To do this when we go out for dinner

[octoberstorms]

Having a Christmas meal out with some really good friends. (We are all aged 20-22) Slightly complicated as we can only go to one location nearby a friends house as she's just had a baby and can't go far.

I have an eating disorder and am really really restricted on what I can eat because of it (currently in therapy) am also a vegetarian. Restaurant is a steakhouse which has no vegan options and only veggie options involve halloumi (which I hate!) and I don't like any of the accompanying foods.

I've mentioned this to my friends but as one person can only do this location due to baby they've said we can't go anywhere else unfortunately.

It's an early dinner due to the baby at 5pm so AIBU to go along and have a glass of wine/maybe a dessert then have something to eat when I get home or will I look silly?

@octoberstorms it is I’m unhealthily obsessed 😂
I hope your dinner goes well eating or no eating (at least if you don’t eat you might get to snuggle baby while mum eats her dinner 😍)

We are all really good friends (known almost all of them for a year or so now and have met 2 of them a few times but talk a lot online) :) I consider them all to be great friends.

I think you're being fairly naive and completely overestimating the friendship to be honest, they definitely aren't 'great friends'.

They are all going out for a meal, travelling there together and eating where they all fancy. It looks to me as if they not only don't care if you come, but are actively excluding you.

If they were great friends, you'd be travelling together in 2 cars to the other restaurant in the same town so the new mum could attend and you could eat. That's how friends behave.

Your diet is incredibly restrictive but if you were my friend I'd do what I could to make sure you could have something wherever we went.

Don't bother going, focus on friendships which are reciprocal in future.

@MustardScreams the OP never said there were no sides. Just that the sides offered are not things she eats

It sounds to me like you're just a hanger-on and aren't really part of the friendship group, despite you trying really hard and wanting to be part of this group. These women don't seem to really care about you. A year isn't a long time. Maybe you're just trying too hard and have become a doormat in your desperation.

I agree :(. You need some proper friends, OP, because these really aren’t yours. It sounds like they are all good friends with each other but you have arrived later-you have only met the woman with a baby a few times and say that you don’t know her that well. You can do better than this.

I wouldn’t be going to a meal I could afford on a train journey I couldn’t afford to see people who don’t listen to me, where they serve food I can’t eat.

Two starters. Dessert. Done.

and would rather not pay for just a plate of vegetables

Why not? I’m not veggie but I don’t eat red meat. If I went to a steak house I’d just have some vegetables. I eat plates of vegetables at home.

You say you’ve eaten stuff before on other restaurant trips but your friends will be well aware of your restricted eating issues believe me. The things you won’t eat pile up - steak, fish, halloumi, things served with halloumi, chips, potatoes, mac and cheese, plate of vegetables etc. A friend of mine was anorexic and restaurant outings were always difficult as she could eat very few things.

It’s a good reason to get on with trying to get over your ED.

These friends invited OP, so there’s no reason to think they don’t want her there. If they didn’t they just wouldn’t have bothered.

These friends invited OP, so there’s no reason to think they don’t want her there.

Their actions say otherwise though. They have collectively ignored her when she’s said there’s nothing there she can eat.

In fact they’ve simply chosen to prioritise friend with a baby in this instance.

They may be well used to OPs restricted eating and not want to have their lives ruled by it, which is fair enough.

I've read the full thread and I honestly think your friends are shit.

I say this as a first time mum with a 4 month old. Your friend is being extremely precious. You said its like 20mins into the next town? Why can't she just leave a bit earlier? You said her partner is perfectly capable of looking after baby so I don't understand.

And they are also inconsiderate. They KNOW you have an eating disorder and they KNOW there is nothing you like on the menu and yet they still chose this as the place to go. AND they want you to get the train there yourself??

Honestly I wouldn't be going. But then I'm a stubborn cow when I choose to be.

It's her turn to be the one who is accommodated. It's no one else's fault or responsibility that you have an eating disorder - particularly as many of your friends don't even know about it. For all you know, she may have had some MH or physical issues after the birth, and therefore the rest of the group are focussed on making the outing appealing to her, first and foremost.

Yep.

I wouldn't be going. They are not good friends.

I think you might have very specific tastes and be quite fussy. That's your right but your friends might feel like they compromise a lot for your needs and that it's time for you to do the same for them? Your plan sounds good. No point in ordering what you don't eat but your friends don't have to always go to a restaurant of your choosing. You will still enjoy a nice night out and hopefully there will be a pud you like.

I would rather not pay for a plate of vegetables

Sadly that is often the option, or near enough , if you are vegetarian. At this time of year many restaurants seem to be in competition to provide vegetarians with the most boring meal to "enjoy" while their work colleagues eat their way through a turkey dinner with every extra that can be stuffed on the plate.

Some of the "festive" menus I have seen so far offer vegetarians the ultimate classic veggie opt outs.

Mushroom risotto - OK as a starter, but who wants to eat a whole plateful. Ho,Ho,No.

Red onion and goats cheese tartlet with limp salad - not even veggie ffs

Pasta bake - no words to describe the literal physical and emotional pain of overpriced over microwaved pasta bake hitting your mouth at 300degrees.

