to ask my colleague not to cook broccoli...

[crazybutterflylady]

This is my first AIBU post so please be gentle with me...

I work in a small office of about 10 people. I sit right next to the kitchen. I am 4 months pregnant and have been really battling with all day morning sickness. One of the things that really makes me want to vom is the smell of veg cooking, particularly broccoli.

There is a girl in the office who does the South Beach diet which is basically a lot of veg and a bit of protein. She insists on steaming broccoli most days and it makes me feel really ill. I have mentioned it a few times and said how it makes me feel really rough. At first she seemed sympathetic and stuck to other veg but recently she has started steaming it most days.

I am really starting to feel pissed off about it. Surely she could cook it when I was out on my lunchbreak, or stick to salads or soups or something that doesn't stink the entire office out.

Grr. Yours greenly

Tell her she's a lightweight and that real Southbeachers only eat raw brocolli. :o

Has she lost weight?

ha i like it cumfy

she's teeny otchayaniye but she always has been since she's worked here and she's always done it. Good for her, but just steam the frickin broccoli at home and much salad at work please

I think yabu.
I get nautious at the smell of coffee/ coffee being made, but what am I going to do? insist everyone I work with to not drink coffee? It's my problem not theirs so I just get on with it.

Spray air freshner at her every time she walks past. You could dot them around your desk and the kitchen too.

I totally feel for you there is clearly something about broccoli and pregnancy as I also can no longer stand to be in the same room as this once loved vegetable.

There is an argument that YABU but as you have asked her not to do it and explained the situation then she is being inconsiderate, if the office is so small that you can't keep the microwave in a seperate room then there shouldn't be one.

The aftermath of the broccoli can't be nice either...

My colleague the other day ate a whole raw carrot and half a packet of raw green beans for lunch

What - without cake??

As someone who has just cooked brussell sprouts in the office microwave I would say your being slightly unreasonable!

OMG Switch, I bet you are about as popular as a fart in a lift.

No wait you ARE a fart in a lift!

No really I'm more of the "compromise" school of thought with this one. I dont think they should provide a microwave if people can't use it.

If people only heat up nice smelling things, well, that's sausage rolls and that's about it!

You shouldn't get hell for being healthy but then again...some consideration should be shown.

I think they should have a "microwave can only be used for heating aromatic foods between 12:30pm and 1:30pm"

Those who hate the smells of foods wafting around the office can take their lunch break then. Presumably if they are of the sandwich eating variety, they can still eat whenever they want, but feeding time at the zoo can be avoided.

Tell us that was a joke, Switch. What a selfish, unnecessary thing to do.

TBH, I don´t think that you have to be pregnant to not want to work in a place that smeels of broccoli and farts brussels.

Smeels??!!

Where do you draw the line then. As I said earlier I have a serious aversion to the smell of coffee. However it's a fairly intricate part of office life in most places I've worked and most people drink and enjoy coffee everyday. I'd much rather the smell of steaming brocolli to coffee.
Would you consider people drinking and making coffee in an office I work to be as inconsiderate as you do the op?
As far as I'm concerned it's the op who's being selfish by trying to impose her own idiosyncrasies on he colleague.

Vomit on her desk. She might get the message.

But the OP is only asking for this consideration whilst she has morning sickness.

Hardly being selfish - who the heck wants to work in an office reeking of steamed broccoli? I'm struggling to imagine an office that stinks of coffee all day long, having never worked anywhere where coffee is drunk in such copius quantities as would make it smell to the same level as cooked broccoli. However, if the overpowering smell of this coffee makes you heave, then I'm sure your colleagues would be mortfied if they knew and would happily drink from sealed cups until the worst of your sickness had passed, as most people would.

copious even

I think YAB a bit U. It is just a normal cooking smell. If HR go down the route of banning smelly food them how far do they go?

All the IT guys in my office are from India and only eat curry. Yes it's a bit smelly but there's no way they could ban them from eating it.

What if you develop an aversion to the smell of coffee? Would you ask them to ban that?

I'm afraid I think that feeling a bit sick with certain smells is just part and parcel of being pregnant and you'll just have to deal with it. It is temporary after all.

But if the cooking smells are pervading the office, then surely there should be better ventilation in the kitchen/cooking area?

YANBU - who on earth needs to steam broccoli @ work? Can you not speak to your boss - this is anti-socail beahviour and shouldn't be allwed even if you weren't pregnant.

When you start feeling better you'll be able to get your own back ...I did.

When I was pregnant with DD and had extreme nausea the smell of coffee used to make me turn green and of course coffee is the smell that greets you every morning in an office.

Anyway, a few months later, once the nausea had gone I developed a craving for Bombay Potatoes so regularly used to microwave them for my lunch .

On a few occasions I was asked not to heat them up as they had important meetings that day and the smell would waft throughout the offices!

Maybe you could develop a liking for something that she doesn't like the smell of

mayorquimby I also have a really strong aversion to coffee, which is upsetting since I love the starbucks red cups time of year.

However, like you say, this is part of office life and I have to live with it (indeed, I have to MAKE coffees). I'm not sure broccoli is something you expect to go hand in hand with office life, though.

I think that as you're office has clients in it there should be a ban on any very smelly foods - thats pretty standard in most places where clients will be.

Eau do broccoli is not nice for anyone.