Married at First Sight UK’s Mel Schilling says she and her husband talk openly about weight gain – in order to help them both stay trim.

The 50-year-old dating expert said it is one of the secrets behind her happy marriage to husband Gareth Brisban.
Speaking to Mark Dolan on GB News she said: “The two of us have been together for nearly 12 years. And we’ve both been through the ups and downs of our weights. I’ve had a child and been through IVF, and so all of that has changed my body shape. He’s gone through stages where he developed a gorgeous little beer belly.
“We talked about it, it certainly wasn’t something that was brushed under the covers. We used humour and had a joke about it, and then we started motivating each other to get into the gym and to eat healthily. It was very much about `okay, what can we do about this problem, let’s work together toward a solution’, as opposed to, ‘you’ve got a bit of a podge and you’re no longer sexy’.”
She added: “Bodies change, people change, men gain weight too. One of the joys of being in a long-term relationship is you get to go through the ebbs and flows of life with that person. And often that means that bodies change, hairlines change, this is part of accepting a partner for who they are and loving them anyway.”
The topic of conversation came after a groom on the E4 series told his wife he wouldn’t want his partner to have “horse legs”
Offering her view, Mel added: “There’s been some research done on people who actually partake in this, this fat shaming, and they believe that saying something hurtful, or shameful to a person who’s overweight, is going to motivate them to go to the gym or to start eating lean. But the opposite is actually true. What the research shows is that it does some real psychological damage. It increases anxiety and depression and definitely plummets self-esteem. And all of these things actually reduce motivation. So it actually makes it worse.”