Is husband right that I need psychological help? (Won’t eat outside of home)

[Melessah]

When I was 19 I had a very traumatic experience. I found half a mouse in a ready meal I had bought from a supermarket. It was in a curry. I created a post on twitter and a couple of papers actually picked up the story.

if was obviously very upsetting. I was a university student at the time living off ready meals. After that experience I refused to eat from restaurants, takeaways or supermarkets. I won’t even eat crisps. Everything I eat needs to be 100% “safe”.

Everything I eat is home cooked. I would never buy a ready meal again. I don’t even buy bread from a supermarket. I eat potatoes as my main carb. I eat a lot of eggs (from my mum’s chickens).

Husband obviously knew what he was signing up for when he married me. I do not see myself ever letting my guard down.

Anyway, we were on holiday and he really lost his cool with me. I was eating fruit and boiled eggs and he told me I need help. And that he was getting tired by my the restrictions I place on myself and therefore him.

I have spoken to a psychologist but it didn’t help. I don’t want to be like this. Who is the one that is being unreasonable

YABU and your husband is right. You need help.
This is completely out of proportion to the original incident and it's extremely restrictive and it's having an affect on your DH too.
I know you said he knew what he was getting in to but he probably didn't realize just how bad it was going to be, how long it would go on for and how he'd feel about it a few years down the line when there was no sign of improvement.

You need to get help for both your sakes.

@Melessah you’ve now posted multiple times repeating how this affects you.

Can you post more about the kind of therapy or counselling or whatever it was that you got?

I’m going to be honest with you - if you want to have children then make that your aim - because it’s not just about making baby food. You could cause disorders eating in any children you have or could severely restrict their normal lives. You couldn’t but but impose this on them and believe me, that wouldn’t be a barrel of laughs for them.

I have seen a psychiatrist and OCD has not been mentioned.

Unless you are a psychiatrist it’s highly inappropriate for you to diagnose me.

Sounds really traumatic OP and it's not surprising to have had that sort of reaction.

I think it's about reconciling the irrational side of your mind with the logical truth - which is that it is very, VERY unusual to find a mouse in your food.

Obviously it happened to you and that is horrendous, but the chances are still extremely tiny. The chances of it happening twice to one person must be astronomically small.

Maybe you could work on some kind of compromise - e.g. you might never eat a ready meal again, but eating at a restaurant with an excellent hygiene rating might be 'safe'?

I can also understand your husband finding it difficult as wanting to eat at a restaurant is normal and it's quite limiting not ot be able to.

Are there any small steps you think you might be able to start with? Just one thing you don't eat now that you could start eating, and go from there? Maybe your husband could support you with small steps?

Honestly if this is the case, maybe you are being a little unreasonable.

I don't deny that must have been a horrible experience but for most people it would mean just giving up ready meals - most of us have some foods we go off after a bad experience (not necessarily mouse related).

But you say you want to be able to experience those things with your husband. Maybe he lost his temper with you and wasn't as kind as he should have been. But if you want to change, you probably do need some real psychological help. This is not being said in a horrible way. This is being said because you need someone trained properly in the kind of therapy that will help you - I don't pretend to know what that is, but you clearly want and need someone who is experienced with severe food aversion.

Remember no one is going to make you switch to UPF foods for 100% of your eating! But your life is so limited, food can be such a joy!

I wish you lots of luck.

I don’t think you’re being unreasonable OP. If your husband has a problem with your eating habits, then a good time to mention it would have been before he married you. I don’t see a problem with not wanting to eat food that has been prepared by God knows who, with who knows what level of hygiene. I do know that the amount of conversations I heard about handwashing during covid, in which the concept was discussed like it was some sort of novel discovery, was nothing short of alarming. The first time I saw Gordon Ramsey on tv back in the day, he was berating a member of staff because they were about to take a plate of food to the customer without having cleaned the rim of the plate. He then spat on to a tea towel and proceeded to use it to wipe the plate. Lovely. The things I see people do on tv really makes me wonder what they do behind the scenes when no one’s looking.

I was making a sandwich once and a family friend said that if I saw the inside of a bread factory, I’d never eat anything from a bakery again. Thankfully, he didn’t go into too much detail, so I could eat my sarnie in wilful ignorance.

Your diet sounds fine to me and I think you can survive without the likes of crisps, fish and chips, ice cream and any of the other crap that passes for food these days. Presumably, your husband was fine with you not eating out when you were dating. Why is he expecting you to change now?

