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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Ungrateful breakfast

306 replies

Jckf · 26/01/2024 10:40

Name changed as I’ve mentioned it to a couple of people. I don’t know DPs Mum massively yet as we haven’t been together long, she’s come up to our city to visit and is staying at my house along with DP as I have a spare room.

Last night before bed she asked me if I wanted a hot breakfast making before work, I told her no thanks I will just have my usual weetabix. Woke up this morning to her at my door with breakfast… a weetabix with two poached eggs on top (no milk). I couldn’t bring myself to eat it because it looked disgusting. DP said don’t worry I will tell her you don’t like eggs on a morning and you can have your normal breakfast and took it downstairs. 5 minutes later she reappeared, two weetabix with crème fraiche and raisins. Again, vile. I just wanted weetabix with some milk in the microwave.

I don’t know her well enough to ask her to not fuck about with my breakfast and I want her to feel comfortable in my house, but I’m at work now and starving because I ended up leaving without eating. I do want DP to comment to her that I had said last night I didn’t want her making me breakfast. He just thinks it’s funny and started telling me the crap combinations they suffered as kids.

AIBU in wanting DP to nip this in the bud now or should I laugh along?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
7
StrawberryJellyBelly · 26/01/2024 15:34

femfemlicious · 26/01/2024 10:55

Making people food is her love language. Why not tell her how you want it made.

That’s what I’d do.

MrsTwatInAHat · 26/01/2024 15:35

This kind of thing is never good and I don’t see why you should pander to it just because someone is older. Having to do something for someone whether they want you to or not, ignoring what they said and wasting their food is rude and needy. If she’d brought you a present you don’t like much, of course yes you’d be polite then, but not deciding to cook weird food, against your wishes, using your stuff. Why did she ask if she was going to ignore you? If she’s trying to show she’s grateful, she’s being extremely clueless and/or overbearing.

if she has dementia then I’d be forgiving of course, but otherwise I’d have to say quite firmly “Please don’t make me any food, I don’t want you to.”

I do have a very overbearing and needy mother though so I may be extra sensitive, but I’d hate this so much.

Begsthequestion · 26/01/2024 15:35

RampantIvy · 26/01/2024 11:30

this is hugely passive aggressive.

I disagree. I feel that this phrase is overused a lot on mumsnet.

I think she is probably trying too hard and failing spectacularly to endear herself to the OP. I agree that it is an odd combination though.

In my case I would eat the eggs and leave the weetabix which, IMO, is disgusting. When milk is added it just becomes a soggy cardboard mess.

If you really wanted to please someone, why wouldn't you make them the food they wanted?

Why make them something they haven't said they wanted, twice?

Begsthequestion · 26/01/2024 15:39

MollyMumkma · 26/01/2024 15:11

My goodness, all this fuss (plus the f word) over a couple of eggs. Just eat them and be quiet.

Are you this timid in other areas of your life or just in your own home?

AppropriateAdult · 26/01/2024 15:42

I think that, like Penis Beaker and Crying at the Sistine Chapel, Poached Eggs on Weetabix may become one of those shibboleths that future Mumsnetters use to prove how long they've been around...

TommyNever · 26/01/2024 15:48

Looks tasty enough to me.

Ungrateful breakfast
NeedToChangeName · 26/01/2024 15:50

LondonLass91 · 26/01/2024 12:37

Just say thank you, smile and eat some of it. It is what I tell my children to do if they are at someone's house and the don't like the food. It's your 'partner's' mum, so of course you should be polite and respectful.

Yes and No

If I come to your house and you make me a ham sandwich, I'll swallow it down as best I can without retching

If you offer me a ham sandwich and I say No thanks, then I'm not eating it

If you offer my children a ham sandwich and they say No thanks, I wouldn't force them to eat it

Original poster
Jckf · 26/01/2024 15:51

There is a lot more replies than I expected!

Everyone is English, no specific cultural expectations or anything.

Been with DP 7 months, he owns a 1 bed flat that’s a studio so she would have needed to book a hotel, I have a 3 bed house so plenty of space for everyone, it’s only 3 nights.

I didn’t get up and feed my guest already because it was 6:10am, I assumed she was still asleep, she’s DPs Mum and is here to spend the time with him - he took her out for breakfast after I had left for work, and I wouldn’t be making her breakfast when he has the day off and I don’t.

I don’t even think the eggs were runny so would have been very dry. I didn’t laugh it off in front of her because in the past DP has made comments about her lack of sense of humour/taking things personally.

Apparently they had beans with everything as kids, Sunday dinner, steak pie, stir fry! DP has got some more crème fraiche for me whilst out and told her that I plan my meals so to ask before using anything that hasn’t been specifically mentioned as free to take. I don’t think any aggression was behind it, I get the impression she lives off of easy oven food so was maybe trying to be creative. Last night I made a lasagne from scratch and she was amazed that I knew how rather than buying a ready made one.

OP posts:
BirthdayRainbow · 26/01/2024 15:57

It's amazing ho many people who are sensitive are also quite forceful in their actions that annoy others.

Can dish out but not take..

Emotionalsupportviper · 26/01/2024 15:58

Resilience · 26/01/2024 13:20

The big question here is how OP's DP views his mother. Presumably the relationship is good if he sees her regularly, has invited her over and is happy to introduce her to the OP (if not, then OP has a DP problem not a would-be-MIL problem).

