Feeling guilty for prepping

[Poppins17]

I’m new here on this thread having stumbled over from the Christmas thread a couple of weeks ago.

Reading some of the threads it has kicked me into gear and over the last few weeks I’ve purchased 2 x sets of 4 plastic drawers which I’ve filled with items I need as well as my freezer working out a 3 week meal plan with the idea being that if we had to isolate for 2 weeks we would be more than covered. I’ve got a proper plan for 3 weeks but we could easily stretch the items I already have for 4/5 weeks if needed.

I have also finished all of my Christmas shopping so that we don’t need to go out at all now other than for food.

I was feeling great about being so prepared and my DH is fully on board however I’ve seen some Facebook comments today from friends complaining about people stockpiling and basically planning too far ahead.

I’ve by no means stock piled in terms of converting a whole room into a store cupboard full of things but it’s making me consider whether I should feel guilty that I have a pack of spare toilet rolls and some spare tins of beans etc put away for a worst case scenario situation.

Anyone else feel guilty, or have I just got the newbie jitters?

I believe for those who have the space and money, having a stockpile built up over time is the socially responsible thing to do. You can then let others who can't, access what they need when things get tough. Acting like a martyr and not preparing when you can is socially irresponsible and adds to the burden.

Don't feel guilty. If anyone should it should be David Cameron and Boris etc who have made perfectly normal people panic and feel that they are unable to guarantee that they will be able to feed their families over the next few months. For a first world country with the resources and riches we have this is a disgraceful situation that we have been shoved into through no fault or lack of our own.

I agree. If you stock it up little and often rather than one big hit, its much better.

We started stock piling in February when the first hint of restrictions/lockdown came in March. But we bought a couple of extra bits every week rather than getting 2 or 3 (or more) of everything in one week.

We carried on this way every week since, and will continue to do so while we have the room to store it. We have one shelf unit in the garage, and keeping the freezer topped up so we could easily do a month without needing to food shop.

If you are sensible about it, then its a good thing to do.

If you are prepping and not panic buying, no guilt. Planning ahead is sensible, especially if you have dependents.
Buy what you need, don’t take the last of anything, use local businesses.
IMO, a lot of the nastiness and criticism is based on the ancient fear of ‘If you speak it, it will happen’ As if preparing for disaster will make it come to pass. Tempting fate.
It’s up to individuals to make their own choices, and it’s always seemed odd to me that prepping attracts such vitriol.

It’s sensible to have (at the minimum) 2 weeks supply of food in stock. It doesn’t sound like you’ve been stock piling really, if you’ve only got an extra pack or two of differentiations things in. But fairer to others if you spread it out over several weeks/shops.

Given that at any moment we could be told to stay home & not be able to go out for 2 weeks, it’s only common sense that we should all have 2 weeks supplies at home. That goes for household/cleaning/medical supplies as well as food. It’s the socially responsible thing to do IMO.

Don't let the 'last minuters' & 'someone else can get my shopping'ers' make you feel bad. There is nothing wrong with preparing to be self sufficient in case of an emergency/illness/isolation.

The selfish ones are the ones that go in & sweep entire shelves into trollers, buying hundreds of bottles of hand wash & hundreds of toilet rolls and then selling them at a profit.

Orbiting ALL of the pasta, more than their family could eat in a tear, let alone a month!

Don't forget things like Panadol & treats.

Orbiting? Or buying
Tear - year

I usually have all of Christmas done by the 1st of December. However last year I decided that with Christmas and dd birthday (27th) being so close together, I wanted to have both done by November at the latest so we could just enjoy November and December without any stress, and if we saw little bits we wanted to pick up as extra gifts we could without worrying about somebody else missing out if we'd forgotten everyone. I've done all her birthday and Christmas, including clothes/chocolates/stocking/xmas Eve box/pyjamas etc. I shall be doing all my family and DH's on payday and the following couple of weeks, alongside wrapping paper, tags, bags and cards. then everything shall be finished by 1st of November. All left will be Christmas food, and birthday decorations. (Have all Christmas decorations already)
I don't feel guilty, I'm an organised person by nature and I hate feeling stressed during the festive period. It's my favourite time of year and I just want to enjoy it!

Dont feel guilty for making sure you could self isolate for two weeks at the drop of a hat. Some people would call that feckless.

If other people live buying food day to day then that's for them. You buy for the month and that's for you.

I have four kids, one has a blue badge and not one shop would let me put some loo roll from the delivery aside for him. So I dont feel guilty. I have four kids to feed, I have no support and no one to drop anything off if we needed to isolate.

In the first lockdown people on FB was posting pictures of people buying more than one pack of mince. One pack of mince and one bag of pasta wont keep my kids alive for a week. We literally need twice as much food as someone with two kids.

