Guest says I starved her <shock>

[stringsoup]

Had a relative to stay for a few days, she just wanted to eat all time which we did not expect. I had cooked and baked which she ate (way more than us) then she said she wanted to get up in the night as she was so hungry!

Stop having her to stay. She is rude to complain about you to your sister. Your complete menu makes it clear that she was offered plenty of food at meal times and snack times as well as being told that she could help herself.

If someone said that about my hospitality, that would be the last time that I would invite her to stay.

I have family like this! If she is good with online shopping you could get her to order in a delivery of her foods in advance.

Yes, just ask her what she would like to eat.

Why would you want to host someone who is so rude again? Does she ever have you to stay at her home?

Ok so she has a large appetite. Did she say you 'starved her'? No. Just that she got hungry in the night.

So either you supply more food or you don't and tell her to get her own above and beyond what you are offering.

If I was staying with someone the first thing I'll do is go to the local supermarket to get a few bits for the house and a few snacks to share I know we both like. Or even other snacks to keep in my bag or room if I know I'll be ravenous.

I also quite enjoy hosting big eaters. More so than those who never seem to want anything I offer. But there has to be a limit. For financial reasons if nothing else..

I guess take it as a compliment she likes your food?

Is she generous with food when you visit her?

I think it's entirely subjective.
I stayed with a cousin recently, she said afterwards that l 'ate like a bird' but l still managed to put 5lbs on (in a week!) while l was staying with her.

Too long a gap? Where? They were eating every 5 minutes.

Revoke the invite. She sounds greedy and entitled. She’s staying in a family home, presumably getting free bed and board. I’d tell her to F off.

Tell her shes not welcome to visit again if she makes out she was starved when in reality she was quite greedy!

Urgh never invite her again. She sounds like a walking dustbin continually stuffing food down her gob.

My nan was known for putting on huge feasts where everybody left stuffed. Then as she got elderly her appetite shrunk and so did her portions, so after a while we would leave hungry. It was enough for her.

Which is why these posts insisting the OP MUST be serving adequate portions are stupid.

OK Op, what’s your explanation?

Either your cousin is an ungrateful baggage, your sister is a liar, or you must acknowledge something has gone a bit wrong. Is there any backstory?

Think back and see if you can work it out because we weren’t there! But if someone said they were hungry after staying with me I’d want to have a think as being in someone else’s house feeling hungry or cold etc is absolutely miserable and if I like the person I wouldn’t want them to stop coming.

I wonder if the fact that she eats more than you meant that she didn’t feel comfortable eating until she was full at meals (like when you go for lunch and everyone else has a salad, you don’t want to order the steak and a sticky toffee pudding!). Or maybe she doesn’t eat the sort of things you do- my gran for example wouldn’t want to eat 90% of the food I cook (too spicy, some raw veg made her ill) so I adapted what I ate when she was with me? Other than that I’d put some biscuits, crackers and fruit in her room so she didn’t feel as though she had to ferret around my cupboards if she wanted a drink/ something to eat so that might be worth thinking about.

That menus sounds absolutely substantial for guests, especially as you've provided eg cakes/scones/biscuits etc AND toast after dinner.

Are your portion sizes small?

Maybe cousin i used to eating a lot? Maybe she's a midnight feaster?

Or maybe she has a bit of an issue with food and not being in control of it makes her panic a bit.

I do and staying at MIL's always made me a bit edgy. I didn't like her meals much and felt anxious about eating snacks in front of her or being caught eating a snack I'd brought in our room. I felt judged about not eating much at meal times but was so hungry (not hungry enough to eat liver and bacon in a gravy thicker than concrete tho 😂).

I felt the same when I stopped smoking, in honesty - couldn't manage it unless I had a packet in the house. I'd panic when I didn't have any, even though I didn't have one. I'm the same with food.

People are weird 😂

If I were you I'd get in extra snacks (crisps, biscuits, more bread etc) for next week and maybe up the protein at breakfast.

Please address it with her, OP. Just tell her to not go hungry and grab food when she wants it.

Wow, sounds like a lot! Ah well, next time get a truck load for your cousin! I couldn't eat that in a day, not in a million years even if were small portions.

Why is she coming back to a house that, she claimed, starved her @stringsoup ? Tell her to know what she said, and ask her why.
This thread just made me hungry so I'm off to have some tea, toast, bacon, eggs, fruit juice... and then complain I've starved myself 😉

I wouldn't overthink it, some people are bad guests just as others are bad hosts.

