Hi all,
Dh is feeling upset and I feel guilty.
So he does all the shopping and most of the cooking (apart from when he's at work, he cooks most evening meals, I do daytime) . He is good at it. This is what he wants to do. I have asked a few times that I take over the shopping and most of the cooking and he swaps to 'my' chores which is pretty much everything else. Partly because I feel the devision of chores is unfair but mostly because his choice of food is rubbish.
Don't get me wrong he does cook tasty meals from scratch but everything is cooked with oil, butter etc and lots of it. The ingredients are often high salt and high sugar. Instead of veg making up the bulk of the meal it's things like pie with piles of mash and a tiny spoonful of veg.
I have let it slide because quite frankly I'm exhausted and it's one less job for me. However, it's got worse and worse and I'm not prepared to sit by and watch now. By worse I mean that he is feeding the children so much sugar. When I was in charge of meals and before I met dh the children ate a very low sugar diet and lots of veg and they were not fussy at all.
My eldest has become a very fussy eater (which may be part of her asd) so for an easy life dh just let's her eat what she likes. He refuses to give her sweets as he says its not good for her yet he will feed her endless sugary food. She complains she is hungry all day despite having eaten which annoys dh so I sat him down this morning and explained that yes she is hungry because she is eating food that is high in sugar and not much else and it's not filling. As an example she had yesterday, coco pops for breakfast, a jam sandwich and crisps for lunch, sausages, chips and beans for tea, as well as some treat snacks. So while he is not sat there feeding them piles of sweets and ice-cream it is all high sugar stuff. This is where he falls down, he thinks it's proper food so it's OK. I am concerned about my childrens health.
When I did the food shopping and cooking, sugary cereals, jam, chips etc were occasional and reserved for holidays for example. But they are becoming an everyday thing.
I never use oil to cook with and I told dh this.
I am struggling to lose weight. When I'm in charge of my food (such as through the day at work) I eat lots of veg and some fruit and it's all healthy low cal stuff but then I go home to a heavy, high cal dinner. I often feel I can't then refuse to eat it, so I eat a small amount but then I'm left hungry and will snack. I'm have stated eating less during the day to compensate for my dinner.
Its the same with the children I explained to dh that when they are with me and he's at work they do not have crisps or lots of sugar. They even drink water but dh does not believe they will.
I think this stems from how he was fed because his parents will make what looks like a hearty good meal but actually broken apart it's full of sugar, high in carbs and fried in oil. They do tend to cook pizza and nuggets for our children 'because that's what kids like'. Dh and his parents call it kid food and that's what kids eat. But it's not how I was brought up and it's not my experience.
Dh is now hurt because I basically told him I'm taking back over the food and I know this is something he likes to do for our family.
So aibu and perhaps I should have let it go? How do I teach dh what is actually healthy and make him see that children will eat these foods.