to expect the In-Laws to make a bit of an effort with daughter's diet?

[Ellybellyboo]

DD (age 16) can't have any gluten. She's coeliac and was diagnosed just over 8 years ago.

DD copes pretty well with it but has been having a bit of a hard time with it recently. She just wants to be able to go and get a burger with her mates and has been eating stuff she shouldn't. All her friends are brilliant with it, but she feels a bit awkward and like she sticks out like a sore thumb

We don't live near our families but travel up to visit every 6/8 weeks or so and we're travelling back for Christmas. Staying with my Mum and Dad, and visiting the ILs for Boxing Day.

Every single time the subject of DD's diet comes up with MiL we end up having the same conversation. MiL will always comment that "we never used to have all these allergies" that she doesn't have a clue what to feed DD and I always end up agreeing to take something with us for DD to eat or we'll go out to eat or just completely avoid mealtimes. Over the years I've given her loads of information, recipes, web addresses, etc, etc, etc

Anyway, MiL phoned last night to talk about Christmas. Doesn't know what to feed DD. I asked what they were planning to cook - cold left over meat, mashed potato, pickles, salad. I said that was fine, don't worry, DD could eat all of that. MiL said she wanted to try a new recipe with the potatoes so DD wouldn't be able to eat it. I asked MiL if she could just scoop out a portion of mash for DD first, maybe bung her a jacket potato in the oven. MiL ummed and ahhed then asked if I could just bring something with me as usual.

In all honesty, I'm just a bit fed up with it. I don't think I'm asking for the earth here. DH rang her back and told her not to worry about feeding us, that we'd come over after lunch. Now she's having a hissy fit.

Compared to my Mum - who always cooks one big gluten free meal for all of us, she hits up the Free From section in Tesco, makes stuff like pastry from scratch with GF flour. Really makes an effort and never makes DD feel uncomfortable by giving her different meals, or a crappy ready meal

MiL/FiL are good, competent cooks (FiL used to be a bloody chef) so is it really that unreasonable to expect them to make some effort?

Your DH handled this well.
Are there any soap scriptwriters / storyliners on here? We could do with a character on Cozza/Stenders having this, to educate the public.....like we had Mark Fowler with his HIV back in the day. Or maybe a DFail 'journo' could write about it - with sad face, of course. The only way to get the point across to some people.
'There's none so blind as those that will not see.'

Coeliac disease has been around forever.
So your MIL is wrong there.
My old NDN I grew up with had it.
We all preferred her bread for some weird reason.
She's 50 now!

Stick to your going after lunch and just never eat there again.
They'll learn - hopefully...??

I don't have coeliac/diabetes or any dangerous other food allergy, but have become intolerant to gluten and lactose.

I feel better if I avoid the above... It was a trial and error thing, I switched to lacto free milk etc and immediately my life changed. Gluten is less problematic, but a definite reaction.

Is it OK for me to buy GF food because I'm genuinely in better health?

I'm not whiny, attention-seeking or a twat. I'm getting old. I'm glad that products are improving, I hope they continue to do so and then come down in price.

I went to a talk by one of the UKs leading coeliac professors. He reckons research is suggesting that far more people do have problems with gluten than are currently diagnosed by standard coeliac testing. Personally i don't produce antibodies to gluten but have a diagnosis of antibody negative coeliacs through genetic testing and gut biopsy (and the fact that i get spectacularly ill if glutened).

That is simply ridiculous and must be incredibly hurtful for your dd!
As a Mum to an eight year old coeliac who has had it from birth I appreciate how hard it can be for your dd! My dd's friends Mums all keep Gluten free food at their house, for when dd goes over for tea! Her school go out of the way to help, her brownie leader (as a fellow coeliac) goes out of her way to help! My parents bought a second toaster and have a shelf of gluten free foods and treats at their house!

If my daughters friends Mums, can go out of their way to welcome my dd and have food that she can eat, then surely your daughters grandparents can do the same! There is honestly no excuse today, eight years ago there really wasn't much available in the shops for coeliacs,! Today there are so many different options! Your outlaws are competent cooks, one is even a chef! They should be going out of their way to make delicious gluten free alternatives for their granddaughter!

Ask them if they truly realise the dangers of your dd not keeping to a gluten free diet! Not just the initial pain, discomfort and diarrhoea! The risk of bowel cancer, infertility, anaemia and a body exhausted and struggling due to not being able to absorb the proper nutrients that her body needs!

As chef's they are more than capable of making delicious gluten free meals for your dd! It says more about them that they don't!

I don’t have a problem with anyone who chooses to not eat gluten for what ever reason. I think it’s great it makes things more affordable and gives much wider choice.

The only thing I hate is that now I have to triple check that gluten free menus at resterants are actually gluten free and safe for ceoliacs. Zizis is terrible for this because all the meat on the GF menu is cooked with gluten containing ingredients and this was only mentioned in the the small print on the gf menu. I don’t often eat out now.

Three members of my immediate family are ceoliacs so we pretty much cover most meals. My in laws don’t get it but they are late 80s and don’t cook family meals anymore.

Wtf is she putting in the mash to make it unsuitable? I can't think of anything other than milk, butter, cheese or herbs/spices tbh

"Wtf is she putting in the mash to make it unsuitable?"

Exactly! You'd really have to stretch to make potatoes unsuitable for someone with coeliac!! The woman is being deliberately awkward and malicious, thinking this is just some "made up" illness. She sounds ignorant and nasty.