By ill I meant properly ill - campylobacter, listeria, e.coli etc which could kill you. Not being sick with revulsion which isn’t nice but in the grand scheme of things not that bad. Interesting that you chose to pull me up on that point in my post and ignore the rest.

No, it being in the media doesn't signify how dangerous it was, just how revolting and also rare an occurrance it was.

Things that happen daily don't show up in newspapers really, they're not news.

Being ill because you were disgusted is not the same, and I really really hope you understand this as its pretty important, as being sick because you've got ecoli or hantavirus or... whatever!

I'll throw up simply because someone else in my view has thrown up, that doesn't mean I am sick myself! I've puked because DP hasn't flicked channels fast enough on a messy or gross food related task on Taskmaster... I have no infection or disease (just a stupid brain!).

ARFID is shit to live with - I live with it, mine has far more complex causes that are much harder to unpick but I am working on it and have developed a range of safe foods so I can eat when out of the house so its not negatively affecting my partners life.

Did anyone discuss ARFID with you?

when I was a child I found half a wasp in the pith at the bottom of freshly squeezed juice.
i cannot drink anything with bits in now, but it is very specific so not remotely life limiting
I can understand your fear, but you really need help putting this in to perspective

But you've asked if you need psychological help - surely that implies that you KNOW you have a condition! And someone else upthread suggested OCD too - I'm sorry if it offends you but this IS what it sounds like.

Of course he's right. You can't live your whole life like this.

If you never want to eat ready meals fair enough, they're crap and unhealthy anyway. But you're not going to get bits of rodents in a restaurant meal - that happens (very rarely) in factories, where they get into the machinery and no actual person is looking very closely. It's not going to happen in any half-decent restaurant where the food is kept in airtight containers before cooking and the chef actually looks at it.

If therapists can't help you, you need to help yourself. Go to a nice restaurant, order something you like, and eat it. Repeat, at least once a month. Date night! Make yourself get over it.

If I were you I’d see a new psychiatrist, because this is classic contamination OCD. I’m a clinical psychologist with lived experience of OCD (divorced).

I’ve had the following treatments:

Focal psychodynamic therapy
EMDR
TF-CBT

I do make progress (slowly) but eventually return back to where I started

I spoke to a psychiatrist monthly for the better part of 18 months. Did nothing. We tried a few medications but it didn’t really overly help. The side effects (brain fog, physical exhaustion) were always too much for me.

You do not have nearly enough information to say that. Very unprofessional

You are being massively unreasonable and I’m not surprised your dh is fed up.

It sounds like you’ve developed a food phobia by avoiding certain food sources for a long time, as with any phobia to get over it you need to gradually expose your self to these fears.

CBT would be very helpful.

Sounds exhausting for everyone involved, I can’t imagine how much time you must spend cooking! . I know you have tried before but you need to try again to sort this out. Have you seen a eating disorder specialist?
As well as potential children , who could not be expected to eat like you - it would be incredibly damaging. Another reason to sort this problem is a hospital stay or care in old age. What if you were in a situation where you could not prepare your own food? Carers or hospital staff cannot accommodate this . Please try again to resolve this before a tricky situation leaves you very hungry! Good luck

I have the information from the thread. If you don’t want suggestions, don’t start a MN thread.

This is definitely something you need to resolve before you have kids

Does your DH make his own meals? Is he allowed to have food in the house that you wouldn’t eat?

You've said it yourself, OP. You can't live like this, and you shouldn't. I hope you can get some help with this that actually works.

I dont think you want to change. Yes it was traumatic but do you actually want to change?

The answer to concerns about bad hygiene in kitchens is to only go to restaurants with high hygiene ratings
OP I'm sorry you had such a traumatic experience but the restrictions you now have sound miserable. Not being able to eat out while on holiday must be affecting your enjoyment of your holiday and obviously it is affecting your husband's.
I think you should get some counselling because if you have children your eating disorder is only going to get worse and it will negatively affect them

Why are you so resistant to suggestions of OCD? Is it in your family or friendship group and you are thinking 'I'm not THAT bad'? Because it's just another condition, there's no stigma attached to it.

Why are you reacting badly to the suggestion you have OCD rather than considering it as a possibility given that you say you've seen 7 different professionals, none of them have been effective and none of them have mentioned OCD? What are you looking for from this thread OP? Many people lose tolerance for quirks they once found bearable - charming even - in a partner once the first years of the honeymoon period has worn off. What are you hoping to hear from MN?