Constant competitive undereating is giving me the rage

[Bettercallsalli]

Family Easter meal and once again ruined by my mother!
After 6 mouthfuls...o im so full. Cutting peas in half...just makes us all that eat nornally on edge.

I think you may have missed the point of the thread.

Eating small portions if that is what you like / can manage is not problematic at all.

It is constantly commenting on other people’s portions that is the issue. It’s rude and totally unnecessary. In exactly the same way that people badgering you to have more courses than you would like is also rude and unnecessary.

That would be a larger portion than would be served in a Michelin starred restaurant.
😉😁.

Never heard that terminology before.
Thanks for explaining.
I now remember dad getting plateful and mum served herself next to nothing.
Hence in old age she has health problems associated from a lifetime of undereating.

I have a tiny 6 stone mother in law who is very controlling of her own food intake constantly comments on how full she is and what a good eater she is but eats very very little and it's very wearing and subtly undermining. Every meal or snack is her passing remarks silently and being the most womanly woman who ever lived with the tiniest most feminine appetite ever. The constant inference is that she's more womanly more feminine and generally much better at womaning than me or her daughters.

You are welcome @JustbrotherscarlenaNsoul . There have been amusing / infuriating threads on MN over the years where women have been served tiny portions even when desperately inappropriate- like when they are breastfeeding.

This is such a classic mum move. My mum’s the same. Everytime her food comes out in a restaurant if it’s even slightly above an average sized portion she’ll go “oh my god, how am I possibly going to eat all that?!” (Then she eats it all then goes on about how she can’t believe she ate it all and how she never eats like this at home)

Are you OPs mum?

It must be a generational thing. My MIL is from another country known for very short and small women, she’s naturally tiny and constantly talks about her weight and others, comments about food, appetite etc.

My own mother has struggled with her weight and been on diets for decades and seems obsessed. Despite me being a healthy size 10 she’s constantly talking about what she/I eat. If I get an evening snack she will make a comment etc. I call her out on it but it’s exhausting.

Not all old folk have tiny appetites - my mum eats like a horse and she’s 82

Yes. My late mum could out eat DH. She always served up massive portions.

MIL eats like ‘a bird’ and don’t we all have to hear about it. Don’t think I’ve ever seen her enjoy eating.

I hope it’s a generational thing and therefore should die out soon. My DD and her friends in their 20s seem to have a healthy relationship with good and more interested in being fit.

Yes, never heard that old chestnut before, of course. 😂. It is obviously the fault of a man if a woman has a small appetite.

Since my DH died, my appetite has collapsed. And I’ve never regained it. I suppose my stomach has shrunk - I don’t know. I don’t eat little to cause a drama, and I don’t appreciate people telling me I eat too little 🤷‍♀️

If everyone, big or little eaters, just concentrated on their own plate, and didn’t comment on others, there would be less reason for drama.

Penis portions 😂😂😂😂😂
I’m assuming this isn’t a thing and it’s just a great typo

Yep slimness is a currency when you’ve little personal agency. I’ve said his on her before but my 84 year old five foot 2 mum told me proudly last year how she’d dropped weight and was now 7 stone four. She thinks she’ll live longer thinner.

my husband put a pig in blanket on my mums Christmas lunch plate, she was desperately trying to get someone to take it. Cats bum mouth if you are in a cage and you ask if she wants some cake.

op you can’t stop her you can only change your reaction to her. It’s hard though.

I got an explanation as to what it was from another poster.
I thought the same.

Perhaps the women don't eat it all because you're not getting the quantities and balance of the different foodstuffs right. Instead, as women need iron more than men, give the women smaller meals overall but ensure they're more iron heavy, give them extra meat. After all, if you're concerned about who needs more of what then obviously you want to do that properly.

Ah, I skimmed a few pages but didn’t see an explanation. Definitely not going to google it though 😂😵‍💫

I think the only way to deal with this is to start finding it really funny. Because this is legitimately sketch-show material! Absolutely brilliant.

