To wish my relative would stop harping on about portion sizes

[Averagesizedsalad]

I have a relative who is doing my head in with their repeated "Oh I'm so teeny tiny, oh this is so much food however will i manage" dramas. I need to rant before I explode! Share with me your infuriating virtue signalling teeny tiny stories? Maybe I am just extra cranky because I am HUNGRY everytime I see them because I'm breastfeeding 🤷‍♀️

Said relatives recent examples:

• When served a totally average sized salad for lunch, lamented "Oh this is so large, however will I have room for dinner later? I shall have to skip dinner, this salad will keep me full until morning" (I WISH I was joking, but alas I am not)

• Recently cooked a meal of pasta for lunch, in which I could count the number of pasta pieces on one hand. Of course accompanied by "Oh what a large meal, I shan't want dinner later at all!" It equated to about 1 normal sized portion of pasta dish split between 2 people, so fair enough that might be considered a light lunch if you're expecting a big dinner later, but not so much food that you wouldn't need to eat later on!

• Lamented that after having a normal sized slice of cake at a party that they were "Being sooooo naughty and would need to go on a big diet afterwards". It's a single slice of cake at a birthday party for goodness sake! You're not eating 1/4 of a cake everyday for dessert!

Obligatory: relative doesn't suffer from any health issues that might result in a small appetite blah blah blah. They are just insufferable and enjoy attention.

Thanks for listening to a hungry lactating mother complain after having about 10 curls (pieces? Squirls? What is the correct term here??) of pasta for "Lunch"

With a doughnut the other half of the ring is literally an extra 2 or 3 bites so why not just eat the thing? I don't usually bother much with cakes in work but i find it really off putting seeing half a doughnut sitting there. I think people who do this would normally consume the entire portion. If eating at home but don't want to be seen as greedy in public. It's nit greedy ti consume a portion size intended for one.

My MIL was a tiny tiny woman who ate nothing but there was never a performance about it.

If someone asked her, genuinely concerned, she would explain that she was brought up that way and these days, it was just what she was used to.

If someone commented on what she ate in any other manner, she would look at them and say "and it's got what to do with you? Fuck off!".

Always funny from a little old lady.

And heaven help anyone who told a child that food would make them fat etc around her. She would give them hell.

If I was putting the cakes out after church to serve with coffee, I’d often cut things like donuts in half before serving.. that way no one needed to comment and people could have one / two / three pieces as they wanted.. we had toddlers to elderly folk who all might want less, plus it was usually quite close to lunchtime 🤷‍♀️

That's sounds annoying, but how old is the relative? Older people eat much less and my mum always worried about having too much food. It was a bit annoying but I just tried to accommodate and listen.

I’ve got one of these
oh my goodness,2 burgers I can’t eat that ,I’d be massively fat .

I think ,as I am massively fat ,said relative just says such statements to make me feel crap ..

No it wasn't that. It was competitive, each woman wanted to be the one who ate the least. They would then try to shame each other with I couldn't manage that!!! The portions were already half according to the recipe so in fact I was serving half a slice, a quarter of a slice, an eighth of a slice etc. It was truly depressing to observe. Thanks for your helpful comment though.

I have a friend like this. Every meal out is a running commentary about portions and how she won’t need dinner. She used to irritate the arse of me, until I met her mother. Then it all became crystal clear.

Her mother was rake thin, smoked like a chimney and already had bone problems in her 60s (which she was strangely proud of as it proved how delicate she was) but she was vicious about other women’s food intake. Described her own (gorgeous 6ft tall) daughter as “lumpen” and “bovine”. On my friend’s wedding day, she came down in her dress and looked absolutely stunningly beautiful. Her mother’s first words were that it was a shame she hadn’t slimmed down and she didn’t really deserve such a nice dress at her size. I could have wrung her neck as I watched my beautiful friend’s eyes well up.

So now I am far more forgiving. It’s deep down learned behaviour. And I have also noticed that it’s virtually stopped since she stopped visiting her mother so much.

No it wasn't that. It was competitive, each woman wanted to be the one who ate the least. They would then try to shame each other with I couldn't manage that!!! The portions were already half according to the recipe so in fact I was serving half a slice, a quarter of a slice, an eighth of a slice etc. It was truly depressing to observe. Thanks for your helpful comment though, really amusing.

