To make excuses not to eat with my friend as her greedyness irritates me?

[Corpse]

My friend (we work together) is constantly going on about her "diet" and how she desperately needs to lose weight and was even trying to get slimming pills off the doctor etc. She's a size 20. We always eat lunch together and I'm sorry but her eating habits just really, really annoy me. She'll buy a huge pot of pasta and literally gobble it down in about a minute, she'll then wolf down a packet of crisps and then pop to the vending machine and buy a chocolate bar and then quite often she'll go to the bakery and buy a massive muffin. Now what she eats is her business and I don't care about her size but to go on and on about dieting and then eat like a pig really, really annoys me.
I just can't stand greed. A few weeks back someone brought in a box of maltesers to demonstrate something (he said for everyone to help themselves but the original purpose was for them to be used as a demonstration for something unconnected to eating). Anyway a few people grabbed one of two - my friend took 3, then she took a large handful - and then polished off the rest of the box laughing like she was being funny. Greed isn't funny! it's annoying!

So anyway I don't really want to eat lunch with her, it makes me uncomfortable and puts me off my own food. Will she twig on to why I'm doing this because I don't want to upset her.

You acknowledge your own issues, Corpse, and I think that's the most important thing to focus on. When I was anorexic I could barely sit and eat with other people. Many years on, my eating issues are well under control, but I still prefer to eat solo and really struggle to cope with people who eat messily or noisily.

Don't blame your friend: she is not a disgusting pig. She is a woman with an eating disorder, like you suggest you may be. It may not be helpful for either of you to eat together right now.

Charity girl - but the choices we make about food- how much we eat, and where it comes from, are moral or ethical issues. It's sad that in the western world there are people dying of obesity, not just because of over-affluence perhaps, but also because of the issues brought about by having size zero women being presented as attractive examples of womanhood - while millions starve in other nations.
Somewhere along the way our attitude to food and body size has gone seriously wrong, and that is immoral.

I understand OP - my old boss was like your friend. He would stand behind our desks with a bowl of food, chewing noisily and talking with his mouth full, it was just constant grazing and constant talk of food.

I found it repulsive and I have no issues with food I just don't want someone shovelling it down in front of me. I can't bare sloppy eaters who show the contents of their mouths whilst talking.

Yuck.

I love that word 'litotes'....

I love that word 'litotes'....

Yep: Monty Python taught me eevrything I know about litotes and hyperbole!!

twincrazy "I dont think you have an issue with food at all."

Its the OP who has said this about herself.

You can argue that, Mrsgradgrind, on a societal level, and I wouldn't disagree. But this woman's 'over eating' is not a moral issue. It has no impact on whether she is a decent, worthwhile person, or whether she is a rotter.

'You eat too much, you're a bad person' doesn't make much sense does it? But that is at the heart of the OP. And at the heart of wider society's attitude towards the overweight.

But charitygirl, albeit within the context of societal constraints and pressures, we all as individuals have a responsibility to take control of our own eating. One of the messages that seems to be coming through on this thread is that fat people all have "issues" that prevent them from eating less, which is actually an insult to them as adults; sometimes it is all about exercising free will and not blaming everyone else.

YANBU, Fat greedy people make me sick too. I have a lorry driver friend who weighs 22st, joined a gym for £50/month NEVER goes, eats takeaway EVERY night and bitches that he's "hot" in the summer, and he neds to buy more clothes....my fucking heart bleeds.

OP you have issues with food so be kind to yourself and eat alone.
But also be kind to others.
Having issues doesn't excuse you from being kind.

Oh and I'm greedy but thin! Does that make me morally reprehensible? Or is it okay because society appreciates the way I look?

Isn't gluttony, not greed, the more relevant deadly sin here?

(Think "Se7en"...)

But cracking your knuckles is a deadly sin.

I used to prefer normal but 10 years of diet have left me unable to drink normal....twas a conscious decision and a good one I feel.

Its not really fair for you to blame her for your food issues is it?
Sounds like you are projecting a bit of your self loathing stuff onto her.

It is annoying when people moan about being fat and then eat loads of food but its a minor irritant rather than something to be so angry about.

Can you access any support for your stuff?

Do you think that you are imagining her "stuffing it into her mouth like a wild animal" because of your own issues with food?