We had a cousin visit recently with his girlfriend and 5 yo son. They told us the 5 yo was developmentally delayed a bit. They didn't explain that he was delayed by approx 3.5 years, couldn't speak, understand instructions, had no impulse control, and basically spent the whole time running around, emptying shelves, boxes, drawers and breaking everything he could get his hands on. In between trying to keep the chaos to a minimum and comfort my daughter who was upset by having her things broken I cooked for them 3 meals a day.

DH went out of his way to provide activities to entertain the son and give the parents a break. Finger painting, music making, playdough, sensory bowls.

I went out of my way to help the gf, taking her for long walks when she was stressed as she said this calmed her down, cleaning up after them all as much as I could.

Then the cousin got a stomach bug and we basically had to find ways to avoid him coming into contact with the other 5 people in the small terraced house for the next 3 days when we managed to convince them all to leave early.

After which we all got sick, so clearly the avoiding didn't work well.

The girlfriend then had the nerve to complain that our house was messy (yes, it was, after you and your family trashed the place!) and that we didn't provide a stairgate. Which would never have occurred to us for a 5 yo and I don't think would have been safe anyway as he was a climber. She then broke up with the cousin and said he wasn't permitted to take their child to visit us again. I think we'll cope.

OK - I’ll ask the question which many people will be thinking: is he/she a huge fat greedy lump?

If so, eating less than usual may do them good; could eventually add years of healthy, active life.

One eats what one is used to eating. If you eat less for a bit, you get used to eating less, then you don’t notice.

Some people, particularly older, think a meal doesn't count if it it's not based on meat. Could it be that the soup, and possibly even the breakfast, were judged this way? If someone had this attitude, adding snacks wouldn't necessarily help.

Otherwise I'm baffled as it's a lot of food by most people's standards.

Breakfast - porridge/granola, greek yog, fruit/ eggs - this is a nice snack but not a meal. I'd be hungry soon after.

11am - scone/biscuits with coffee - another snack, so now I severely need a meal.

Lunch - veg/pulse soup. bread, cheese, salami - sounds really small and by 3pm I'd be half dead

3pm - scone/biscuits tea - still no proper meal in sight

Dinner - Spag bol/curry etc - a few hours later I'd actually have fainted by now. dinner sounds great

Sweet treat, coffee not worth mentioning

Supper - toast - with what?!

i'd be crying but in reality I'd employ uber eats and offer you some

Haha, she's coming back to mine for convenience sake and as she's family I will provide.
Lesson learned, I will put on a running buffet to prevent any further censure!

I wish older people realised this. It’s something we are observing now, so presumably my mum and mother-in-law also observed it when they were younger, and yet…

Every meal eaten with either or both of them - every one, without fail - comes with a pious judgy side serving of, “ooh I couldn’t eat a meal that size. I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. That’s too much for me. Are you going to eat all that? No, no bread for me thank you (recoils from bread like it’s a snake) - I just couldn’t fit it in.” Meanwhile I’m sitting with my 650-calorie protein-rich meal because I’m on Mounjaro wanting to drown them in their water glasses/tell them their appetite has shrunk because their body is preparing them for death (I will not go to heaven). Their generation’s obsession with weight really did a number on them.

OP, it does not sound like you were starving your guests. Even if the portions were small, you were offering snacks in between meals.

It's funny how your initial post mentioned cereal/soup/meat and 2 veg plus some snacks and then when people pointed out that the cereal and soup probably weren't enough, they magically turned into porridge, eggs, yoghurt and soup with bread, cheese and salami. So I wonder what the actual truth is.

In any case I would mention it to her. Say that your sister told you she'd said she felt hungry when she stayed with you the last time. Remind her that, as you said the last time too, she's more than welcome to have some toast/snacks/fruit/bread and cheese etc. at any time and show here where they are.
And then provide the meals similar to the second version you described which is a reasonable amount of food to offer.

Your meals sound lovely op and perfectly adequate, but if she has a large appetite you could make some sausage rolls and a fruit cake and tell her she can help herself if she gets peckish.

OK, but what about lunch & dinner ?😀

I wouldn’t be able to stop myself saying ‘is that enough food for you? Don’t want you to leave here starving again?’. I’d be offering her half a chicken to take up to bed with her in case she’s hungry overnight!