Ok it's a tricky time for restaurants with big parties booked in, but to then have the cheek to charge the same set menu price as the overloaded plate carnivores are offered is adding insult to injury.

Sorry rant over. but it is very annoying.

They very often won't even let you treat yourself to a side dish of roasties because they are saving them for the carnivores.

Actually, where I work is going to a Hilton this year and the festive vegetarian menu looks good. Shame I can't go!

You are not being silly. Throughout history it is the silly people who define the future. Maybe two glasses of wine and some bread. Conversely can you buy a steak in a vegan restaurant.

It is a conundrum. What are you going to do. Another glass of wine. It is a three glass problem.

@HundredMilesAnHour harsh post but thank you for the wake up call, I definitely can be a doormat. I always do what they want to do and hate rocking the boat. I have one amazing best friend who is a truly incredible person but doesn't live near here so I was happy when this group of friends invited me into their circle, I feel like I have a life now with them!

@TheDarkPassenger Thank you! (I love Dexter also- my boyfriend has watched the whole thing like six times over 😂) baby isn't coming unfortunately so no snuggles 😢

I wouldn't go at all. I'd hate to be sat there with a glass of wine whilst everyone was eating. It would make me uncomfortable. Sounds like these 'friends' don't really care if you go or not (no room for you to travel with them, restaurant without anything you can eat). I'd back out of the meal and then let these friendships drift.

OP sorry about your ED but I can see why others might chose restaurant - you’re vegetarian but don’t like chips, mac n cheese etc. Sounds like you don’t like anything so they are probs thinking @atoctoberstorms won’t like anything anyway so we might as well please the majority

I'm scared they will not want to be friends anymore if I make a fuss

Sweetheart, they're already not your friends :(

I've been where you are with a group. It's a very hard thing to tackle because it isn't that they're awful, or mean. It's simply that you're B-list, for whatever reason, and they just don't care very much about you. You aren't part of the main dynamic. It doesn't mean that they don't like you but it only goes so far.

However, it's a really damaging dynamic to be in for you. Especially as, this isn't about you not being interesting or fun enough or whatever. It's simply the way it is, and with another group of friends you would be part of the core, and cared about, and what you wanted would matter. That's the way it should be.

I dropped my group of fun, inspiring, diverse, perfectly lovely folk where I was one of the periphery people, because I didn't like the way the dynamic made me feel. And I know I did the right thing.

I think it would do you the WORLD of good to send a breezy text saying, changed my mind actually - this place doesn't work for me so I'm going to just pop in to say hi and have a glass of wine then I'll be eating elsewhere. They'll be full of shock and ohhh but we're disappointed, and you'll smile to yourself and think I'm sure you are... but not disappointed enough to consider me in the planning, or offer me a lift, or think twice about me in any way. See ya for a wine then me and BF have reservations at DeathToHalloumi, have you been there, it's ace :)

I think these "friends" are being really mean. My small team at work like to go to a steakhouse for their Xmas do but because I'm vegetarian they asked me before they booked anything if I would prefer we all went somewhere else.

I had a look at the menu and as it happens the vegetarian option sounds nice (not lasagne or mushroom stroganoff ) so I've said I'm happy to go there. Had I objected they would have booked somewhere else, even though it's their favourite restaurant. That's what people do to make everyone feel included.

"See ya for a wine then me and BF have reservations at DeathToHalloumi" OMG I just spat my coffee out that's so funny 😂 @FizzyGreenWater

Thank you, you've cheered me up, it's sad though as one specific friend in the group always wants to do stuff with me more than anyone else and she's so lovely. Just a shame really the whole group dynamic isn't working. :(

Everything @HundredMilesAnHour said.
Sounds harsh but it’s true. You aren’t part of their friendship group and you don’t want to be either really. Focus on yourself, recovery and spend time with like minded people who understand your situation. They probably find you a hinderance and aren’t willing to work around you.

OP, I wouldn’t let strangers on the internet wreck your friendships wih these people. It might be all about the new mum, which as a one off is fine.

Don’t allow yourself to get pushed down a road to a conclusion that they don’t like you and don’t care etc etc. People here can comment easily, but they don’t have the info really. If you like them, and enjoy spending time with them, then let it go this time

They aren’t great friends, you need to find some new ones

@Leighhalfpennysthigh you responded to my post upthread when I suggested the OP sounded impossible to please.

Happily you are correct - I have never had an EO. However a close relation does and I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. She has struggled with anorexia for nearly 15 years now. When she is in a good place she wants to be included on family occasions and outings and will come and eat what she feels able to eat. It would be an absolute waste of time picking somewhere to please her, partly because nowhere does and partly because offering her a degree of choice about where to eat could lead to her spiralling down a rabbit hole of obsessively checking menus and comparing calorie counts to choose the least ‘harmful’ dish and then potentially having a meltdown when she gets there if that exact choice isn’t on offer. Not to mention the very high chance that we could agree to eat at the restaurant of her choice and then on the day she doesn’t feel able to eat in public.

I know full well that having an EO isn’t being ‘picky’. I also know that living with someone with an EO has its own challenges. Of course it’s nowhere near as bad as being the sufferer but that doesn’t mean it’s selfish if friends and family put themselves and their preferences first once in a while.