So dont feel guilty or let people judge you. How do you know they dont have a loo roll igloo at home?

A couple of weeks is fine, especially if you have built up over a few weeks. It's actually pretty sensible to make sure that if you have to self isolate none of the family will need to risk contaminating others for any reason. More than 2 weeks is unreasonable: the world isn't ending and there is enough of almost everything to go round.
Don't worry op: there are people really taking advantage. You aren't one of those people if you maintainability rolling 2 week stock.

I never felt guilty about realising weeks beforehand that things might get tight in the future.

I told my mum in January (or maybe beginning of February) that a pandemic was coming and that having extra in the cupboards would be a good thing.

I also told her that the first lockdown stopping didn't mean back to normal and that a second wave would hit, and there would likely be panic buying again.

We do meal prepping, so mum has a couple of weeks worth of meals in her new chest freezer, and I keep a good supply of rice at my own house. Enough that I don't need to get any during the panic buying stages. I don't buy anything I won't use, just an extra each time I shop so that I have a supply for a couple of weeks ahead if I can't go out.

When shelves start to look empty, I don't really go shopping at all, except for fresh food, that's why I prep, so I don't add to the problem at the time.

Thanks for all the responses.... I’m going to ignore Facebook and just try to feel confident that I have done the right thing for us.

Thanks for those who have mentioned - as well as meal prepping I also have some fabric conditioner, toiletries, flu tablets etc and puppy food and treats.

I have a lot more than two weeks worth, built up since 24th June 2016. I didn't and couldn't shop from the 16th March until May 7th other than people from church dropping off bread and milk and fresh fruit and veg.

I have a child who needs 10-15 portions of fruit and veg a day and need to provide that with tins, dried and frozen.

We all have conditions that mean we use more loo roll.

One of use will only eat certain brands due to their disability.

One has several allergies and anaphylaxis.

We have one child self isolating for 14 days, so I can't go out for long to do a shop. I have a condition that making standing painful and I go faint. ( Imagine human dominoes if I fainted at the back of the line and knocked the whole lot over. )

Little bits extra bought over several years, always using the oldest first. It wasn't me in the shops trying to buy bog roll and pasta in March.

Nothing at all to feel guilty about!
Ignoring fb is a good idea all round.
Well done for being well organised.

I havent stockpiled a single thing through any of covid or anything, I always buy this early (I was actually a little late starting this year)

it utterly baffles me how people leave this stuff till the last minute... I see it every year when people go shopping on xmas eve and bitch that the 'must have' is sold out, like 'no shit' and they always blaim others or make excuses like 'I had to wait till pay day' like you didnt know for 12 months in advance like everyone else... they choose to wait till the very last payday/minute to do anything so not my job to feel sorry for them or guilty that I put actual effort into organising

Definitely give up Facebook before you give up prepping

Not feeling guilty. In fact, taking steps to make sure that we are NOT the problem when food distribution gets fucked by no deal Brexit means we have acted unselfishly.

I don’t think the prepping of food is an issue but having Christmas sorted is ultra depressing. What do you do in December... buy Easter eggs?

What do I do in December. Relax. Watch cool films on tv. Decorate the house. Pick up any extras I've missed. Shit like that.

I think there's a huge difference between prepping and panic buying. Adding a few extras to your shopping every week makes no impact on the supply chain; everyone panic buying pasta at the same time is what caused problems last time around.

I do believe that people buying more than they needed in March was what resulted in a lot of us then going without and having a serious amount of anxiety. However I think we now need to live differently; I used to live week to week in terms of shopping but now we could be told to self isolate with no notice and as a responsible adult I think that means you should have enough food in to manage until you can either at least get an order or get some help to get fresh food. I also think that it’s responsible not to be popping into shops every day so doing a bigger shop is also wise.
I’ve also started buying for Christmas mainly because I want to get some bits from shops and not all online and at the best of times the shops at christmas are rubbish and this year with social distancing I think it will all be long winded and stressful so I’ll get some stuff now to reduce pressure later on.

@Divebar

I don’t think the prepping of food is an issue but having Christmas sorted is ultra depressing. What do you do in December... buy Easter eggs?

DH’s birthday is the middle of December so once we have a weekend putting our tree up and decorating the house, the next is spent celebrating his birthday and the following is the one before Christmas where we tend to relax at home, maybe visit family etc. In normal years I’m probably done for October/November - I don’t want to be shopping in December when it’s manic.

@Divebar

I don’t think the prepping of food is an issue but having Christmas sorted is ultra depressing. What do you do in December... buy Easter eggs?

Decorate, bake, drink, make stuff, go out to concerts and events, enjoy the preparations. My celebrations stretch from St Nicholas’ Eve to January 2nd and none of them involve scrabbling around in a frantic, ill-tempered frenzy.