Aibu that you should say thank you when someone cooks you dinner?

[MarmaRell78]

Maybe I'm in the minority, but I always say thank you when someone cooks for me. I'm on maternity leave, so basically doing all of the cooking / cleaning/ washing / clearing up. DH can't even be arsed to put his stuff in the dishwasher, a classic pile it up the side of leave all over the house.

But the very least, surely, is when I've cooked him dinner he could at least look up from his phone and say thanks? I get that he's been at work, but am I asking too much?! Silently fuming and wondering whether to pick this fight.

YABU - You don't need to say thank you every single time someone cooks for you when you're off work anyway

YANBU - Doesn't take much to make me feel a little more appreciated and it's definitely good manners

My husband is the same. My family are a thank you family though and his are not. It drives me crazy. I always thank him and he rarely thanks me (though he seems to think he does!) he will if I stare at him pointedly long enough. I’m hoping he picks it up as I teach my toddler 🤣

An Ex was a massive arsehole over this. Never, ever said thank you.

Worse, if I asked him why he hadn't said thanks, he would say, 'I just did'.

Worse than that, on the odd occasion he cooked, we were all expected to swoon over how amazing it/he was. It/he weren't.

He turned out to be such a silly, ordinary man with an ego where his real brain and manners should be.

my parents never taught us to thank anyone for a meal so I never did until I started going to eat at others houses as an adult. Now I definitely do.

my dd always thanks me and it’s just so sweet and unexpected since I never really taught her to do it either. 💙

This

15 years together and dh still thanks me for every meal. Usually followed up with something like, 'it's been a while since we had this' , 'where did you manage to get so and so ingredient', or something to acknowledge my effort. So yanbu. I've noticed ds started doing this - thanks mum that was yummy, thanks mum this is my new favorite. It is the little things that mean so much.

I have a slight problem with this. My DH does the cooking and he expects the whole family to say thank you and show gratitude but does he say thank you when I've cleaned the bathroom, hoovered or each time I wash his clothesfor example? NO, never! So why is cooking so different? It's just another bloody household chore. Why is one more deserving of gratitude than all the others?

Agreed. Every night we all thank the person who has cooked, be it me or Dh.

PS I think you should say thank you for ALL chores done for you and if you expect a thank you for a meal, you should expect a Thank you for everything anyone contributes to the home.

I've had this argument many times with my DH. He never says thanks. I would have to make a concerted effort and purposely stop myself saying thank you when someone cooks dinner for me. Thankfully my children have learned from me and have lovely manners.

Was he not like this before you had a baby with him?

I suppose we are strange, but we don’t say thank you to each other for cooking dinner. Or doing dishes. Or taking out the bins. Or any household chore really.

What we do do is we don’t have screens at the dinner table, so we talk. We equally divide the work of cooking and washing up. It’s not a set thing, but flexible some nights I cook, other nights he cooks, other nights a DC may cook, sometimes two of us cook together. Sometimes who cooks also does dishes, sometimes not, sometimes a DC does dishes. It’s all pretty fluid but manages to stay fair.

I think in your position, I’d prioritise him not ignoring you for a screen during dinner and doing more cooking and washing up than trying to get a mumbled “thanks babe”. That’s not asking for what’s really important.

Yes have a chat with him. Tell him how much you would appreciate a thank you. Sounds like he just needs a little reminding.

Why are you doing all
the cooking?

he should cook on his days off as a minimum.

Not only is he ungrateful, he is a liar.

This would bother me.
I thought this was just basic manners, to say thank you after a meal, my son always thanks me even if ive not cooked and it's take away or in a restaurant.
I've said thank you for some meals I could barely force myself to eat because of sensory issues and eating disorder, you do it because someone has spent time money and effort to feed you, and it's good manners.
We are a grateful household and big on manners though, I thank my son for completing his chores and other tasks, it seems to make him more willing, positive reinforcement I suppose.
I would never dream of not thanking my partner for a meal he cooks, and he thanks me for cleaning up after, it's an acknowledgement that I see and appreciate the effort you've made, and we are a team working together.
Is he generally ill mannered? Phones at the table would suggest so.

I think the question is too broad as personally I think it depends on whether it is your partner cooking or an external person like a friend.

However I am clearly in a minority here as I think YABU. I absolutely cannot stand the concept of families or couples that insist on thanking each other when cooking. I cringe every time we go to dinner at our friend's house and at the start of the meal the husband is always the first to say 'ooo, this looks lovely, thanks darling' before the rest of us chip in. I will always say thanks in a situation where we are guests but I hate that fact that the husband is always the first to pounce.

I should caveat my situation by saying that I'm from an ethnic background and in my experience, thanking someone for cooking just isn't a thing. I'd be amazed if any Asian husbands are thanking their wives for dinner! I've grown up going to people's houses where the mum would cook for 20 ppl and not one person would say thanks. I think a lot of it comes from the perspective that we really enjoy feeding people so it just seems bizarre to thank someone. Probably more controversial is also the fact that many wives were housewives and so cooking dinner was clearly part of their role and a husband wouldn't thank their wives for dinner in the same way that the wife wouldn't thank the husband for going out to work.