This is disgusting. my mother has said similar, but even she would not do this on a wedding day. How fucking horrible. Why are we women so awful to each other?!

Sadly, they have disordered eating. Feel bad for them and otherwise ignore.

That's unforgivable.

My mum can't eat a piece of cake or a cream cake etc without commenting that she shouldn't eat it....I've asked her to
a. Refuse it
b. Eat it and enjoy it without the comments

When we used to go for dinner, we'd get 1 potato, a small amount of veg and a slice of meat....nope!!!

The young people at my work, far from any performance under-eating, ate all day- from bowls of cereal in the morning, to chocolate, pasties, cakes, biscuits, revolting smelly things in plastic pots, toast; it was never ending.
They were all not fat, and saw nothing odd in the quantities eaten.

They would simply have laughed at your "portion queen" relative, and ignored her.

I agree about cheap cakes, they're not hard to resist. Some of them have a slimy texture. You can feel rather than taste the sliminess. But if you say no thanks people might think you're a bore, depriving yourself, performatively!

Like @nancyjoan though, I'm saying this on this thread, in real life I just leave what I don't want, or just smile. I don't get in to conversations about what I'm probably going to end up leaving uneaten on the plate.

Former mil and sil are like this. Neither are slim either.

The fact you think it is about greed is really telling. If someone eats half a doughnut it doesn’t mean they are judging you for being greedy for eating a whole one. It just means they….only want half a doughnut.

There are quite a few posts on this thread that have tipped over from being about performative undereating (which I 100% agree is a thing and is both annoying and harmful) to posters just judging other people for eating less than them.

My mum does this. Refers to normal portions as ‘huge’, judges people for eating them, talks about overweight people as ‘colossal’.

My sibling died from complications of anorexia.

If you don’t spend the whole meal banging on about it, you’re golden. Loads of people don’t eat that much. It’s not having a small appetite that’s annoying, it’s making a big humblebragging fuss about it that gets people’s backs up.

When I was with ex we had a friend whose wife would do this when we were all out at dinner. Still cherish the memory of SIL snapping at her to shut up and order so we could eat.

People, especially women, know exactly what calories they are eating/what portions they are eating and they should be left to get on with it.

Men don't face this sort of censure, not ever.

I think your posts are, as usual, wanting to say far more, be far more jibing, but you stay just on the side where you won't be called on it. I clock them though and I expect others do too.

Obesogenic society was coined by somebody like you, wanting a stick to bash people with. We have a completely messed up society of which, obesity is a factor. This thread wasn't about that though and we don't need a spokesperson, thanks.

She sounds like an absolute LEGEND 🤣

But if you say no thanks people might think you're a bore, depriving yourself, performatively!

"No thank you" is not performative. Here is how my aunt performatively refused a cake at my daughter's second birthday.

Me: "OK, I'm cutting the cake."

Aunt: "Oh none for me, thank you."

Me: "OK. Uncle?"

Aunt: "I mean, we already had so much food already."

Me: "No problem. Uncle, can I offer you some cake?"

Aunt: "There was just so much! All those sandwiches, the vegetables, we already had biscuits too, don't you think that's quite a lot? I couldn't eat any cake after all that.

Me: "Uncle, would you like some birthday cake?"

Aunt: "I just couldn't, it's so much. Did you make it? All that cream, and jam too? It's so much, we already ate..."

Obviously this is the point where I should have slammed the cake in her face. "Not for me, thank you" is fine!

I am really sorry to hear about your sibling, what an awful bloody disease that is.

I doubt your mum sees any parallel with her behaviour.

I honestly don't understand why people can't just shut up when it comes to what other people are eating. Nothing they could say is going to change it and it's solely for their own benefit/weak egos. They do though, sadly, have agency over their children and can wreak any amount of pain and suffering. All done under the guise of 'caring'.

I clock them though and I expect others do too.

Of course. It's a bloody klaxon.

To be honest, I would quite enjoy this opportunity to ramp up the fuss to the next level and give her ridiculously tiny portions.

So wait for her to say her totally normal portion is “enormous!” and apologetically whip out a tupperware and offer to decant some of it, ask her how much she thinks she can eat- this much? A bit less? Keep going?

Silly woman.

I suppose the only caveat is if she has an actual eating disorder in which case better to be kind. But if she’s just being a performative arse, give her the performance she’s asking for!!