Bonus points if you can throw in little remarks implying she's over-eating...!(not really, the poor woman clearly has a complex).

You’re writing as though men were fat and women had to stay skinny. Both sexes kept slim!

In the 70s\80s, hardly anyone had type 2 diabetes and were on medications for high blood pressure or weight loss injections.

It was about looks, but it was also about health. Today’s culture is still about looks and not about health - hence your comment.

Being overweight, and eating to get that way (it doesn’t happen by itself), is unhealthy. It’s a waste of food and money, bad for the environment but most importantly, bad for your health. It will either kill you prematurely or ensure you’re on medication for life.

Maybe some of the previous generations are still somewhat surprised to see us eating ourselves into diabetes.

I could have written this post! My MIL is like this and refuses to get help because it’s caused by trauma of being abused her while married life. She’s so thin now it’s worrying!

Oh my mum in law was like that. She’d say, apropos of nothing, I never eat chocolate . The box of Maltesers you have by the side of your armchair constantly aren’t chocolate then mil! Also when I got pregnant kept telling me how she only put a stone on when pregnant. Now because I’m not related to her didn’t interact with her much I just found the Maltesers thing funny. She was unhappy with her weight though. The pregnancy weight thing did get irritating though and i remember once to the end of my pregnancy being upset as it seemed like a judgement. It wasn’t it was all about her issues with being overweight.

I’ve known or heard quite a few overweight women tell me/say that they don’t eat chocolate or overeat. I do really want to say why are you telling me this I don’t care.

It doesn't matter that women overall require fewer calories than men. Active or taller people require more calories than sedentary or shorter ones, we don't grill (see what I did there?) our guests on how often they run or swim or measure them before deciding how much food to give them. When you're hosting, you give everyone the same amount unless they ask for a smaller portion (which is fine to do, just say "smaller portion for me please" and then shut up). It's not the time for policing people's (women's) food intake. What shit hosting.

Reminds me of some woman on one of these threads once who told us all how, when she goes out for dinner, she inspects the plates when the food arrives and if she deems the portions too large, she actually complains to the waiter and then spends the rest of the meal doing a cat's bum mouth at everyone else about it. When people told her how unbelievably rude, sour and antisocial that was and asked why she couldn't just eat what she wanted and take the rest home, she accused them of being fatty fat fats who were jealous of how slim she was and how birdlike her appetite, and that it was her moral duty to ruin the occasion because obesity exists and people don't need to eat that much. Like she ever got invited out for dinner a second time!

Awful people.

Ah yes, because breast feeding mothers are such a huge portion of society at any given time that male Vs female calorie requirements don't actually matter anymore 🙄

I've breast fed for one year out of my 32 on this earth. The other 31 years my caloric requirement has been less than my dad's and husbands who are both almost a foot taller than me with more muscle mass. It's basic science, men need more food then MAJORITY of the time. To the point it is normal for men to eat more and if a woman was breast feeding and hungry she would just order an extra side in a restaurant or at home/with family would just say I'm starving can I have a big portion please. No one is shovelling male amounts of food onto an average sized woman's plate just incase she's breastfeeding 🙄

My former MIL is like this about food “oh I couldn’t eat all that” but oddly is not as skinny as you would expect from her purported strict portion size.

Because the cupboards have sweets and chocolate and biscuits in them sh always said was for fil but he’s dead and they still arrive every week in the supermarket shop 🤔

She’ll tell me I’m too skinny in one breath and then that she’d kill to look like me in the next. Utter loon.

My mil did this too with pg, “oh people couldn’t tell I was pg, they asked me whose baby it was”

Because you were pg at a time swing coats were in fashion & they hide bumps and yes people would have known you were pg if you’d been pg in summer not winter.

Worse still she'll say it to pg women in the family.

No one is shovelling male amounts of food onto an average sized woman's plate just incase she's breastfeeding

Of course not, they're using a spoon or a ladle like normal people. Why would they be "shovelling" anything? Or is this the shaming language whereby people never simply eat, they always shovel, chomp and gulp?