In laws with tiny stomachs

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Staying with in-laws (aged in late 60s). We are a normal healthy family with normal appetites (I think?). I am sick of having to "request" 3 meals a day. As far as I can work out they generally must eat a cup of tea for breakfast, a dry wafer with a thimble of cheese for lunch and a grilled sardine for dinner usually, with loud exclamations that the enormous amount consumed for each meal will see them out for the next few days.

Today I have had to drive to a cafe for a normal lunch and bought horderves "for Christmas" just to bulk up the dinner of boiled potatoes and two slices of ham. Children are ravenous. It was their choice of hosting, and I am paying for all the food (but they get to dictate the (lack of) menu!

SIX Weetabix each plus toast and fruit? Assume you're joking??

My late Nanan “ooh I got plenty in” open the fridge - a pint of milk, a tomato, two slices of ham and a yoghurt. Fruit bowl had a mushy black banana and a soft orange.

Cupboards - two of those small tins of baked beans, a pot of Ambrosia rice pudding, tea bags and coffee

Freezer - quarter of a pack of frozen veg and one of those bags of frozen cod you get in Iceland with one piece left.

That would not feed me a day

If your DH refuses to advocate for you, and would rather see his DC and wife go hungry than upset his parents, then I'd refuse to visit them again. Invite them to yours instead, and allow them to eat as little as they want, but don't deprive yourself. Alternatively, accept their invites but on the condition you can take additional food to cater for your larger appetites.

Your DH is a dick for letting his kids go hungry to not ‘rock the boat’, why would it rock the boat anyway? And you’re as bad for allowing your poor kids to go hungry.

I love my MIL but she is like this. She invited us round for dinner Christmas Eve. It was a bowl of veg soup with one piece of bread. I had the same portion as my 7 year old nephew! DH was allowed an extra bowl.

I maybe menopausal but I do Pilates, weight lift and run! DH competes in ultras. We need our food!

If only it were that simple! My sister proudly tells us she’s got nothing in when we go to stay. I take our own food but we get the silent treatment if we cook it. We often have to stop off on the way home to eat as we’re hungry. Lots of comments like ‘wow, you’re going to eat all that’. It’s dreadful. She had a BBQ in the summer for 16 people and provided 8 sausages as ‘not everyone would want one’. All the guests were starving but she never seems to notice. I brought sausages with me but wasn’t allowed to cook them.

She came to stay and help me after major surgery earlier this year. I was on some hefty medication that had to be taken with food so I needed to eat at set times throughout the day. I’d bought everything for her to make simple nutritious meals while she was here. She wouldn’t cook. She actually told my daughter that she didn’t need to eat. It was dreadful. I was so ill and the medication was making me feel terrible because I didn’t have enough food. Despite being in a lot of pain, it was a relief when she left so I could have some proper healthy meals!

She proudly told me this week that she doesn’t cook
for her teenage son any more. He makes his own meals. She never cooks. Says it’s too stressful. Her
DH cooks for them both. She eats what he makes but left to her own devices, she’d live on soup and salad.

YABU just because this is yet another thread about the ‘in-laws’, like they are another species.
Yet the ‘in-laws’ are also parents - the same people!
Why so many moans, or is it about you as an ‘in-law’?

Anyway, back to food. Not in law specific, this is just different people, different lives, different expectations.
My friend was like this, I would keep food in my room to eat because I was so hungry. Two tiny sliced bread squares of tuna sandwich is just not enough between 12.00 and 18.00.
My mum, we visited on Christmas Eve, and the table was set with one mince pies each.

On the other hand, I have my children staying. They eat much more than I do, they help themselves at home, wander out to a cafe and shops, cook for us all sometimes. I haven't slept for three nights because I have eaten far too much. I am shattered.

That is ridiculous. I get that older people don't need as much food, but forgetting that other people do is really bad of them.

Sis has issues.

