Help my AP is eating me out of house and home and now dh had enough- advice please

[Julesnobrain]

We have a nice Czech AP who has been with us now for about 3 months. She's a big girl but not fat.We noticed straight away how much she ate but that was compared to the last one who was anorexic !! After todays eating dh has told me to get rid of her but she's actually really good with the kids, very reliable, steady and good at cleaning. We have just got back from our hols. She stayed in the house (it was OK thank you ladies for your advice on this one). I left a freezer full of home cooked meals with a day by day schedule plus snacks plus an additional £20 for milk, bread and salads. When we came back we spent £200 and stocked up and she has literally spent all day eating aghhhhhhhhh. Today she has had 2 bowls of cereal, a proper cooked lunch (chicken, veg, mash etc), a loaf (yes a full LOAF less the 2 crusty slices) of bread, half a family size/large block of cheese, a quarter large jar of mayonnaise, 4 apples, 3 yoghurts, 2 muffins, 3 packets of crisps, 1 tin of tomato soup, half a packet of rich tea biscuits and a 2 litre bottle of lemonade. Now I know its deeply sad that I know all this but due to her eating 2 family sized jars of mayonnaise in a week before we went on holiday dh had asked me to monitor what she ate. We are honestly not a mean family and I think we eat heathy sized portions ourselves but this does seem an awfully large amount of food and it is costing us a fortune. I don't want to get rid of her and I don't feel its appropriate to change her conditions and request she take a food allowance ( I think £25 - £30 a week is going rate?) but have any of you had this problem, how did you handle it, did you start a special ap shelf of food? dh is threatening to start buying tesco branded mayonnaise and label it just for her which seems really mean. I have asked her if there was special food she would like me to buy but she has said she likes everything... which she does......... any advice please. sorry its such a long post

gosh I'm not sure what i'd do in that situation.
short of buying less, but shopping more frequently if that's an option?

otherwise you'll just have to give it to her straight and tell her to stop eating so much

hmm, you have to take the good with the bad.
why did you get an aupair in the first place? think of the reasons. if she still fulfills those requirements, and particularly if she fulfills them well, then the extra grocery bill needs to be thought of as the price of her services.
if not, then fine, replace her with someone who eats a lots less, but doesnt get on as well with the kids etc.

i currently have a cleaner who no longer does a good job cleaning. but she is reliable. turns up when she says she will. is fantastic with the kids. polite, well mannered. etc etc etc. i am not going to give her up for someone who does a fantastic job of cleaning for two weeks, then doesnt turn up just before a dinner party. leaving me n th elurch

Jules, have never been in this situation myself (altho have had several AP's) but just wanted to offer my sympathies. Very tricky situation. TBH, I would agree with your DH that the amount she is eating is far in excess of a reasonable diet that one would expect to financially provide for. However, she is brilliant with the kids and very reliable. Have you actually tried raising the issue with her? I know its really awkward but perhaps discussing the problem first with her may give rise to a solution? I don't think you would be unreasonable to say that you are prepared to supplement food up to X amount but over and above that she must provide for herself. Sounds as if there is a lot of resentment building and if you want to save yourself the headache of replacing your otherwise fab au pair, then I would bite the bullet and tackle it head on with her.

I think you have to buy cheaper food and hide the good stuff. She will probably calm down soon - she's got to put the "British 10 Kilo" that, I am reliably informed by giggling Polish girls, is unavoidable

There isn't so much choice anywhere else. Combine someone who is naturally greedy (like your AP, and like myself) with a suddenly HUGE range of food she normally has no access too - and she's going to eat and eat, but I think her appetite will top out soon.

OK, she may be a young woman with a huge appetite - some of them do. She may also have an eating disorder. Whatever you decide you have to do, please do approach with extreme tact.

Goodness me!

I actually had to have a chat with my AP about the cost of certain items as I couldn't believe how free she was with things - but not to the extent of your AP!

Ours was juice, we only buy decent freshly squeezed juice, the DC have a glass with b'fast and we buy 2 packs of innocent smoothies per week (5 a day and all that) they have one everyday on the afternoon return from school. Several times with AP her we got through 2 packs (£8) between sun and tues and I had to buy more on weds, plus several more bottles of juice.

I now buy her cheaper juice, but she still gets through a lt everyday and she only has smoothies when we are on picnics not just because she fancies several per day.

Perhaps you need to sit down and explain (as I did) that usually X quantity lasts for X days and 'we' seem to be getting through it at a quicker rate.

My AP is constantly hungry, despite being a size 6, and was eating nearly a whole packet of cereal some days on top of cooked meals so the compramise is I buy her cheaper cereal (waitrose own shreddies rather than Dorset Cereals/crunchy nut cornflakes) and large bags of budget pasta (rather than the wholewheat or spinach ones I have for the DC) so she can fill up on carbs to her hearts content.

If she really is as good as you say I think you should try this approach, I don't know how many APs you have had but if I had one that was good at everything I would trying to keep her .

Hi Jules
funny cos your thread sounded like the hungry caterpillar only you can re-name the book the hungry aupair......... but you know what ............she was still hungry! sorry just had to add to your thread, good luck please let us all know how you get on!!

