercise more, I know better than that. Now I know she just had a baby and her body is changing so like I said I don't pressure her, but we're both in our early mid 30s and I feel like we're wasting time in our sexual relationship because she thinks she'll one day look how she did when she was 20 and doesn't feel comfortable doing and wearing lots of things until that happens. Before we know it we're in our 40s and 50s and there will be a whole slew of new body issues for both of us then. I fully support her trying to lose weight but she's so uncomfortable doing anything with me we used to enjoy. Her trying to hide and conceal her figure has the opposite effect and makes it less attractive to me.

I want to convince her that she can be herself and be comfortable but I just don't know how, and we are just less intimate and less affectionate as a result. Should I just give her space and deal with it? I dunno what to do. Didn't mean for this post to be so long.