Ever had to have a word with elderly parent about how much they complain during meals out?

[thefourgp]

I was embarrassed….again and I’m really getting sick of it. There’s nothing wrong with complaining when it’s something genuine but it’s getting to the stage it’s every single time we go out for a meal and it’s petty crap. I take my elderly mum and her two best friends on a day out or for a meal every couple of months as a treat. None of them drive and they’re nice women in general but they seem to be constantly looking for something to complain about every single time now when we have something to eat. It’s getting to the stage I don’t want to take them out to eat any more. Last night the waitress offered to replace the meal or bring something else and one of them sat like a huffy toddler saying ‘you’ll just bring me another bad meal - I’ll just eat my chips. I’m not coming back here again.’. So what’s the point in complaining? She’s been polite, offered you a resolution and you’re still not happy. They took the meal off the cost of the bill but I was embarrassed about how rude she was to the waitress. It pisses me off. The other three of us had the exact same meal and there was nothing wrong with it. I’ve commented to them before about how much they complain and it goes in one ear and out the other.

There is this to say, and it is not an excuse for their behavior at all, for elderly women (men, too), this is often the only small power that they have left. They are barely present in their own lives, many of them. As I said, NO excuse, but a reason. And that said, there is no reason for you, @thefourgp, or the waitstaff to have to put up with it. You may have to be very, very direct, and tell the entire group that their constant complaining is embarrassing to everyone around them, and that one more instance will be the last trip that they make with you.

[quote allfurcoatnoknickers]@FictionalCharacter Oh god, the "ill" my Mum does this and it drives me round the bend.[/quote]
Not ill enough to get medical help of course, just ill enough to sit there looking sad and martyred, in the hope that everyone would stop enjoying themselves and provide the required attention.

Took my parents to The Landmark Hotel for afternoon tea. Asked them what sandwich options they'd like, said no preference. Sandwiches come, dad whispers to mum that he's not hungry. Mum whispers back that he should try as it's meant to be a treat. Suddenly they didn't fancy any of sandwiches they asked for, took my chosen ones and I was stuck with what they didn't want. Every bite they took seemed painful and they didn't even finish it.
Good suggestions from pp about stopping and explaining why.

The elderly are lovely but they like to talk and often moan. They have life problems and to natter on in a negative way is an entertainment for some of them.
However, in all fairness, they don't like waiting too long for food, and then often take ages to eat it. As you get older your sense of taste changes and food often tastes bland to them. They also find the cost very high. However, their rudeness can be very embarrassing even if the staff get quite used to it.
I personally avoid eating british food in restaurants as it can often be poorly cooked and I hate paying for a meal I could have cooked better myself. When I do visit a restaurant I usually go for indian, asian or italian food, or at least a foreign dish. Older people seem to have a limited appetite for the more exotic type of meal. You are very kind to regularly take old folks out to restaurants.

@Heliachi

"Go out to dine? Oh, no, I don't think we'll be doing that any more as it seems to make you ladies so unhappy. I definitely won't be subjecting you to that ever again."

Didn’t work for me “What do you mean?” Well Mum, you complained about everything…. “No I didn’t!” “What a nasty thing to say. What’s wrong with you Fictional?”

So hard to deal with!

You've been nice for ages but from now on just take your mum out.

I'm sure she won't have to ask why.

This thread made me so sad. My dad is in England and I’m stuck in Australia. I can’t visit and nor can he. He’s 72 and such a delight. He’s always lovely to waiters (calls them sir and maam), flirts if he can, says the food is delicious even if he barely ate it or it’s not his thing, never scrutinises the bill and is generally just a total joy to take out. The only thing he’s ever complained about is when I’ve tried to pay.

It seems to me that as people get older they seem to complain more I don’t know whether it’s because they have nothing else to think about. As pp has said stop inviting them out until they ask and then tell them that you find the constant complaining is embarrassing.

@Pixxie7

It seems to me that as people get older they seem to complain more I don’t know whether it’s because they have nothing else to think about. As pp has said stop inviting them out until they ask and then tell them that you find the constant complaining is embarrassing.

Did you mean to be so ageist?

Some people behave badly, or just annotpyingly.