When away from home, in a strange country, working your socks off with the kids and the host said, 'You eat too much"...how completely mortifying

But maybe that's why her parents have sent her abroad, they couldn't afford to keep her!

Really awkward. Tbh I think I'd wimp out particularly if she were fab with the dcs & just bite the bullet (and do some crafty substitutions from Aldi!)

Yes, we had a vegetarian au pair who was like that for the first two weeks. She was bulimic. Then she informed me she was going vegan and demanded that I buy special vegan food for her which she still continued to eat in the same alarming quantities. In the end I just ran the cupboards and the freezer down and we all ate lots of homemade soup and salad. I had to stop getting a veg box delivered because she would be through it like a plague of locusts in minutes. I bought value fuit and veg. It was diffcult and it did cause friction between dh and I.
However if your ap is basically great where it matters and doesn't have a hidden eating disorder, then I would be inclined to agree with stitch and try to ride it out with good humour for the duration of her stay. If you can find a way to talk to her about it so much the better, but I know it's really hard to do.

OMG how can people even eat that much?

I dont think its acceptable for her to eat that much in a day to be honest.... not sure how you go about telling ehr though

Thanks for your advice. She has been in the UK now since Jan, she was with a family for 6 months before us so I don't think it is the availability of food more that she genuinely likes to eat!. I think I will sit her down and explain about the cost and in particular the bread as that is an inconvenience when I need to make ds a packed lunch and find out its all been used!. I like the idea of maybe making up some pasta or something thats just her's and she can have as much whenever she wants. good idea marmadukescarlett thanks

There has to be an emotional cause to this level of comfort eating. Is she very homesick? Was she very lonely when you were away? Does she have friends? Does she seem close to her family? Can you find out if she's unhappy?

I understand that this is a shocking amount of food but it seems likely it's a symptom of something more complex than just greed.

do you people genuinly think we havent got food in the supermarkets ??? and if you looked at the map you would find that czech rep. is in the centre of europe, not east.
sorry, but had to say that as comments like this drive me mad.
no advice on the hungry ap, perhaps she eats because she is bored?

I do apologise, I assumed the Czechoslovakia this Au Pair is from is the same Czechoslovakia continually referred to by Geography teachers as an Eastern European county - and that if the difference between London and the rest of England is anything to go by, Prague is considerably richer and better supplied than the rest of Czechoslovakia.

Two countries, surely?

Is she actually eating all this food herself, or is she having people round when you're not there? Or smuggling it out for other(s) to eat?

I was an au pair with a serious eating disorder. The mother in my first family picked me up on it, saying it was not on to help myself to food from the fridge and not eat properly at mealtimes.. I was mortified, but she was right.

It's one of the reasons I wouldn't consider having an au pair myself. They are young, foreign girls. They are finding themselves. They are not interested in the wellbeing of your children - that is your job.

You need to be very straight with this girl, about economic realities. A close friend of mine had a number of East European au pairs and it was always a disaster because she would start off raving about their work ethic and end up wanting to kill them because they thought she was made of money.

That is a difficult situation Julesnobrain. It was very noticeable to me how much my last (she was also my first) ap ate and we don't skimp on portion sizes. For example, she and two others went on a self catering holiday for a week. She bought a 250gm butter tub before they arrived and she said they had to buy several (it was either 3 or 4) more to last them the week. Dh, the kids and I have just been sc for a week, we went through 1 250gm tub and about a fifth of the Flora type tub dh used. I used to say sometimes that x cost £y and so it had gone up by 10p or whatever to check that she knew how much things actually cost and she'd say "Oh, that's a lot!" but it didn't make any difference to her eating habits.

I think Marmaduke's suggestion is a good one. It would be a shame to part company with a really good ap for the increased grocery cost alone.

I think I would have a frank discussion along the lines: we do shopping once a week - out of the bread that I buy I need to make lunches for the children for school etc. If you are hungry you are welcome to help yourself to X. Then set up an AP snack area and once a week put in it: a big box of cereal, a loaf of bread, some value biscuits, a bag of apples and some jam. That she can have free access too and eat as she chooses. Anything else I would stress it is to be SHARED as a family and must last the week. And simply don't replace things until the following week. However, is this your first AP? Teenage/early twenties girls can eat a considerable amount. The amount my AP eats (who is stick thin) is more than myself, so it's not comparable to one more adult, it's a bit more I find. But I do think it's reasonable to direct them away from the very expensive items and ask them to fill up on more budget items. But don't let it fester, that'll lead to a lot of resentment.

I think that you need to have a frank discussion with her. There are two issues here:

• she is costing you an unreasonable amount in food. Tell her that you would not allow a daughter of yours to eat this much because your household cannot afford for everyone to eat this much

• she is eating far too much unhealthy food for her own good

Can you not ban snacking in your household? It would be healthier and more economical all round and easier to say "no" to your AP.

hmm, not quite the same thing, but related, in a way.
when i moved out of my mil's house, into our own tiny cupboard, i started eating like mad. went up a dress size every three months. was constantly constatnly putting things n my mouth. it was a comfort thing. took me a few years to calm down. maybe she has such issues?

Yes - if your AP has an eating disorder/is binging for comfort, you would do her a favour to have a frank discussion about it.