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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think if there's something you don't want your kid to eat you say when asked not bitch about it later.

356 replies

BeansOnToast56 · 23/05/2021 19:34

So today I looked after my brothers girlfriends daughter for the day as she was working and her child care fell through. She is a relatively new girlfriend of about 9 months but due to covid I haven't really spent much time with her or her daughter but my brother is happy so that's ok with me. My dd is a year younger so it was no skin off my nose to have her here for the day, the girls played nicely and entertained each other. I asked her mum when she dropped her off if she had any allergies, things she didn't want her to have or things she didn't like, mum said she ate most things. She had lunch and dinner here so mum really should of said if there was things her daughter wasn't allowed to eat. The girls had bagels cream cheese, grapes, carrot sticks for lunch, crisps in the afternoon and chorizo pasta bake for dinner with peas and garlic bread with chocolate ice cream for pudding. Well my brother has rang kicking for because the child is vegetarian and her mum is very upset I didn't respect that, how the bloody hell am I suppose to know this? I asked mum and she didn't say her reply was she eats most things, no mention of her being a vegetarian at all. AIBU on to think this is mums fault and if she didn't say how was I suppose to know, her dd is 7 if that makes any difference and she didn't tell me herself.

OP posts:
CrikeyPeg · 23/05/2021 23:39

Awww Beans, your brother and his gf are behaving like knobs; their lack of communication shouldn't be your problem and yet somehow it is. You did them a big favour, sounds like the kid had a great day, such a shame that no good turn goes unpunished rings true here.

You'd think, when someone asks is there anything she doesn't eat, the first thing that would pop out of her mum's mouth would be 'well apart from meat, no' or is that too easy/simple?

I'd be keeping schtum if I got served up that chorizo bake too Grin

NowtSoQueerAsFolk · 23/05/2021 23:42

@underneaththeash

1. Children should not be veggie - no matter what is fashionable, children cannot get 5 of their essential amino acids from a veggie diet and it's significantly less with a vegan one.
  1. You were giving up your time for free! They have what you're alreays prepared for dinner, or they b ring something else.
I didn't know that. Why is it that children can't get all their essential amino acids from vegetarian food, when vegetarian food contains them all?
SunnydaleClassProtector99 · 23/05/2021 23:49

I have been veggie since 6. I have been fed meat by adults. Sometimes I noticed and said something and was still forced to eat it. Sometimes they delighted in telling me afterwards when I didn't notice (animal oil)
Unfortunately there are adults out there who delight in causing distress to children. Every time this happened the 'adult' delighted over the fact they got one over on an uppity child in their eyes. Each time was horrible to experience as a child. The double whammy of the act and being a target of hate and ridicule by an adult.

One possibility is that the child was too scared to say anything or only realised after and was tearful and upset when they got home.

It sounds like someone didn't tell you (brother) and I would be having words. There may be many reasons why the child isn't the one who said something and their actions shouldn't be used as 'proof' they're dirt is wrong.

Hawkins001 · 24/05/2021 00:18

Food contract, basically when we host v,i,p guests, various business people, a contract is drawn up that lists any dietary requirements, medical, and food preferences, mainly to cover and prevent any miscommunication about food preferences and for legal purposes too.

WorraLiberty · 24/05/2021 00:21

Do you really need to ask if you're being unreasonable here?

osbertthesyrianhamster · 24/05/2021 00:36

I don't know who's worse, the GF or your brother. I'd have laughed at his telling me I needed to apologise to her. 'You're batshit. Call me when you're less batshit.' I'd not be stepping in to help again. They call and I'd say 'you'll need to make other arrangements.'

footballmom · 24/05/2021 00:41

Ignore the girlfriend. Speak to your brother again. Tell him that you didn't know she was vegetarian. You asked about dietary requirements specifically, and she didn't reveal this. You wouldn't purposely feed her meat had you known.
Tell him you are extremely hurt and upset. This is not your fault and you looked after the child and fed her and are a nice person.
How dare he/she confront you about this.
Make it clear that if an apology isn't forthcoming that you will not entertain or engage with them in future

Summerfun54321 · 24/05/2021 00:45

Bloody love a chorizo pasta bake!

Wheresmybiscuit3 · 24/05/2021 01:31

You know you aren’t being unreasonable OP

Providora · 24/05/2021 01:52

@elephantoverthehill

All fed, no one dead.
Except for the pig!

I'm putting money on this being your brother's fault somehow, OP. The GF has been led to believe you knew they were veg and he's putting pressure on you to accept the blame so he can save face. It's too batshit otherwise.

