AIBU to ask my friend to leave after criticising my diet?

[Dogingarden]

I have a friend staying with me at the moment because it's just been my birthday.

I have been having treatment for breast cancer and have had no appetite for several weeks. Today I had a craving for pizza and have eaten a large pizza and some chips. I've also eaten most of a bar of green and blacks chocolate today too, along with some other bits.

Friend isn't very impressed and has said several times I need to eat healthy food. She's very much into healthy eating and is very disciplined about what she eats.

I've explained that my consultant says to eat whatever I fancy when I fancy and not worry about what I'm eating as long as I'm getting calories. I have long nearly two stone from chemo side effects, for context.

Friend disagreed with this and said I shouldn't be eating "processed crap" because it's just going to make the cancer worse.

I'm extremely upset by her attitude and what she's said. She's gone up to bed and I'm sitting in the garden with my dog feeling awful. She's meant to be staying until wed but I'm going to ask her to leave in the morning.

Wibu?

Unfortunately there is a very strong narrative that if you eat well, exercise etc then you won’t get cancer.

Obviously it’s not a simple as that & lifestyle only plays a part but many people really do think they can avoid illness by being “healthy”.

oh where is that laugh emoji

All she wanted to eat at that point was pizza - no matter what your experience was, or your podcasts tell her - she wanted pizza or she would have eaten nothing and become more ill.
The post is not asking for nutritional advice and all the preaching is not kind - she wanted advice on whether she was unreasonable to aske the friend to leave - and has confirmed the friend wasn't being kind but being judgmental.

YAB completely U to eat chips with pizza because that is weird and unnecessary, but apart from that I am fully on your side.

yup, its along with the "lost the fight" thing Fight harder! Eat better! Exercise more! Only losers and crap eaters get cancer!!! I genuinely wish it was that easy

The spelling was the BBC’s.

You might know the meaning of oncology, but not necessarily other people.

@Dogingarden
You eat what you're feeling you fancy
And get yourself back on track.
Your "friend" is an insensitive cloth-eared disapproving cow
And kismet forgive me,
None of us know how our lives could unfold and go......
Do we?

@godmum56im not really sure where it has come from, maybe the boom in the wellness industry? People ignore the impact of stress on your health & don’t seem to grasp genetics can make you prone to cancer or high blood pressure etc regardless if you live on apples & flaxseeds.

Have you read the Current advice on maintaining weight published by Cancer Research? I posted it upthread.

Op there are some sanctimonious cowbags on here - I'm sorry for their friends if rhy face the same troubles you have had . Don't bother responding to them, they are just posting superficially.without considering you and what you need. Which is calories!

There is a cultural terror of calories I think, which as you are sadly finding out, is very unhelpful when you are dangerously underweight.

I hope you have been able to express to your friend how thoughtless she was being. 💐💐

It Is not outrageous for some people to agree the friend was judgemental but also think that she did not mean to be unkind, and to think that she had a point about nutrition mattering in general.

Anyway OP, I am very sorry you have had to go through so much and hope you will get your weight back up and feel much better bit by bit. 💐💐💐

My mum died of cancer. She grew up on a farm and literally ate food straight from the farm. Never had anything processed.

Regardless, your “friend” is an insensitive numb skull. How ridiculous to give food advice that flies in the face of what the consultant said.

THIS

Having supported my Dad through cancer, I was delighted when he fancied something to eat/drink as he lost so much weight, was nauseous all the time, lost any enjoyment of food. At one point he fancied an iron bru ice lolly and we were combing the shops to find them!!

Just wondering if she was drinking alcohol and perhaps lost a bit of perspective on your situation and how forceful she was being.

Hope you start feeling like more things to eat and you are on your road to recovery.

if she had made one tactful comment fine.....to bang on about it and to disagree with advice given by her specialist which incidentally is also supported by Cancer Research UK, who might just know a thing or two more than Mouthy Cow Friend.....not fine.....not "be kind" Not "she didn't mean it" not fucking fine

She has your consultant's qualifications, does she? Angry for you.
Too many people act as if how well people are is all merit based, as in if you do the right things, you won't get ill. Not true! Some people who do all the right things get ill, some people who eat rubbish, smoke etc are healthy in their 80s.

How dare she? As a basic rule, I would very seldom give a friend advice without specifically being asked, and doing what she did-just no.

Well, we agree on that then, at least. I hate it when people say that a person has "lost their battle" with cancer because there is an implication there that if they had "fought" harder they could have won it. It's a cruel nonsense to call living with cancer a "battle" or a "fight".

Your life sounds like it is inevitably going to include some big shocks…I hope you’ll think of this comment then. Maybe consider reading “Living Downstream” too

Appalling foolish mean spirited way to respond to OP

I've also been through treatment for breast cancer and when I was feeling my worst I was literally told to eat whatever I fancied because any food is better than no food. I was living on chicken noodle soup without the noodles, sour cream and onion pringles, and full sugar coca cola. Thats it!

Every cancer forum I have been on says the same! Of course, when you feel up to it you should try to eat a more healthy diet - in the same way that everyone should try to eat a more healthy diet.

If you are feeling kind and patient then perhaps you should suggest she does a bit of research, getting information from actual cancer patients. It's all very well telling people what they SHOULD do, if you don't have cancer yourself!

She would be an ex friend if it were me she said that to

Thank you, I had not heard of that book before. I might read it. Certainly, environmental toxins are extremely concerning and exposure to them almost undoubtedly accounts for a great many cancers. Air pollution, soil pollution, water pollution all contribute.

Clearly. And when we all ate organic and did lots of exercise, life expectancy was 45.

By all means if it gives people hope and makes them feel better, food is great. But food doesn’t cure cancer, medicine does.

you know what, its just struck me that being a guest in someone's home and criticising their choice of diet un any circumstances is never ever ok, its just plain rude. In this case its also cruel beyond belief.
Anybody who came to my home as a guest and chose to criticise my choice of diet would very quickly no longer be a guest

Good grief, do you really think people don’t know about carcinogenic food and that tomatoes are good for you? Thank goodness you’re here to educate us.

yup we should all be sooooooooooooooo grateful.
Not.

Can we make "mind your own business" fashionable again. When did it become acceptable to comment on things which don't affect you? When did people become so arrogant that they think the world would be delighted to hear their opinion on everything.

Having said that I don't think your pizza was very balanced, you should have put a donut on top. 😀

Continue to eat what you want when the mood takes you. Chemo is hell and no one recovers from cancer if they don't eat. Tell your friend to leave, no one needs that kind of judgement when they're literally just trying to survive.