It is SUCH bad hosting to give people too little food

it is possibly unique to the U.K. as most countries have a very different hosting culture

the weirdest thing is that you did not speak up either but politely pretended you had been fed adequately

such weird power games/ power dynamics really, to deliberately underfeed one’s guests

i would not stay with people like this again, tough for them, but I really would not

That is so selfish of your sister! If she doesn’t want to eat she doesn’t have to but she should have made food for you. Especially as you were recovering and had got all the ingredients. That is really horrible of her. What was her justification for being so awful to you?! It’s not like she had to pay for the food and didn’t have the money etc. Such weird behaviour! Also can’t understand how people host and put less food on. I always have more than ample on the table so everyone can eat well. No point in hosting if your guests have to constantly check if there is enough food before eating anything!

My late MiL was the opposite, forcing food at every opportunity - a groaning board at midday with huge bowls of potatoes, 3 types of puddings etc, then what seemed like a couple of hours later tea, cakes, mince pies, then more food . She would get offended if you didn’t try her cakes.

There is such moral superiority about eating scantly and being thin, my DPs were always ashamed of me for not being sparrow like - it’s taken many years for me to realise that would be difficult with the frame and build I have. Now they are very old and both suffer from osteoporosis, I wouldn’t wish it on anyone it’s a horrible crippling disease. They ate relatively normally up to their 60s but then very little and catered accordingly- I remember the time DS took the bowl of pasta intended for all 5 of us to share as being for him and putting it all on his plate, to be fair there wasn’t much of it.

Ironically they now due to various sad reasons stock their fridge as if the blitz was due whilst still eating sparrow like portions so the food generally goes off and has to be thrown away.

Eat what you need OP and don’t be shamed for it.

Well I am in my 60s and like my food! Boiled eggs for breakfast .sandwiches lunch with fruit or yoghurt. Proper meal eve.spag bol .meat and 2 veg for Dinner. Snack before bed.Also need to eat well as recovery from illness.

Honestly I’m not a grandparent but reading these boards they can’t win! They are wrong if they push off in holiday but they are annoying to host. Now they either eat too little or provide too much food! I would give up.

But you know most people do, right? So presumably when you have people to stay you offer them a meal, even if you yourself are not partaking?

You don’t need to give up, just don’t starve your guests.

I voted YABU for going there in the first place.

But, I am 44 and I've noticed I need to/can eat less than I used to so I imagine that will increase as time (hopefully) goes on, so it may not be deliberate if they don't have people round a lot and don't realise others need more.

That being said, if feeding people, I'd always make sure I made plenty of food, enough for leftovers, and serve in dishes out in the table for people to help themselves so everyone has enough.

Me too.
and im on the slender side.
can’t believe people eat so little
surely that’s less than is needed just ti keep you breathing
they must be skeletal?

Just be thankful you have been invited! They may not be around next year. Make the most of your time together x

Mine eat a huge breakfast and a very late huge dinner. Tonnes of sweets. I can’t eat so much in one sitting. After a while the sweets are foul. Have to sneak out with DC to get a bit of lunch.

We always have three meals a day and a range of snacks for visitors.

Oh that's hard. My husband and I are in our mid 50s. We absolutely eat so much less than we used to. We had my son and fiancee round for a few days over Christmas - and I had to keep reminding my husband that they will eat more than us. At one point he was about to ask them how many potatoes they wanted - I told him just to use them all. Breakfast on Christmas morning was our usual - scrambled eggs and smoked salmon - but I was conscious he hadn't made very much. They weren't starving... but I can imagine in another decade they might be. I'd say we were a close family and I'd hope that if and when the time comes they feel in real danger of physical collapse due to lack of calories they would be able to remind us that we used to eat more than half a mouthful of turkey and 4 sprouts and we would make more just for them.. especially if they were buying!

I used to eat like a horse, I was actually quite greedy, but in my late 50s I only eat one decent meal or two small ones a day. However, I recognise other people eat like I used to. If you’re buying all the food, why can’t your DH have an adult conversation and tell his parents you’re all starving and it isn’t costing them anything so why is it a problem?

My mum is like this she’s extremely thin so I don’t think she realises that people who aren’t as slim as her do have bigger stomachs which means we can’t simply survive off half a sandwich for dinner.

Forgot to add, if anyone says anything kindly, she will be rude and basically call them greedy