And it's really not age-related

My mum had a friend like this. He would reduce staff to tears in places with his demands and complaining. Really petty things too sometimes such as cutlery placement on the table, number of ice cubes in a drink etc. Thank goodness we only holidayed with him once, my mum was so mortified she ended up falling out with him. Apparently though it was quite lucrative even before the days of trip advisor as places would offer vouchers and freebies to avoid bad publicity. So you complain even though you would and plan to actually go back and then you get upgraded to first class, free drinks, extra months on your membership or whatever as well.

This goes beyond mere complaining and is actually abuse. In fact, I'd say it's fraud to be soliciting/blackmailing for money off and vouchers when you know there's nothing wrong. Plain old theft.

If you're brought a meal with maggots crawling over it or you see the waiter picking his nose on the way to your table with your food, you should absolutely complain; but I think the vexatious complainers should be stood up to and, if need be, belittled in exactly the same way they're trying to do to the restaurant staff. They need to be made to understand that they are the odd ones for expecting arbitrary things to be very slightly different. If they want to always serve drinks with exactly four ice cubes in them or bone china cutlery or whatever, they need to open their own restaurant and stipulate just that.

The whole point of going to a restaurant is that you experience the atmosphere and the little individual touches that the management/staff put in place. If they serve the (good) food you ordered but on blue plates when you personally only like white ones, you're perfectly at liberty to concluded that this particular establishment 'doesn't work for you' and not return.

As a taxi driver, my husband also had customers who spoke to him as if he was theirs to command, but that tended to be young people.

I've thought for some time - and I very well may be wrong - that behaviour like this comes naturally to a lot of younger people who have grown up in a world where so many things are automated, anonymous and 'there's an app for that' that they actually struggle to relate to actual humans.

Most of us have no idea how some of these amazing apps work - we just know that clever people have made them (usually) work - so we don't even try to begin to understand, we just expect it to be there at our service and to do what we want it to do now.

I'm far from 'young', but I even find myself getting irritated when the printer takes 15 seconds to wirelessly receive the data to perfectly replicate the full-colour, full-graphic screen on my laptop - until I actually stop to think about the incredible feat it's performing, and ponder for a second how many hours it would take me to produce a pathetic approximation of it by hand, much less 50 copies of it.

We all have a little smile at Great Auntie Mabel being introduced to the internet for the first time and Googling "I'd be very grateful if you could please help me to find the the bus times in Swansea for Wednesday, thank you very much" instead of just "Swansea bus timetables", but I think a lot of younger people take it much too far the other way.

My Aunt was a queer old duck! When she lived with us for a while she tried to get the whole family to go raw food! Nope. Not having it!

She had loads of fads. She demanded soya margarine wherever she went but in her later years I noticed Anchor butter in her fridge! She then denied ever eating soya Margarine, even when Mum reminded her that she insisted the lady in a local shop where they were on holiday, get some in!

She was all about hating fat and too much sugar (everything was too sweet -oh and before you think well ok that's her taste, I should tell you of all the cakes she had in her pantry - including some apple cream turnovers that really should have been in the fridge but there was no room in the fridge with all the chocolate cake and Colin the caterpillar cake!!!).

Anyway, taking her for a meal was erm...interesting! Finding something she would actually eat! I did take her to a cafe in the New Forest where she decided to have a baked potato with Prawn mayonnaise. She thanked the staff profusely for a lovely meal. Days later I was telling mum in front of my Aunt that we had gone to the cafe and what we had eaten. Cue Aunt "Well,,,,it wasn't very nice!|"... She had cleaned her plate...

It was also a bit uncomfortable when eating out with her as she would constantly look around at other people, commenting on their appearance! She was obsessed with tattoos, telling my mum that every baby was tattooed (that was when we realised she was going a bit funny!).

However, she was never rude to staff/shopkeepers. On the contrary, she would sweep in like Lady bountiful and wish them all a good day as she swept out again!

Dh was best man at a lovely friends massive wedding they are a different culture to us. Some of the older ladies confused him with staff and he spent most of the time being ordered about and being moaned at as he were responsible and not particularly nicely. Took all his patience to remain polite - never seen him so exhausted.

I wasn't there but I made the mistake of asking my mum if she had enjoyed her meal with her friend. She usually barks "No" at me.

