Slightly miffed at In-Laws buying us food.

[Christmasbeach]

MIL has always bought DP and his brother food since they both moved out. BIL stopped MIL years ago (apart from when she offers him steak/high end meat) but DP still accepts the occasional bag when she's insistent. DP does try to reject these bags but sometimes she'll sneak them into his back seat etc.

I joke with DP that she's playing ready steady cook with us as it's always bizarre items that she's found a good deal on. Usually it's a bag of biscuits/cakes/bread/microwavable rice/crisps with the occasional newly released burgers/seasoned meat. I've always found it slightly bizarre that two men in their thirties are treated like uni students but i've heard that other mums do the same. A lot of the bag of food is cupboard things that DP usually just takes to work for a free home if he's not interested in and if we're given meat he'll have it for lunch.

Now the bit i'm feeling a bit miffed at, if not slightly offended, is that since we've announced that we're pregnant she's been sending food for us both. By that we've received a lot more meat/things for meals but it's all asda essentials. Asda essential sausages, chicken thighs (the original packaging was damaged therefore she put them in a freezer bag for us), wafer ham, ready made mash potato etc.

She quite often makes digs that i'm too much of a health freak (because i've ordered pasta/vegetarian meals out) and 'she ate everything while pregnant'. She knows that I do care what goes into my body, I'm not a huge meat eater and I enjoy cooking. We really do not need hand outs as we're both on good salaries and buying us all this Asda Essentials has only came about after we've announced we're pregnant.

It's also very inconvenient too as we meal plan/do the weekly shop therefore we're either left eating a meal we don't particularly want to eat or unfortunately it goes to waste. I have tried being polite to MIL that either we don't have room in our fridge/freezer or we're not going straight home/there isn't any need as we do our own shops.

MIL has now made a comment to DP that i'm not appreciative. AIBU that as a pregnant professional I'm not exactly jumping for joy at the lowest end chicken thighs in a non labelled freezer bag that needed to be eaten that day?

To me your MIL is trying to be helpful. Is she possibly trying to fill a void?
Her sons are grown up, so maybe she believes this is a way she can still help him in life, show she still cares etc He should thank her for her kindness but be completely honest saying the food is being wasted so she’s essentially wasting her money. Even get him to suggest and it would make more sense for her to use her ££ on some small essentials for your baby.

As many, many people have said on this thread already, food banks will not accept any of the perishable items (rightly so, why should someone struggling financially be subject to unpackaged chicken thighs in a freezer bag) and throwing it in a bin is incredibly wasteful.

I don't understand how so many people on this thread are avoiding the blindingly obvious solution, that is for MIL to stop buying people unwanted and unneeded food.

Your BiL has stopped it, so DH has to step up now.
When MiL said you were unappreciative he should have said yes, we won’t eat this mum and it just goes in the bin. It’s kind of you to think of us but please don’t do this.
If she moans about what you eat you both need to just keep repeating we are old enough to choose our own food MiL just as you choose what you eat.
And never take it. No thanks MiL we’ve done the shopping for this weeks meals and this will only go in the bin, I’m sure you will enjoy it.
Look in the car, and if she’s sneaked a bag in take it out and leave it in the garden. If she comments then it’s we said we didn’t want it MiL please listen to us and respect our wishes. We don’t have room in our rubbish bins for all this food.
She won’t like it but if one son has done it then the other one can.
It would drive me mad….

Obvious hand grenade but will bite.

Annoying since you don’t want / think you’re too good for the food she is giving you. However, what is the woman like outside of this? It seems more like she’s trying to do a nice thing for her son and his pregnant partner rather than some passive aggressive display of feeding or overruling your opinions.

Why exactly can’t you just say thanks and then take it to a food bank or give it away on olio? It’s a pain yes but other than being incredibly rude to her about it she seems obvious. Get DH to deal with the food in future?

Then MiL should donate the money to a food bank. It is wasteful giving it to people who don't need it.

WE are pregnant?? 🙄don't be ridiculous.
Just take the food to the food bank.

Food banks rarely want frozen or cold chain food. There's no guarantee it's been kept properly for a start.

I'm just going to keep posting this in the hopes that someone will read it.

One more time

Food banks will not take fresh meat, let alone foodstuff of uncertain provenance in damaged packaging

Nor will anyone sensible on Olio

And the rest of that is weird twaddle!

It can get quite exhausting receiving ‘gifts’ like this. My mum does it. We have limited storage space and she has no idea what we already have in stock. The non-perishable stuff we accept or give to the food bank. The fresh stuff is a real pain. I have said many times not to give us stuff in case we end up throwing it away. But she doesn’t listen. The annoying thing is, that she is religious and abhors waste. But is seemingly ok for us to throw away fresh fruit and veg. No point giving me piles of fruit if we have lots already.

I have told her directly. Been polite and been cross. I have returned items. Nothing works. She is genuinely trying to be kind.

I have no solutions OP but if you find a solution please share it.

PLEASE STOP WITH THE 'GIVE IT TO A FOOD BANK' shit.

