Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to think you should feed guests if you've invited them

386 replies

Lizziebest · 02/12/2023 14:52

Visiting in laws today on a planned visit initiated by them. ILs are a bit odd about food and seem to eat tiny portions only in allocated slots e.g don't do lunch but breakfast at 7am and dinner at 6pm with coffees in between. When I've mentioned this being odd in the past they offer the thinnest sandwich I've ever seen so have given up trying to explain I think this is bonkers.

Usually I manage this by eating a lot before going but with a toddler and a baby I didn't eat any breakfast this morning. DH prepared all of the toddlers lunch and I didn't ask him to pack me anything. We arrived at 2. I'm starving. DH doesn't think this is weird and doesn't eat a lot himself but is happy to buy me food before and after. Sorely tempted to eat the left overs from toddlers fruit lunch and snacks.

Is it rude to pop out to the high street eat something and come back.

Aibu to think you feed people who you invite over?

I'm also breastfeeding!!

OP posts:
FinghateXmasThisYr · 02/12/2023 17:06

Visitors at 2/3pm would be offered tea or coffee with biscuits or cake if I'd made one. I'd have thought you'd have already had your lunch tbh.

ChocolateCinderToffee · 02/12/2023 17:06

I was once invited to stay for four days with a couple in the holiday home they'd rented. My god. They had this weird eating pattern, nothing for breakfast, a large lunch, no dinner. I suspect one of them was diabetic though it didn't stop them from downing a bottle of wine at lunchtime. They hadn't warned me about this either, just more or less expected me to do as they did. At the end of the third day I cracked and went to the village shop for crisps.

WinterDeWinter · 02/12/2023 17:06

PuppyMonkey · 02/12/2023 16:57

This is fascinating - so you’ve gone for a visit at the requested time of 2pm and you’re on MN while sitting there with them? And then you’ve gone out to buy food and eaten some food on the street? What did they say about you going out? It’s all very weird frankly!?

It’s all very weird because they made it weird by not offering a snack and have form for punishing hunger in women.

I would have called it out in my cheerful big-boned way, but I appreciate that others are socialised to accept this controlling madness.

Original poster
Lizziebest · 02/12/2023 17:07

Businessflake · 02/12/2023 16:07

This is totally on you today OP. Who arrives at 2pm expecting to be given lunch? It’s not their fault you didn’t eat breakfast or lunch.

Will read more replies later but honestly I wasn't expecting lunch maybe a banana and a tea? But equally I could have packed myself a banana and made a mistake not to. I guess with the hunger sometimes only when you stop do you realise crap I'm actually starving.

Also, I would have been happy to pop in to kitchen (if this was deemed acceptable) and make myself something, anything, taken something from fruit bowl I wasn't expecting the red carpet rolled out.

OP posts:
Vegemiteandhoneyontoast · 02/12/2023 17:07

We had OH's cousin visit this afternoon so I made a stack of sausage rolls to go with tea, as we've no cake or biscuits in. It was lovely to see the glint in the cousin's eye when he saw them. They were bloody delicious, all hot and flaky. We ate the lot 😁

Bestwheatenbreadever · 02/12/2023 17:09

Punkkitty · 02/12/2023 15:44

Anyone coming to my home has drink/ tea/coffee/light bite like small sandwich/wheaten bread/sausage roll and then biscuits/buns/cake made automatically and put in front of them regardless of time of day.

I’m Irish though and my mother would disown me if she thought for a second I did not do this. Completely standard for me.

I didn't need to read past 'wheaten bread' to know you were Irish.
I recently had the pleasure of directing some American tourists in a cafe in Belfast to a bakery that does the BEST wheaten. They loved the stuff.

FrenchBoule · 02/12/2023 17:10

Fuck inlaws and their weird habits.

OP, eat at the front of them,they are rude to not to offer you anything.Tight as duck’s arse misers

For all these people umming and ahhing about arrival times.

I can’t imagine family arriving and to not offer them anything to eat, especially if there’s woman who’s breastfeeding,that’s regardless of arrival time.

„Have you eaten yet” would be followed by preparing food.

How the hell can you justify not feeding the family?

RampantIvy · 02/12/2023 17:10

SiennaMillar · 02/12/2023 14:59

YANBU. I went on hols with ILs. They eat breakfast at 8am and dinner at 10pm. NOTHING in between and no shops. I was dizzy with hunger! I had to steal stuff from the breakfast buffet to save for lunch

Why didn't you just go out and buy some lunch? There is no way I would martyr myself on holiday and go without food just because I am on holiday with someone with different eating habits to me.

@Lizziebest I wouldn't feel self conscious about eating food I had bought in front of them. If it embarrasses them then serve them right for being so inhospitable.

TBH if guests turned up at 2.15 I would assume that they had had lunch unless they had driven a long way. Nevertheless I would still ask if they wanted something to eat.

Ladymarycrawley1920 · 02/12/2023 17:13

Guests are always offered food and drink in my house, no matter the time of day or night! But I come from a family of feeders. None of us are overweight though, we just like to make sure that guests have everything they might need or want.

WhichIsItWendy · 02/12/2023 17:13

YABU. Your family have strange manners if they think you need to offer meals to people at 2pm. Why would the average person want to eat at 2pm when they've just had lunch?

You skipped lunch then expected in laws to feed you. YABU.

Notimeforaname · 02/12/2023 17:14

have eaten a panini and a packet of crisp and a banana (in the street)

I've also popped in to sainsburys and bought 2 full bags of food and snacks

I've got enough to keep me going until and after the tiny dinner.