Her and BF had gone to a recently refurbished pub. It had a reputation for being a bit rough so it was closed for almost a year whilst they did it up, they also hired a chef as they wanted to offer restaurant quality food. It is in walking distance so they fancied trying it. Apparently the food was shocking, my mum ordered a stroganoff and a couple of pieces of chicken appeared in some kind of gravy and a bit of dodgy rice. I dont remember what BF ordered but it was also a bit questionable. My mother started laughing hysterically about the food, shouting how awful it was, picking bits up with the fork and generally making a scene. A man at the next table actually told her to shut up, they had yet to receive their meal.

I was mortified for her but she didn't seem fazed at all...

My sister was like this, always had to make a special request and food was never how she imagined it would be in her head, and of course only what she imagined was acceptable. My dad would just take himself outside as he couldn't bear to sit through it. It's definitely a personality thing, but my mum has lost some of her filters as she's aged (ironically my sis used to tell mum to say stuff in her head first ) which I guess is a different issue.

My mum always makes a fuss about the menu. Always asks for the children’s menu and orders off that, usually also asks for mashed potatoes. Nightmare

Do u think they go on a power trip ? It’s like the have the power to evaluate and give feedback in a public space its just my mother was giving my local such a hard time sending things back and giving feedback she had them jumping through hoops to please her. I was cringing whilst she was getting loads of attention and never wanted to set foot in there again. I think price wise they are thinking is it up to what they r seeing price wise as everything eating out wise is massively inflated as has cost of food? Your not alone and because walking is an issue sit down meals or cinema is all thats left. Maybe take her out to see a film then u can’t hear them complain ?

@Whenigrowupiwanttobea

My PIL's booked their Golden Wedding Anniversary Party in a Greek Restaurant and proceeded to moan about "all the foreign muck on the menu"! When I ordered a Moussaka and my BIL ordered Kleftikon we were told off as we should be eating English food!! They brought a cake knife and cook's knife to the restaurant in a lidl carrier bag as the "restaurant probably didn't have such things!" Then the pair of them had a fight because FIL ordered plain vanilla ice cream for dessert instead of "something fancy like the gateaux!

This has absolutely cracked me up. Sorry just can’t stop laughing. Especially the bit the Lidl carrier bag

I think because the thread is about OP's elderly parent, people are posting similar not that it's only elderly people who behave this way.
My younger sister is the same. She's late thirties and behaves like restaurant staff are minions. Her way is to patronise, she doesn't shout or make a scene but talks to them as if they have no brain. She asked a waitress the point of having organic chicken on the menu if every other ingredient wasn't. Said the salt, veges, sauces, condiments, whatever it was cooked in etc should all be organic otherwise it's pointless. Waitress had to go back & forth to ask. Took forever and didn't order it in the end.
It's the same when I've cooked a meal, a thousand questions about it before picking and prodding it at the table.
Anything anyone eats is promptly given a list of why it's not good for you, too much sugar, too much fat, too much salt, too filling etc. She likes to make out she's some food expert (on the days she's not scoffing down kfc in secret).
Luckily she lives abroad and only visits once in a blue moon.
There are much more nicer and respectful people of all ages. It stands out more when you experience cf behaviour.

Just drop them off. Don't eat with them but take a sandwich and stay in the car. Then you get to enjoy the day but not see the moaning or bad behaviours. If anyone asks, tell them; they are old enough to be able to stand the truth unless they have mental health issues.

@Newmum29

This thread made me so sad. My dad is in England and I’m stuck in Australia. I can’t visit and nor can he. He’s 72 and such a delight. He’s always lovely to waiters (calls them sir and maam), flirts if he can, says the food is delicious even if he barely ate it or it’s not his thing, never scrutinises the bill and is generally just a total joy to take out. The only thing he’s ever complained about is when I’ve tried to pay.

Your dad sounds lovely 🥰 Hope you get to see him soon

@gamerchick

I wouldn't have let them comp the meal. I'd have made a point of apologising and paying anyway in front of the complainer.

Then telling them if they pulled a stunt like that again, they can stay home next time.

Going to act like a kid, get treated like one.

Exactly this, especially if there was nothing wrong with the meal anyway. It's not fair to the restaurant really. No way would I take them out again if they behaved like this.

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll absolutely. He was an arse. Just to clarify it was him getting the compensation for non existent issues, my mum wanted no part of it after she found out his modus operandi during the holiday.