Tedious performative under eaters

[SlimPig]

The thread about the PIL's measly portions reminded me of this, and how iritating it is. I remember once at work they bought us all fish and chips on one friday afternoon. When it arrived the two other women started their bs as soon as they were handed their box - oohh the weight of that! I'll never eat all that! Hadn't even opened it and looked at it yet.

Then, once opened, both of them, oh my god, I'll never eat all that (measly takeaway cardboard box portion, not a massive, in paper, large portion) ooh dear, we won't need dinner, or breakfast tomorrow now will we! Don't think I can eat my peas too, I'm so stuffed. I'm going to need to go for two runs tomorrow now! On and on, through the whole meal.

I was starving and had to make a conscious effort to eat it slowly because they were fucking about and pushing it round the box and I didn't want to look a pig, I'm a fast eater anyway, but that meal was just so god awful! In the end I just ate it at my normal speed.

Why? Why do people do this? Why can't they just eat their food normally? Why does everything have to be justified and offset? Just strikes me as so sad that they couldn't just eat their food without a whole performance (infront of all the men in the office, only 3 women there, me and them) of how birdlike they normally eat 😥

People commenting either way is annoying. Have to say though I do find competitive under eating more irritating, many of those who do it are talking crap anyway

@SlimPig totally with you on this.

For us, it’s my FIL, he’s not even on a diet, it’s the performance that’s so annoying.

Oh I couldn’t eat all that (he will), Oh I won’t need to eat again till tomorrow (he will), Oh who will share a starter with me cos I only want a little taste (lies!)…

What’s worse is the commenting on other people’s (normal) portions, including growing teenagers, and him trying to force MIL to share something that he wants (rather than what she wants) to order cos he “only wants a little taste”…then if she agrees, he scoffs it and she only gets a little taste…

Soooo annoying!!

There’s a woman at work that mentions carlories multiple times a day, how she can only eat 1200 a day, oh I the steps needed to walk this off, oh what are the calories.

yes we’re all trying to lose weight but mentioning it every 30 minutes is annoying.

Well, people like to talk about stuff that's on their mind, which, ironically, is what OP is doing in talking about these people, and what they're doing, too. It's a bit pot/kettle!

Precisely what I thought, too...

trying to force MIL to share something that he wants (rather than what she wants) to order cos he “only wants a little taste”…then if she agrees, he scoffs it and she only gets a little taste

I would have killed him years ago

Reading this thread, I wonder whether people would think this of me. That's I'm a performance under eater.

Firstly I've got really bad IBS and sometimes I just can't eat much or can't eat certain foods or I'll suffer badly for it.

I love food, but I can't eat really big portions, so if I'm offered some cake for example. I'll say "just a tiny slice please", then still inevitably get given a piece that's too big and feel embarrassed when I can't eat it.

Another perfect example. I go to dhs parents for a takeaway, I'll have a bit of everything, plenty enough to fill me. Then I'll keep getting asked why I don't want some more because I haven't had much. Then mil will get the ice cream and biscuits, chocolates out and I'll say no thank you, because I genuinely just don't want any, so she'll go off to find me something 'low calorie' even though I don't want low calorie I don't want anything! So she will insist I take it home and start putting things in my bag. I know it's kindness but it turns into a performance and not on my part.

People find it odd that I don't drink anything but water or coffee. When I order a water people are startled. "But don't you want a proper drink".

At work people offer food, sometimes, if it's something I really fancy I'll have a bit, but if I turn it down it's always "oh but one won't hurt, you're slim so you don't have to worry".

I talk about food a lot, because I love food and I love cooking but I'm satisfied with 3 meals a day and sugary foods only occasionally and generally I just prefer to eat foods that I've cooked at home that I really like 🤷‍♀️

You're not performance under eater, seems like you didn't understand the original post.

🤣 😂 omg how does poor Roger cope!!

It’s the little comments made by people with the aim of them feeling more virtuous and as a consequence the listener feel less virtuous that the OP is objecting too. Make no comments - that’s all OP is asking for.

CS Lewis called it the 'Gluttony of delicacy' in the Screwtape letters and said it was as bad as the 'Gluttony of excess' except that most people think it is a positive trait because all have too much of what we need really so are all gluttons for excess for something or other, if it is not food

Whether you agree with the 'Christianity aspect and the idea of either of them being sinful, I think it is true that both of them as bad as the other. One is selfish greed but the other is greed for having things your own way regardless of how it affects others.