Thats a hell of a lot of food to me. Way more than anyone needs over a period of a few hours, breastfeeding or not.

Coconutter24 · 02/12/2023 17:16

Lizziebest · 02/12/2023 14:58

Yes you're right. My sister said the same when I text her. There's such a weird vibe around eating previously I've had to secretly eat while feeding the baby and hidden wrappers in my pockets.

Maybe I feel weird about it because they are v thin and I'm not.

Show quote history

This sounds like a you problem if I’m honest. You know their eating habits so know they won’t be eating around the time you are there. It is odd that nothing even a biscuit was offered with a cup of tea or something. You arrived after lunch, was they expecting you to stay till tea or did you leave before this? You are breast feeding and know you missed breakfast so snacks etc you should have got for yourself or asked husband to pack if you were busy.

Inertia · 02/12/2023 17:17

It’s rude of them not to offer food, especially a breastfeeding mother.

It’s insanity to be a breastfeeding mother and deliberately skip breakfast, lunch and the offer of food on the journey knowing that you’re visiting people with weird food issues.

To be fair to your husband he’s given you at least 2 chances to eat.

So you’d have been late - so what? It’s not as though dinner would have spoiled!

Notimeforaname · 02/12/2023 17:18

Also, I would have been happy to pop in to kitchen (if this was deemed acceptable)
They have told you its unacceptable to go into the kitchen or have any food??
Or are you just presuming this because of an "unspoken vibe", if the latter, just bloody ask them.

Zanatdy · 02/12/2023 17:18

I’d always feed guests if arriving at a meal time, 2pm I’d have assumed they’d have eaten. Can’t you ask for a sandwich or piece of toast in future?

Original poster
Lizziebest · 02/12/2023 17:19

Loulou599 · 02/12/2023 16:55

This is insane. So you ate a panini, a bag of crisps and a banana and also bought 2 full bags of other food, all to survive a couple or hours at your in laws?

I don't think your in-laws are the ones with a food problem

Yes would you like to know what I bought?

Not all to be eaten now.

A multipack kiddylicious veg sticks
Multi pack walkers cheese and onion
Bananas
Grapes
Bag of easy peelers
Some breakfast bar things
Hobnobs
Fanta
Sandwich

The comments from lots of mums about always having something available were helpful so going to put some bits in the nappy bag, some in pram pocket etc.

If anyone is interested MIL sighed when she realized id been out to shops.

Whoever said eating is seen as a sign of moral laxity was right I think.

OP posts:
quizmasterr · 02/12/2023 17:20

OP I do think this is on you as well. They say may have got away from you, as you put it, but why is that your IL's fault especially when your DH even offered to stop at McD's on the way? Sorry but you sound a bit ridiculous.

I think sometimes doing more than one thing can be too much such as going to soft play and your in laws.

For the record my in laws rarely feed us even though they live a 3 hour drive away so we've always eaten before we get there or we order a takeaway for all of us.

Loulou599 · 02/12/2023 17:20

But you wouldn't have been happy with a biscuit or something out of the fruit bowl as you went to the supermarket, ate a lunch and then proceeded to do a food shop. Why did your kids need buying for btw, I thought you said your husband gave them lunch?

wineoclock90 · 02/12/2023 17:22

Loulou599 · 02/12/2023 16:55

This is insane. So you ate a panini, a bag of crisps and a banana and also bought 2 full bags of other food, all to survive a couple or hours at your in laws?

I don't think your in-laws are the ones with a food problem

Have you ever breastfed? Totally normal. I would eat that or more.

burnoutbabe · 02/12/2023 17:23

PuppyMonkey · 02/12/2023 16:57

This is fascinating - so you’ve gone for a visit at the requested time of 2pm and you’re on MN while sitting there with them? And then you’ve gone out to buy food and eaten some food on the street? What did they say about you going out? It’s all very weird frankly!?

This

Surely it's far ruder to arrive at 2pm then you leave for a few hours than arrive 10 mins late having eaten at McDonalds and blame baby for delay.

Scirocco · 02/12/2023 17:23

I'd always offer a guest a cup of tea/coffee and a snack. Unless I don't like them.

Lilithlogic · 02/12/2023 17:24

Behindyouiam · 02/12/2023 15:16

Snap!

Show quote history

Snap x 2, hate the thought of anyone being hungry in my home, like my Grandparents and mum the least offered is always a brew and a biscuit. It just feels like good manners.

Canonlythinkofthisone · 02/12/2023 17:28

My parents are a bit like this.
But, I know I won't get fed if I take my little one for a lunch time visit so I either get something on the way there, or on the way back. It's just one of their (many) quirks.
More annoying in the past when they'd say they'd do X for dinner, and then wouldn't.

Pluvia · 02/12/2023 17:29

Notimeforaname · 02/12/2023 17:14

have eaten a panini and a packet of crisp and a banana (in the street)

I've also popped in to sainsburys and bought 2 full bags of food and snacks

I've got enough to keep me going until and after the tiny dinner.

Thats a hell of a lot of food to me. Way more than anyone needs over a period of a few hours, breastfeeding or not.

Oh, look — one of the virtuous non-eaters has arrived. Good for you that you can live on fresh air and the occasional green smoothie. The rest of us need to eat.

Notimeforaname · 02/12/2023 17:30

I think it's more odd to leave the place you're visiting to buy food and eat in secret than its is to say, "Is it ok to grab a piece of fruit/bread, a biscuit/cup of tea please"? And If they said no..then fine, theyre freaks, you go out and get food.

But to not even ask and then go eat in secret while wondering how they will judge you, sounds like your problem rather than theirs.