SmokedDuck · 24/05/2021 02:30

@Hawkins001

Food contract, basically when we host v,i,p guests, various business people, a contract is drawn up that lists any dietary requirements, medical, and food preferences, mainly to cover and prevent any miscommunication about food preferences and for legal purposes too.
Jeez, if someone needs this to come to my house, they can stay away, thank you very much.
Maggiesfarm · 24/05/2021 03:21

@pallisers

(Please don't start threads with 'So', which means 'therefore'; you continued, "...should of said if there was things; the 'of' was repeated. You don't have to be highly educated to know that is wrong.)

What a pity the late Seamus Heaney, winner of the Nobel prize for literature, didn't have the benefit of your advice. He started his translation of Beowolf with "So"

Ah well, in Ireland.....

Beowolf is a poem, it could even have started with 'And'.

Starting a paragraph with 'so' is wrong.

However, the op has definitely not done anything wrong with regard to how she fed the little girl. She wasn't told!

I agree that chorizo pasta bake sounds good! Any sort of pasta bake suits me, as long as there is plenty of cheese :). Just think, had the op known the child was (supposed to be) vegetarian, she could have cooked a vegetarian pasta bake and maybe added some chorizo to her own and her child's plates. The point is, she didn't know and the mum is being extremely unreasonable and unkind to someone who gave her a helping hand! Hopefully she has changed her tune.

AlicjaCross · 24/05/2021 06:28

She's probably upset as her dd came home saying what great food she'd had.

whosappleman · 24/05/2021 06:59

There's no way this is your fault. If anything the kid was a bit naughty to not have said anything bit ultimately it was her responsibility to tell you.

SoupDragon · 24/05/2021 07:15

Please don't start threads with 'So', which means 'therefore'

Chambers dictionary would disagree with you. It has 20 definitions, only one of which is "therefore". Interestingly, definition 20 is "a meaningless interjection used to start a sentence".

HTH.

yoyoyooo · 24/05/2021 07:31

(Please don't start threads with 'So', which means 'therefore'; you continued, "...should of said if there was things; the 'of' was repeated. You don't have to be highly educated to know that is wrong.)

It's "should have" not "should of"

You don't have to be highly educated to know that is wrong.

DeltaFlyer · 24/05/2021 07:40

I would love to know the mindset of the people who voted yabu Hmm
The brother and gf are wrong, she could have said something about being vegetarian when you asked. If she thought you already knew then a simple "don't forget - no meat"

At a nursery I worked in it wasnt until the child had been there for 7 months that the mum said no pork products for religious reasons, she was irate. It was dad (not the religious one) that filled out the paperwork so didn't write it down and had put ham sandwich down as a favourite food.

saraclara · 24/05/2021 07:48

When your brother asked you to apologise, did you ask what exactly you are supposed to apologise for?
I don't get how he could listen to your explanation, agree that you always ask for this information, yet still think you need to apologise

Iloveacurry · 24/05/2021 07:51

I’d be texting them both and say that you won’t be apologising, as you didn’t know she was vegetarian as neither one of them told you.

aliensprig · 24/05/2021 07:52

@underneaththeash

1. Children should not be veggie - no matter what is fashionable, children cannot get 5 of their essential amino acids from a veggie diet and it's significantly less with a vegan one.
  1. You were giving up your time for free! They have what you're alreays prepared for dinner, or they b ring something else.
This is total and complete bollocks.
Splann · 24/05/2021 08:00

My brother is not veggie, he had a bacon sandwich here last week on his way home after a night shift

Do you think his GF perhaps thinks otherwise? Which might explain why she didn’t mention being vegetarian as surely you would know, with your brother being such a devout veggie Grin

Fishandhips · 24/05/2021 08:02

If you don't know you can't do, you even went out of your way to ask which is more than most people do

MisgenderedSwan · 24/05/2021 08:04

Clearly the daughter isn't bothered if at7 she didn't mention it! When my dd started preschool at 2 I trained her to say 'no yoghurt, no milk' at snack time. The teachers were busy and it would have made her very poorly! A 7yo would be able to mention she didn't eat meat if she wanted to. The mother is crackers, all she should be saying is 'thank you so much for looking after and feeding dd!'

Keepyourdistance000 · 24/05/2021 08:07

GF sounds like a lying troublemaker.

Sonofabiscuit · 24/05/2021 08:07

@Jocasta2018

I guess the important thing is the child really enjoyed the food - two portions! I wonder how she reacts to her mother's cooking...
I was wondering that and do you think its jealousy on the mothers part ? Her DD spent day with you ,had fun and had two helpings of the pasta bake . Dafter things have been known .