Screwtape, a very senior devil, tries to train his nephew in the damnation of a human soul. Wormwood’s “patient” is a young man with a difficult mother.
His patient’s mother terrorizes hostesses, servants, and waiters with her demands. “In a crowded restaurant she gives a little scream at the plate which some overworked waitress has set before her and says, ‘Oh, that’s far, far too much! Take it away and bring me about a quarter of it’. If challenged, she would say she was doing this to avoid waste; in reality she does it because the particular shade of delicacy to which we have enslaved her is offended by the sight of more food than she happens to want.”
Screwtape concludes with satisfaction, “Her belly now dominates her whole life.” She doesn’t know it. She’s actually quite happy with herself. “Because what she wants is smaller and less costly than what has been set before her, she never recognises as gluttony her determination to get what she wants, however troublesome it may be to others.”

I don't eat a lot when out and about as I prefer to eat home cooked food and avoid certain oils but I never comment about 'how little I eat' or anything to do with it really at all!

However the number of comments I get when I refuse a biscuit, cake, donut, whatever, is absurd. You would think I had just murdered their puppy not refused a biscuit.

Are people being deliberately thick??

Again. This is not about how much or how little anyone eats. Most people don’t care.

It is about people who go on and on and on and on about how little they are eating. And they make a show of it. So that everyone else there knows how little they are eating.

If anyone doesn’t understand this, I can explain the OP in greater detail to them.

That's very rude.

My point was, often when you decline food or ask for a smaller portion. Other people turn it into a performance. Because they won't stop the back and forth insistence that you eat more.

I don't think I've ever met anyone who gives a running commentary of how little they are eating.

But a large percentage of people constantly pass comment on what others are eating and try to force food onto people. I can't help wondering if some of them are reflecting there own behaviours.

I have a friend who is always keen to arrange a meet up.. coffee, brunch, lunch.. and then orders a black coffee. I just get on and munch my way through my meal or cake.

Justifiable homicide.

No jury would convict . . .

Hah! That reminds me of a colleague of mine. She was very large (and quite self conscious) and had once told me she finds it hard to eat in front of people. She was having therapy to deal with her self esteem and eating disorders. She was trying to eat in front of people and in the office and not hide away etc.

Once time we ordered from the local chinese. She was tucking into her same sized portion as everyone else when our bullying arsehole line manager walked by, sneered at her and said 'Are you really going to eat all that?'. She swallowed her mouthful. Smiled. Looked at him directly and said; 'It takes alot of work to maintain a body like this'. Then serenely carried on.

Fucking awesome.

(And yes HR did get involved. He was asked to leave eventually due to that sort of behaviour. )

Why do you keep meeting her?

That is not what the OP was talking about. Read it again. And similar stories reported by others.

Maybe she's a good friend despite not eating in quantities that Pottedpalm deems socially appropriate?

Nothing messing you up more than growing up with feeders who are also judgemental undereaters!

Gran did all but pry my jaw open to shove apple in every time she saw me whilst also calling me fat and starving herself. Parents made me finish everything on my plate before getting down from the table while using dodgy language around food (dad's favourite was 'rakes'....she ate rakes of fat food). Being called fat and the michelin man but then being given chocolate and sweets picked up on the way home from work daily as a treat. Told eating too much, not eating enough, too fat, too skinny. Absolutely NONE of the comments were helpful.

I've probably been the PITA in all the stories told above at some point! Still messed up with food but never ever pass judgement on anyone else's choices and never talk about my own food anymore.

Any comments either way can really affect people.

But to get back to the PP, people are being deliberately obtuse, pretending not to understand. You ARE the people she is talking about, and you are insufferable.

I am also a slow eater and get really pissed off if anyone mentions my weight, how much I eat, or how slowly I eat. I'm perfectly healthy and it's no-ones goddamn business.

However - I think what was annoying op IS the performative nature of it. It's one thing to sit there eating slowly and minding your own business, but spending the entire meal exclaiming how little you need to eat sounds tedious and annoying. I'd be annoyed by them. Also, I don't think OP publicly chided them! I mean, unless you count this totally anonymous post.

A friend asked me to meet her for lunch last month. We met at the pub near her house. I ordered fish and chips. She said she wasn’t hungry and had a coffee. No big deal. I didn’t interrogate her or force her to eat more. She didn’t go on and on about how food would make her stuffed, how on earth could I eat so much etc.

We respected each other’s eating needs and caught up on life and had a great chat. And didn’t have boring conversations about portions or calories or being stuffed.

Thus the ‘performance’ element was missing.

Can those who are having trouble comprehending see the difference?

I used to visit a lady in a care role. She was super skinny and had been all her life. She still lived with her husband - I would cook for them both and he would immediately start with the 'oooh, you're putting away, love', 'god, you're really getting stuck into that', 'blimey I'll have to carry you to the sofa', 'go on, keep guzzling it down' etc. to the point she would give up and he'd eat what she'd left. I bet he'd done that to her her entire life. I ended up taking her out to eat...without his bullying she had no trouble polishing off cafe/pub portions.