On that basis, I'd find this rather sweet if annoying in terms of food waste. I'd interpret it as her trying to do something nice for you to get you to like her. As a guest in your home she may see it as a way of repaying your hospitality.

I'd simply say, "Thank you so much for thinking of me and going to the trouble to do this. I'm very particular about how I like my breakfast though, so I'm very sorry but I can't eat that. Please don't worry about sorting something else out. I find it uncomfortable eating breakfast in bed anyway so I will come down and get my own shortly. Feel free to help yourself to it!"

If she then persists, you can be a bit more direct, maybe mentioning the food waste angle.

There are steps before a show down is required.

Years ago, I went for dinner at a BFs house to meet his mum and his mum served me a plate with a whole boiled leek on it, a large field mushroom and a fried egg! She was utterly batshit but I was very fond of her.

his mum served me a plate with a whole boiled leek on it

Guessing she was either Welsh or from the North East . . .

theDudesmummy · 26/01/2024 16:03

I'd love a boiled leek with eggs!

TommyNever · 26/01/2024 16:06

It was Margaret Thatcher's favourite breakfast, often shared with her twin sister, Marjory.

Ungrateful breakfast
TommyNever · 26/01/2024 16:07

TommyNever · 26/01/2024 16:06

It was Margaret Thatcher's favourite breakfast, often shared with her twin sister, Marjory.

Damn, Mumsnet cropped the weetabix out of that picture.

diddl · 26/01/2024 16:10

Last night I made a lasagne from scratch and she was amazed that I knew how rather than buying a ready made one.

That's weird!

To think that others can't/don't just because you can't/don't!

spotddog · 26/01/2024 16:18

OP, please come back to let us know what you had for dinner and tomorrow's breakfast.

Original poster
Jckf · 26/01/2024 16:21

I’m making dinner so that isn’t a concern! I will suggest DP gets up at 5am to beat her to making breakfast. Or I might tell her I eat after my run so please don’t make me anything because it will go to waste - and then have a bacon sandwich on the way!

OP posts:
MotherOfHouseplants · 26/01/2024 16:25

Maybe she is on Slimming World? My MIL used to do unspeakable things with Weetabix during her SW phase (she once made a ‘cheesecake’ with a Weetabix base) and would proudly declare that she ‘didn’t have to syn it’ because it was her ‘hex b’. It’s a fucking cult.

DryRotter · 26/01/2024 16:26

The best thing you could have done, was just make some fresh weetabix with milk, the way you like it and eat it and then go to work. That way she would have seen that you only wanted to eat it one way and you might not have been ‘starving’ at work.

No need for the martyr act. Why do people on Mumsnet make things so complicated.

femfemlicious · 26/01/2024 16:33

5128gap · 26/01/2024 13:31

I'm not sure how serious you are? Because to me this is just an example of dealing with a person's well-meaning eccentricities, that while slightly annoying, is harmless and not worth creating a fuss about. If it were me I'd just tell her I'd rather get my own breakfast and (given she clearly want to do something for you) add "but it would be lovely if you could peal some veg for dinner/load the dishwasher/pop out for some creme fraiche.."

Thank you. This is how you deal with family. They are always so quick to ultimatums here. Why be immediately hard on her?

wronginalltherightways · 26/01/2024 16:34

hoarahloux · 26/01/2024 10:46

"Vile" 🙄

I'd have found both options presented to me vile, tbh. Some people are very sensitive about food combinations and textures.

2jacqi · 26/01/2024 16:39

@Jckf omg! what kind of weird concoction is that??? weetabix and poached eggs on top???? 😁😃😁

DryRotter · 26/01/2024 16:46

The title makes me think of sulky sausages, moody mushrooms and huffy hash browns who are refusing to say thank you.

kkloo · 26/01/2024 16:48

Presumably she thinks weetabix are some kind of weird cracker?

Surprised at the comments about microwaved weetabix, it's a yum hot breakfast like porridge.

FictionalCharacter · 26/01/2024 16:58

MrsTwatInAHat · 26/01/2024 15:35

This kind of thing is never good and I don’t see why you should pander to it just because someone is older. Having to do something for someone whether they want you to or not, ignoring what they said and wasting their food is rude and needy. If she’d brought you a present you don’t like much, of course yes you’d be polite then, but not deciding to cook weird food, against your wishes, using your stuff. Why did she ask if she was going to ignore you? If she’s trying to show she’s grateful, she’s being extremely clueless and/or overbearing.

if she has dementia then I’d be forgiving of course, but otherwise I’d have to say quite firmly “Please don’t make me any food, I don’t want you to.”

I do have a very overbearing and needy mother though so I may be extra sensitive, but I’d hate this so much.

I agree. As always we’re seeing lots of “aw, she’s trying to be nice” but doing something that someone has explicitly said they don’t want isn’t kind or nice.

As a guest I’d never think it was OK to go into the host’s kitchen and cook something with their food, unless we’d agreed that I would do that.

JanglingJack · 26/01/2024 17:05

TommyNever · 26/01/2024 15:48

Looks tasty enough to me.

🤣

Who wouldn't?!

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