I do not suffer from ceoliacs, not am I an attention seeking anything ( as far as I know) however, since I have started cutting out gluten, I have been able to come off all my asthma medication and hardly ever need to take any IBS medication either. I started going gluten free because some people reckoned that it helped with fibromyalgia, for which it seems to have done absolutely zilch! So, I do think that there is something in the gluten sensitivity issue. It is not always just an attention seeking fad! I can get away with eating the odd slice of cake or biscuit once in a while, but wouldn't want to go back to eating gluten products regularly.

MiL said she wanted to try a new recipe with the potatoes so DD wouldn't be able to eat it

Why dos she want to try a new recipe with the potatoes so her granddaughter can't eat it? This is the clanger here. She's being deliberately awkward. Good on your DH for calling her out on it.

OP says the MIL was talking about making a white sauce (so containing flour in the roux) which no doubt she'd have to pour on the meat as well if OP brought her own spud, with a look of surprised innocence on her face.

Any good frozen dinners your DD enjoys. From Cook! or M&S. Suitable food for your DD and no trouble for your Mil. Plus no errors/contamination.

It would smoke out whether an additional meal is stressful or whether she is being deliberately awkward.

Thanks all!

I’m not going to get into a show down with her. It won’t achieve anything other than making DD feel even more uncomfortable than she already does.

We’ve explained the condition to her, I’ve printed information from the NHS website, shown her websites and all sorts. She’s not accepting it after all this time.

We’ll just stick to not eating there. She won’t visit us, so she’ll have to get used to seeing us for a couple of hours here and there, or get over herself

She keeps asking if my DDs can go and stay with her in the summer. Not bloody likely when she can’t feed DD1 for one bloody meal without being a dick about it.

God knows what she’s doing to the mash. She was taking about white sauce. Although, I think she was just being difficult. She’s probably now madly googling mashed potato recipes

Even if she sticks to her opinion that it’s faddy, it’s just a bloody potato FFS

Last time she started with her “we never used to have have all these allergies” DH pointed out that they didn’t have mobile phones, Sky TV or dishwashers in her day either but that didn’t stop her accepting them.

IME some people will go out of their way to accommodate someone with food allergies/intolerances and at the other end of the scale, some just seem to want to be as awkward as possible.

I always take backup food with us wherever we go, because some people, however well-meaning, may be unfamiliar with the needs and make a genuine mistake.

I agree with PP, only see MIL+FIL after meals.

She just sounds extremely difficult. Right call by you and your DH. If she wants to get on board and show she's a reasonable human being by listening and making a tiny reasonable adjustment, then she will. If not, she'll have to suffer the consequences, as you say.

Also, I sympathise with the visiting when staying at another relatives, btw. We used to stay with my DP and visit the (divorced) ILs and DH's family. My FIL and his wife made it ridiculously difficult every single bloody year, as they wouldn't invite US to THEIR house but tried to angle for an invite to my DP's house for a Christmas meal. No amount of suggesting we met at a pub/restaurant, or explaining that it made me extremely uncomfortable to have to ask my DPs to cater for extra people - that we couldn't "host" as it was not my house to invite them to - made any difference. It was some sort of power play and I hated it. Eventually they'd grudgingly offer us an invite on a day convenient to them (but not necessarily us). They'd act as if we were the ones unwilling to visit, when we'd travelled 100+miles. Glad to be out of it, tbh.

MiL will always comment that "we never used to have all these allergies"

Next time MiL says that, point out that we used to have much higher rates of child mortality. You don't get many 'sickly' children (who are always ill for no obvious reason) these days.

Not the point of the thread but potato with white sauce sounds horrible. Actually baffled to think how you could add gluten to a potato and make it better. She is really stretching the bounds of cooking just to make a point. People are weird.

Unfortunately gluten is often added to a huge variety of things, including potato (well, any that are prepared or frozen). It’s often added to things either as a thickener or to make a crunchy coating (ie on oven chips or roast potatoes).
I read EVERY single label. It’s surprising where you’ll find hidden gluten.

Yes, whatever she’s making sounds revolting. Quite glad we won’t be eating it!

I know that flour is added to commercially made food but it sounds utterly bonkers to add it to home-prepared food. Especially if one of your guests is coeliac.

My colleague's husband nearly died from untreated coeliac disease - perhaps you should tell your MIL that?

"She keeps asking if my DDs can go and stay with her in the summer. Not bloody likely when she can’t feed DD1 for one bloody meal without being a dick about it."

Your DD should be absolutely direct about this, though in a slightly more diplomatic way: "The girls would love to come and stay, but the food issue makes this impossible." "What food issue?" "Well, the fact that you seen to struggle to cater to a gluten-free diet. It makes DD feel uncomfortable and a burden, and we're not willing to put her through that. It's isolating enough for her to have such a serious condition at her age, and we don't want to do anything to exacerbate either her health issues or her sense of embarrassment that she is different."

My MIL tried the "in my day, we didn't have lots of children with nut allergies in schools!" when DN was in the middle of being tested. DH loudly said "Yep, because they usually had died before reaching school aged." (This was one of the only times DH and SIL have got along!)

What Hissy and Educating said. My DD suffers from horrendous IBS, tested negative for coeliac, but definitely bloats up when she has certain wheat products. It is not always about being faddy and attention seeking.

“we never used to have have all these allergies”

What a load of old shit.