If I try and strip the 'ethnic experience' out of it, in my view I just don't understand why you are thanking your partner for cooking and then not other things. Cooking is one aspect of the relationship/family unit and there are tasks me and DP split up to allow our house to function and making dinner is just another one of those. Rather bizarrely I'll often say thanks before we start eating dinner anyway but that is because my partner will have brought the plates to the table!

I've read through some other comments and it also made me reflect on something else that some friends and I were talking about. I think it also comes down to formality - the idea of thanking people within the family for cooking or indeed carrying out other chores just seems to create or suggest an overly formal or polite relationship which seems odd within the family unit. I'm going to sound up my own a**e now but we never said/say thank you but I still feel like I have very good manners and am incredibly polite around others - it's just with family we show gratitude through love/actions as those relationships aren't restricted by the formality or social etiquette that governs external people.

A thank you is really important to me and DH so I would say your DH is being really rude at best, and very disrespectful towards you as well.

Also by being glued to his phone when he eats he is effectively shutting you out on top of not acknowledging the work and effort you are putting in to running the home and caring for him and your new baby. A thank you should be the absolute minimum, and really he should be doing all he can to show you he notices and appreciates everything you do.

It's the difference between feeling loved and valued and feeling like an invisible unappreciated servant.

Go pick that fight! (And don't back down - good luck OP)

We are not a thank you household when it comes to cooking.

I can’t tolerate my children thanking me for feeding them. It’s basic mothering. I will feed anyone who needs feeding in my home. It’s basic, basic human interaction, it’s really nothing special.

However, I have taught my children to thank other people who feed them (except their family members, we all feel the same way) because not everyone sees things this way. Rather a thank you than not.

An exception to ALL of this is when I do something really amazing: totally out of the ordinary birthday cake; all out birthday dinner; Father’s Day breakfast; Christmas lunch etc. They know by now that planning, shopping for and preparing such things takes a lot of time and effort and that THAT deserves thanks (not the purchasing and cooking of the ingredients).

THAT SAID, god help anyone who sits at my table eating food I’ve prepared while on their bloody phone. There’s not thanking, and then there’s being downright rude.

On point.

DH and I have been cooking for each other, and, now adult kids for the last 46 years.
I can't think of one time that we haven't said Thank you, that was lovely
As for phones at the table

Sorry, posted too soon.
As for phones at the table 😡But I'm not from the mobile phone generation.
However my kids and grand kids are but no way would they be 'on their phones' at my dinner table.

I think you need a new meal time rule or two.

1. no phones / tablets at the table

2. always say thank you for the meal and do not leave the table without asking / before everyone is finished

You need to model good behaviour to your child. Well that's what you tell your husband, just before you tell him to stop being a dick.

We always say thank you, even if the person cooking (we alternate nights) dishes up the leftovers from the night before that the thanker cooked! It’s automatic and ingrained.

DP is bad with his phone, though – or was til the day I read him the riot act cos he had it out at breakfast with DD, sat down to lunch I’d made for the three of us and got his Kindle out, then whipped his phone out at dinner. I threw it in the bin and told him he’d been rude all day and the mealtime behaviour he was modelling was how our daughter would behave.

He was raised in a strange house where food was put on the table at set times, no thank yous, eaten in silence as fuel and people got up and left when they’d finished, and his mum cleared up at the end. Hard habits to break even though he doesn’t want to live like that or have meals like that, but he doesn’t have a lifetime of “meals as a social gathering” to fall back on the emotional muscle memory.

We do have nights where we agree we’re both plum tuckered out and have no chat left, shall we both just peacefully stare at our phones then watch telly in silence? But it has to be by agreement.

DH and kids always say thank you for dinner when I cook..thanks mum this is amazing.. and we do same when he cooks. I also thank them for washing up and OH thanks me when I do the house . Maybe overkill but nice to be appreciated .

OP,

Saying thanks is unbelievably basic.

That he doesn't shows he is both uncouth and disrespectful.

Stop cooking for him.

Be too busy with the children.

Sort your contraception out.

That he is so disrespectful of you is not good.

You will be returning to work thankfully, but him doing so little while you are on mat leave is setting yourself up for a tough return.

Stop doing everything.
Leave the cooking and his laundry to him.
Stop picking up after him.

Have you left both children with him for the day?

If not why not?

You are allowing your relationship to slip into resentment area which will destroy it.

Children learn at a young age to say thank you.

His refusal to say it is very rude but a very passive aggressive dismissal of what you do.

Don't underestimate his deliberate disrespect.

I would be telling him that considering his inability to do something as basic as say thank you, you will leave him to sort out his own meal.

He is tired?
How are things going to work when you return to work?

He's opting out of family life by being on his phone constantly.

Him doing so little and leaving a mess says so much about him.

He's a shit husband and a shit father.

You need to take an honest hard look at yourself as to why you havl allowed him to treat you like this?

Your relationship is doomed if you allow it to continue.

I hope you have family to support you.