Children of UPF parents

[Horriblebirth]

Just wondering if anyone else grew up being fed absolute shit by their parents and what their relationship with food or their diet is like now?

Growing up I was given ready meals, frozen meals, sugary snacks, probably over 90% of my diet was UPF. Pasta using a jar of sauce was considered a cooked meal.

I used to get embarrassed when I'd go to a friend's house and their parents cooked a lovely meal and I didn't like any of it. I wasn't being rude, I was just so used to beige crap.

It's been so hard to try and get myself to eat real food as an adult. I'm still terrified of trying new things and have a really limited diet. I'm trying my best to ensure my kids never turn out like me because it's depressing and embarrassing.

You said in the OP that you are terrified to try new things. Tell me more about that. What happens if you don’t like it?

Is terrified the right word?

My mum cooked from scratch apart from the odd Pataks curry paste jar. Her cooking was good, but quite basic. I eat lots of veg because I grew up on it which is obviously good... Or is it? I try not to think about what it's sprayed with. Not so keen on meat despite it being heavy on the menu as a kid. These days even that is pumped with shite. If I was a conspiracy theorist, I might be inclined to say our food chain is poisoned - But that's another post!

I suppose I opted to give DC lots of healthy options, but as she is getting older she is becoming more narrowed in her healthy food choices. She eats way more sugar products than I did. The obvious treats aside, there's a lot more of it hidden in cereal, bread etc.

Not sure how old you are OP but in the latest 80s early 90s I ate a lot of UPF snacks - Super Noodles and meatballs in a tin almost every day. Those awful microwave chips that taste nothing like chips! The reason I mention age is because although they were UPF, the ingredients list was different to now. These days UFP's are filled with a lot more edible type substances compared to back then.

I wonder if a lot of times adults aren't equipped with cooking skills, hence choosing UPF products. I'm not convinced it's cheaper to eat processed, but people won't buy fresh produce if they don't know what to do with it.

I can cook. And I do make meals from scratch a lot, but I buy UFP products for convenience/time management. (And pure indulgence). There is lots more distractions in the modern world to spend lovingly cooking up meals from scratch.

What do you gain by blaming your parents for your current food choices? Yes childhood can set good or bad food habits but I’m assuming you now have choice and control over what you eat and can try different options. If you’re talking 20 years ago, you’ve had many years to outgrown your childhood - being terrified to try new things isn’t a normal reaction to food, what have you done as an adult to overcome your fear?

I’’m afraid lots of this was already UPF by the 80s. The Chorleywood bread process began in the early 60s. Cereals like Start and Special K. Yoghurts like Ski - I used to fight my brother for the toffee one. Margarine etc etc. All UPF. It’s great that your family didn’t eat this stuff but absolutely not true that it wasn’t UPF.

My mum was a single parent with a full time job and mental health issues in the 80s.
Yes we had findus crispy pancakes type food quite a bit but I imagine they were a god send to her and took some of the stress out of what must have been a tough time.
I always thought convenience meals must have been pretty liberating for women when they first appeared - a bit like washing machines freeing your time to spend away from domestic work.

Formula was initially advised if women were malnourished then it became popular, but for some babies it was healthier.

It was very heavily pushed though and not just for health, my grandmother formula fed all of hers without trying BF as it was just the expected method (well my underweight mother got topped up with carnation milk 🙈🙈) all her daughters BF in the 80s and she said how much she wished she had done so with hers and how it just wasn’t talked about, you went to the bottle.

Yes for sure, have you seen the tv series “back in time for dinner” talks about the changes to food at home over the decades, fascinating to see how life changes for women over the decades.

I remember my own gran talking about giving her babies carnation milk, these babies must have been little chunks ! Yes it was heavily pushed, I think it was seen as convenient as well, but again lots of women were undernourished so topping up babies was probably essential. Different times I guess.

it was condensed milk not carnation my gran spoke about.

Sorry yes it was condensed milk, the sticky thick one! And I was worried to give calpol in fear of interrupting the virgin gut 🤣 (I know that’s been debunked now, but was rife with rumours in my baby days!)

I do think terrified describes it to be honest. I would cry if someone were to try and force me to eat something I "don't like". I put that in quotes as 9/10 times I haven't even tried it. It's very irrational, eg. eating loads of tomato based foods but the thought of eating an actual tomato makes me sick.

There are certain areas where I have managed to overcome it but it's an ongoing battle.

I think they were very liberating. Especially to working Mums. And there just wasn’t the knowledge about how bad they were for us then.

It maybe explains my mum and her family's very sweet tooth they basically lived on pudding 😀

Buy organic fruit, veg, and meat where possible, if you are able to.

Kindly, OP, that sounds like a pretty severe food aversion and may be nothing to do with what you ate as a child.

This is an aversion similar to, if not ARFID and nothing to do with what you were fed as a kid.

If you take the blame away, because blame indicates out of your control. Then what?

Food isn't always about liking it. Sometimes we can hate a food at first but then accept it 9/10 after a few goes.

But nobody can do it for you.

Yeah this isn't 1980a upf is say it's kind of arfid too. My dm fed us lots of fruit and veg Yet I have a huge aversion to eating tomatoes or grapes whole. I can't even think about a grape, the texture on the outside is different to the texture on the inside FFS it kind of pops. It makes me shudder.

I've had to learn to cope with it and find other ways to get the food in (like blending tomatoes). I can't eat courgette or leeks in disks for example. I have to eat them in long strings/courgetti instead.

I understand it may sound that way, but it's definitely not ARFID. My parents thought it was funny for me to call vegetables yucky. My siblings is the same way. Everything was automatically ordered plain for us, it's like we weren't even given the chance to try these things.

Try them now then. Train yourself. But blaming your parents is going to do naff all to help.

My DC went 'ew, it's got green bits on' when we were eating our good, home cooked meals in the 80s. It's a stage.

If you're still doing it as an adult, it's on you, not them. Move on from the parent blaming. It's ridiculous.

Maybe they did find it funny or maybe they just didn't know what else to say Have you had any therapy it sounds like the disordered eating has really taken over your life , I am not having a dig but how long are you going to blame your parents for this?

Wow I wasn't expecting to get attacked for this. Have you even read any of my posts? @Jigglyhuffpuff

I'm blaming them because they are to blame, that's the reality. I love them so much and I have no resentment but I am struggling because of this.

I haven't had any therapy @Coffeeishot but you are right that my disordered eating affects my life every single day. That's not something I had even considered to be honest but you've literally a lightbulb in my head there that it may help.

Some people on here are saying I should just eat things now as if I hadn't thought of that.

I'm not doing that as an adult.

That’s really not the reality though. I was probably fed potatoes for dinner every single night for my entire childhood. It didn’t make me want to not try rice or pasta or noddles once I was an adult and capable of choosing my own diet. I rarely eat potatoes now. My Mum poo-pooed anything spicy, but it didn’t put me off trying spicy foods, even though I’d never once eaten them as a child.

Your situation isn’t your parent’s fault. Nor is it yours or anyone else’s fault. It is what it is, and therapy would help you to explore and overcome your fears. Are you ND, OP? Very rigid, beige diets are the norm with ND people.