Most won't take frozen or cold chain except direct from supermarkets as you have no idea of the conditions it's been kept in. People who need food banks don't need food poisoning. They also need food that's easy to cook. Think of how you cook chicken portions. You need an oven and other ingredients. Not always available.
They also might not be able to store it at the food bank.

There may be churches or soup kitchens that can cook it so it's ok.
But it would make far more sense for MiL to just bloody well listen and stop giving people stuff they neither need nor want.

The irony here is that the ones sanctimoniously suggesting the food bank, are the ones clearly with the least experience of donating to them!

The person saying do you not realise how grateful some would be for that food right now seem to be badly missing the point. We are in a cost of living crisis and there are many who could really use that food right now. Why buy up all the bargain food that someone else might really want and need in order to give it to someone who doesn't want it? That is just depriving someone else. It's like a thread I read ages ago about bargain turkeys and some bloke who'd bought 20 or something and was stacking out his freezer and giving them to all and sundry and the discussion about whether this was fair when he was well off but just liked a bargain and was depriving everyone else of the opportunity of getting one.

Some people are addicted to shopping and some people are addicted to "bargains" whether or not the items are needed. Obviously she is getting too much for herself, so doesn't need the extra shopping so giving it to you. Maybe she feels really compelled to buy it. It might be that it used to be something she did that was needed when her offspring were younger. But isn't so appropriate now. On the other hand, it might be hard to break these habits. We don't know anything about her past or whether she might feel compelled to stockpile bargains in case, or whether it's a habit of how she expresses care and she can't break that habit easily. It might even be compulsive to some extent. The thing about the chicken with the broken packaging that needs to be eaten immediatelyactually seems a little strange (and not helpful) which makes me wonder if it is very compulsive for her and if there is something else there that compells her to buy this extra food and therefore it might be far more hurtful to her than you realise that you aren't grateful.

I think rather than just getting cross, can you encourage replacing this habit with one that can give her the same good feeling (of being involved/caring) whilst being genuinely useful? Is there anything else - not food? - she could pick up for you if she sees it? If nothing else, she could be encouraged to not buy perishable items or meat (no room in the fridge etc?), but items that last. Dried goods like pasta or tins or cereal? That way you are a lot more likely to make use of them and if they aren't things you normally eat you then donate them more easily as they won't go off or have broken packaging.

But not all nappies and wipes are equal. Later on it becomes a pain, but it's quite nice buying the first and second size nappies. My sister was a bit guilty of this and pushed pampers onto my DD, when she liked Tesco's/Lidl's own.
There's charities desperate for funding, to do this isn't kindness, it's a power play.
OP you've got to be straight with her or this will get directed towards your baby and you'll end up with a house full of crap.

My nan used to do this

I'd get a bag of really random food and other stuff

I used to thank her, laugh to myself at most of it, redistribute it to anyone who i thought would appreciate it and use what I could

She meant well and was trying to be helpful

I miss her

OP has done a runner

I would probably smile say thanks and then hand it in to a food bank. Not worth the fight...she clearly thinks she's doing good.

"I think rather than just getting cross, can you encourage replacing this habit with one that can give her the same good feeling (of being involved/caring) whilst being genuinely useful?"

No, her children have grown up. Those of us who have left over caring feelings, but our children are adult professionals can get involved in community causes. Pasta won't work if the OP wants wholegrain etc and she rocks up with budget white carb brand.

She means well

If it was M&S stuff would you feel the same

You. Wed to be blunter or dh does as his mum

If you really don't want it then a few options

1. leave bag in her doorstep

2. put on olio

3. offer on local Fb group

4. bin it. Last option

GIVE IT TO THE FOOD BANK = CANCEL THE CHEQUE!!

My mum does it. She always ALWAYS sends me home with a random bag of bits whenever I visit!
After a Christmas visit I came home with half a bag of frozen cocktail sausages, a couple of bags of Quavers, half a tin of tiffin and a handful of satsumas!

Indeed, and also missing this valid point from @Hadtocomment

We are in a cost of living crisis and there are many who could really use that food right now. Why buy up all the bargain food that someone else might really want and need in order to give it to someone who doesn't want it? That is just depriving someone else.

MIL buying a pack of £2 chicken thighs from the Whoops! section is preventing someone who is genuinely experiencing food poverty from buying it.

If I genuinely wanted to be of help to someone, here's what I would do. ASK them where I could make myself useful. And if the answer was 'nothing', or, 'just be there for me if I need to talk', I would accept that.

Here's what I would not do. Interpret for myself what I decided was best for someone. Act in accordance with that interpretation, keep acting upon it when that person informed me gently that it wasn't what they wanted or needed, or grumble to my son that his partner was an ingrate because her view of what was best for her didn't happen to chime with mine. Because, as the elder, wiser person and family matriarch, I must by definition know better.

It's not hard. But the numerous issues with direct, adult communication, or of pulling out all the stops to accommodate this batshittery at some inconvenience to ourselves, all so as not to offend the boundary-stamper, suggests why there are are so many threads about conflicts exactly like this.

since we've announced that we're pregnant

You’re both pregnant at the same time?

"The OP is pregnant"

And so, apparently, is her husband.