Mil has issues with food although she doesn't like to admit it. She obsessively notices what everyone else puts into their mouth. She knew I was pregnant because I ate 3 roast potatoes instead of 2. I had no idea that that I had a usual number or that I had gone over my average but she knows. When ds was small she would grill him about whether I have had cake at the cafe. She is completely obsessed, she was also the first person to notice that a friend shovels the food in, nobody else noticed until she pointed it out.

I'm same as Renee and feel a bit like the OP sometimes but try to ignore it & keep it to myself. I try to be more tolerant.

Most peole don't look very nice when eating and eating disorders can mess with your view of things.

Agree with MrsDeVere for most people what you are describing would be a minor irritant.

Not sure eating alone is a good step, might 'feed' your issues even more. Can you eat with others, vary who you eat with, perhaps with your friend once or twice a week & make excuses the other days?

And there we part company Mrs G! Of course we are responsible for what we eat but responsible to whom? Only ourselves, possibly our loved ones? We really don't need to account for our calorie intake to random colleagues.

entropygirl I am going to have to go out and get some more. It is so fizzy and refreshing in a way that water, completely illogically, cannot be.

I'm sorry cant typ properly just busy shoveling some chicken kievs in my
heavingsnout globulous gob- fuck! I just dropped custard on the key board

I totally agree with the OP. I work with a girl who is the same size as me (we're both a bit chubby) but she is constantly going on about how she hasn't eaten for two days etc/ drinking meal replacement smoothies etc.....

What she doesn't seem to realise is that eating sweets at her desk is a kind of food. So is going out for lunch. So is eating 2 dominoes pizzas in a row and bragging about it.........

Then going on about your diet again.

I think she's sick in the head actually. I can't bear listening to her

OP - if it helps, it could be she goes on about diets round you because she's aware she's overweight and you say you're the other end of the scale, you 'highlight' her failings more than others. It could be she talk about dieting to you, not because she actually wants to diet, but because she feels she should want too, particularly round you.

That said, the way she eats sounds hideous to watch. And it's unspeakably annoying to hear people talk about dieting, even if they are actually doing it, it actually forces everyone to think about food and their diets, even if they don't want to think about.

Tell her what youve told everyone on here, you think shes greedy, she eats like a starved animal, you dont want to have lunch with her, and shes a pig.

Tell her that, and I guarantee you wont have to eat with her again, shell find someone less mean to have lunch with.

You describe her as a friend, really? You sound like you loathe her, so tell her exactly what you think of her, shell tell you to piss off, and then shell be well rid of you.

In short, yes YABU, and nasty.

Op, you say that you have an eating disorder too, although yours is at the opposite end of the scale. Has it not occured to you that your friend has an eating disorder too? Or are you too self-obsessed to notice? Surely you must have come up against people's ignorant comments about your own condition? Don't you have any compassion or empathy?

To my mind there are 3 issues here. First the woman is talking about dieting and not doing anything about it which is boring for anybody listening. I guess most of us could forgive her that one unless it is her only topic of conversation and of the three I think this is the one for which the woman deserves some sympathy because obsessive thoughts, which this constant talking reflects, is a sign of some sort of mental distress.

The second issue is that she eats like a pig. That is annoying imo. Doesn't matter if you are fat or thin or what you are eating, if you shovel it and eat with your mouth open it is deeply unpleasant for the rest of us.

The third issue is that the woman is greedy in the sense that she eats more than her fair share. The maltesers example makes her look like somebody who couldn't care less about other people and who has an inability to share. I am not slim, far from it but I would never be so rude as to take more than my fair share of something that belonged to a group. Not an attractive trait either.

So YANBU to cut down your lunchtimes with this woman. Yes, she is clearly struggling with food issues but there is more to it than that - some of her behaviour is just bad manners.

And fwiw, all the diet drinkers, some of the latest research shows that the those who drink diet drinks put on more weight than those who drink the full-sugar version. It would seem that you aren't saving yourself any calories for cake consumption but depriving your brains of the reward it thinks it is going to get from the sugary taste but which fails to deliver the sugar hit that normally goes with it. In the end you just consume more calories in other ways to make up for it. Fine if you prefer the taste but it isn't as innocent a thing to drink as you might think. The causal link is still being investigated but given that obesity levels have risen regardless of the explosion in the diet food market, I reckon there is an element of truth in it.