Married Couple Lost 118 Pounds Together Without Weight Loss Drugs

• After years of feeling unwell and overweight, Richard and Jill Wendt decided to embark on a weight loss journey together.
• The couple lost a combined 118 pounds by following the Mayo Clinic Diet.
• Today, they both feel physically and mentally healthier.

In 2023, Jill and Richard Wendt decided to take charge of their weight and health. 51-year-old Richard had been taking blood pressure medication since his late 20s and used a CPAP machine for sleep apnea. And 49-year-old Jill reached a weight that made her feel uncomfortable and self-conscious.

“Over the course of time, the weight just kept going up and up. It just kind of happens without you realizing it,” Jill told Healthline. “You just feel down and out about yourself, and you get in the cycle of, well, that sucks. I can’t find pants that fit, might as well go home and have something to eat because what’s the point? I can’t find clothes anyway?”

Realizing that work stress and unhealthy eating habits had taken a toll on their health, the couple wanted to make a change.

“[Knowing] what challenges our parents and grandparents had, if we can do anything to be proactive going into our older years, we wanted to be able to do that,” said Jill. “We might not be able to avoid some of those illnesses, but maybe they won’t be as bad for us.”

They researched weight loss programs and decided to try the Mayo Clinic Diet in June 2023.

Since then, Jill has lost 60 pounds, and Richard has lost 58 pounds. He no longer takes blood pressure medication or uses a CPAP machine.

“I’m a stress eater, so [the diet] kind of brought that to my attention,” said Richard. “When I was in the office, it was easy having a stressful day to get up and walk to the snack machine and grab a bag of M&Ms or [when I’m] working from home, walk up the stairs and grab a bowl of cereal.”

In addition to offering a food plan, he said the Mayo Clinic Diet helped him understand his unhealthy habits and how to practice healthier habits.

The Mayo Clinic Diet is a digital weight loss program that uses a food groups system to create a whole-health menu program to follow.

“It’s the perfect fit for all the patients who’ve walked into my office and said, ‘Can you please just tell me what to eat?’” Tara Schmidt, lead dietitian for the Mayo Clinic Diet, told Healthline.

People can choose from seven different meal plans, including Simple, Healthy Keto, Mediterranean, and Protein Balance for GLP-1s.

“We have numerous Diet members who are actively taking anti-obesity medications. With this in mind, we created a specific meal plan to address the unique needs of those on these medications, group coaching sessions around frequently asked questions, and continue to update content the more we learn from individuals and research,” said Schmidt.

The program also provides education and behavior change and offers tools like recipes, virtual support, peer support, and a food tracker.

The Wendts chose the Simple plan, which offers quick recipes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

“We did some freelancing with it and changed things or ingredients a little bit ourselves but generally tried to follow that,” said Richard. “It never felt like you were dieting, which is one of the things we really enjoyed about it. You were eating healthy, and nothing is off limits.”

One stipulation for finding a program was not feeling deprived of foods they enjoy. For instance, following a program that removed dairy was out of the question.

“[We] both grew up on a farm, and I love my milk. I’m not giving that up, so maybe I don’t drink as much, or if you like your sweets, you can still have them, but maybe you just don’t do it every night…or you find something that substitutes for that sweetness,” said Jill.

Going back to the basics of healthy eating is something that Jill also gained from the program.

“It’s re-learning what you learned as a kid with the food pyramid, the right portion sizes, it’s okay not to eat everything on your plate if you take too much, or if you’re at a restaurant, it’s okay to take the leftovers home,” she said.

Christina Brown, MS, ACSM CPT, a nutrition and weight loss coach, said the majority of weight loss results are due to changing eating habits to ensure that people are not only eating quality calories but also eating in a calorie deficit.

“In order to lose weight, you must eat fewer calories than you are burning,” she told Healthline. “The easiest way to ensure you are doing this is to track everything you are eating so you know exactly how many calories you take in. You cannot out-exercise a bad diet.”

Guidance on habits to add and habits to break is another aspect of the diet that resonated with the couple.

For instance, the habits they added included eating a healthy breakfast, as well as eating more vegetables, fruit, whole grains, and healthy fats.

Some habits they learned to break included watching TV while eating, snacking (except for vegetables and fruit), and consuming sugar and alcohol.

“I review the healthy habits every day before I go to sleep,” said Richard. “[Maybe] I didn’t have whole grains today…you’re not going to meet everything every day but just to keep that general trend of making sure you’re not straying off those healthy habits.”

The couple incorporated the habit of exercising into their program, too, with Jill walking daily and Richard turning walking into running.

“I was never much of a morning person, but now…I try to be out running by 5:30 most mornings. It just became something…I found out I really enjoyed,” he said.

Research shows that people with partners who participate in lifestyle programs are more successful in reducing weight.

“Unfortunately, we can very easily give up on ourselves, but if we have someone else counting on us, we are much less likely to give up,” said Brown.

For example, she said if your partner is sticking to healthy meal planning, you will be more likely to or if you know they are meeting you at the gym for a workout, you will go even if you don’t want to because it is harder to cancel on them than on yourself.

This notion motivated the Wendts to try the Mayo Clinic Diet together. If Jill signed up, she told Richard he also needed to.

“I’m the one that usually prepares the meals, so to do it just for myself and then have to try to make something separate for him…would be difficult, but if we’re in it together, it’s easier,” she said.

In addition to eating the same food, following habits together, like not eating in front of the TV, also helped them stick to it.

Although the couple hit their goals, they plan to stay on the program for a while to maintain their weight and continue to use the program’s resources like its tracker and recipes.

Schmidt said the program is a lifelong health approach and not a program that preaches a certain number of weeks of toughness.

“We’re teaching our members to build new habits and slowly create eating and exercise practices they can continue long term,” she said. “A key predictor of weight loss maintenance is adherence. It’s important for people to find a method they can see themselves practicing for life.”

The benefits the Wendts have experienced are their biggest motivator to carry on healthy habits after they stop the program.

“We were putting up Christmas decorations yesterday and we were like wow a year or two years ago, going through the effort of hauling everything out we would be sweating and winded but this time…it wasn’t a struggle to get the boxes out,” said Jill.

Feeling well together is the most rewarding part of their journey, she added.

“Doing it together has been a fun thing to do…it just brings you closer cause you’re in it together,” said Jill.