Dad's obsession with my body

[User24689]

Hello MNers
I am after some advice/ thoughts on an issue that’s been going on a long time and wondered if anyone else had had to deal with anything similar. Sorry in advance for the length.

My dad has always been very preoccupied with weight and food – he loves food and cooking, Irish family, always thinking about what he’s going to create for the next meal etc but at the same time both my parents were always very critical of other people’s weights. As a child I had a clear sense that being overweight was wrong and that it was something that happened to other people but wouldn’t happen to me. When I went through puberty I started gaining weight in totally normal places but worried about it a lot, and my worries were completely reinforced by both my parents. I was encouraged to diet so that I didn’t get fat and spent a good few years battling it before eventually settling with my different figure, which there was no fighting of course, and feeling like I’d failed. As my weight fluctuated in my teens, my dad took me running with him, I wasn’t allowed to eat the same things as my younger brother, and I became increasingly anxious about it until I started properly restricting my food around age 16. I was very distressed, though I did lose a lot of weight, and my weight loss was praised at home so I carried on. By the time I was 18 and at uni I was restricting dangerously and was diagnosed anorexic. I eventually reached out to my parents, my mum was very supportive but dad found it really hard and never talked to me about it. I gained the weight back and he continued to speak about food and weight in the same way as if it had never happened.

I continually relapsed into my eating disorder for a further 10 years. 8 years ago I met my wonderful fiancé who I am marrying in 3 weeks’ time and 4 years ago we moved to Australia which was the best thing I could have done for my mental health because my parents don’t see my body so can’t comment on it. We have a good relationship generally. I have had a few bad relapses regardless and after a few years of really good counselling here I finally considered myself recovered a year ago. I gained weight, my periods came back and I before Christmas I fell pregnant :) Life is so good for me right now and I am so proud that I beat the ED because I honestly thought I would live with it forever (I’m now 30).

The problem is, my dad still can’t let go of this obsession and still asks me about my weight, what exercise I’m doing etc. He is not being mean, he thinks he is being caring and I don’t want to hurt him because I know he adores me. My parents are now divorced, that happened 10 years ago, and I believe that my mum couldn’t cope with his obsession with this either because she is very funny about food herself these days and I think it must all be related. Since I have been pregnant he has been quizzing me on whether I’m showing, like that is a bad thing. At the weekend, he arrives for my wedding and will be staying with us for 2 weeks. I am so, so anxious about both of my parents reactions to my weight gain – I haven’t gained much at all through pregnancy but they don’t realise I gained 10kg before that even happened!

It has all come to a head for me this morning as I have received an email from Dad titled ‘gluttony’ and attached is an article about weight gain in pregnancy and how the biggest contributor to the “obesity crisis” is pregnant women eating badly and giving birth to overweight babies who are then predisposed to be overweight (think that’s the gist, couldn’t bear to read it). Watching my body change in pregnancy is a massive challenge for me as it is and the title of the email brought me immediately to tears, it was like being slapped.

Has anyone been through anything like this with a family member? How can I deal with him? My husband to be has a difficult relationship with him because he has a lot of anger about my past and I really don’t want to start married life with them falling out and me feeling awful. This is supposed to be a happy time. :(

Also just want to make it clear I don’t blame my parents for my eating disorder – I chose that behaviour myself for a lot of reasons. I would never want to upset any MNers who have a child with an ED. These are just my personal circumstances.

Well done OP

For similar reasons, I went through with my therapist how to manage my (not even conceived at this point) DCs diets. It was very useful, because it can be triggering gto see your DC not eat very much (I've never worried about them overeating funnily enough). The DC are very good eaters and self regulate marvellously. I really recommend having a plan in place, with your DP on board as again, if you find yourself in a situation where another adult is trampling all over your food strategies, it can be massively triggering. In those moments where your anxiety is like mad tinnitus and you can't hear yourself think, planned responses, strategies and action s can be very useful.

I also planned and rehearsed "if what I fear happening happens" so for you this might mean a deeply insensitive comment from your dad. Rehearsing it means you won't freeze or flip out and stay in control of the situation.

We've had issues with food and the DC from my mum, and alcohol and the DC from my dad. It is very healing and empowering to create boundaries around them, and weathering the storms that have ensued.

Good luck with the wedding and congratulations on your pregnancy.

Well done, OP.

Well done OP!

I hope everything goes smoothly from now on. x

Well done. I can only imagine how hard it was to write that email

Well done OP.
Good luck with everything.
Enjoy your wedding and congrats.

So sorry to hear the terrible time you had growing up and well done for turning your life around.

I'm really shocked that a father would do this.

I actually now think I had a better childhood than I ever gave myself and my parents credit for.

Thanks so much everyone, you are all just so lovely! I have an update - he has replied.

It was very brief, he opened with 'oh dear', then said he was sorry, he had just found the article interesting. He said he had forgotten 'how I was when I was growing up'. He ended with 'grovelling apologies' and said he would speak to me soon.

I realise some of you might be outraged by the flippancy but I'm not because -as I said - communication in the family is crap and the fact he apologised and even acknowledged the past is significant. It annoyed me that he referred to it as 'how I was' - it was always like it was this taboo thing, nobody dared put its proper name to it.

DP and I have talked it through. DP pointed out that he doesn't need to take ownership of it, he probably never will. I'm on a hiding to nothing expecting I can change his feelings about the matter, it's a deep rooted problem with him. All we need to do is change how he behaves towards us (i.e. me/ DC) in the future, and this is the first step with that. I feel positive about it and so does he. I haven't replied to dad yet.

To the person who questioned why I didn't want DP to go in and stand up for all of this on my behalf (so sorry, your post is on other page and can't see it while I reply), I think I just really would like DP and Dad to be able to have a positive relationship in future and I don't want him to think this is an opinion that has come from DP - I really think Dad thinks he's right and there's nothing wrong with what he thinks, feels and does. Dad needs to know that I haven't been influenced by DP into thinking he's wrong (although DP definitely was the person who made me realise what had triggered all of this).

Outself that is excellent advice - I will discuss that with my counsellor when I next see her. Thank you.

upthewolves,

I'm in awe of how you've dealt with this! I've had disordered eating most of my life, and I'd seriously struggle with my thinking processes if my father sent me an email like that, or made comments like yours has.

My mother used to send me such emails: links to articles about obesity or dietary related stuff. She never acknowledged that I had problems (she never knew I was bulimic, but she probably could see that I had food issues). I went to stay with my aunt (her sister) when I was in my 20s, and my mum emailed her to warn her that I "ate a lot". I weighed 8 stone. When we go visit my mum serves tiny portions, then claims to feel full while watching everyone else eat. My partner (who is a big strong man, and a runner), always asks for seconds, and she always sniffs at him. I don't dare ask for seconds, but I wish I had the guts to! My mum seems to equate thin with good, and is constantly competing with her sister to be the thinest - even though they are nearing 70! Mental.

I'm an athlete (endurance running), and a safe weight for my height and fitness level, but I still second-guess my food choices every day. My coach despairs when I complain about energy levels and he then learns that I've not taken on enough protein/fat. It is so hard to break through long ingrained patterns.

I have a family member like this too. She used to call her DD a 'fat little pig' when she was growing up. Last time I went to her place for a dinner party she served 5 salmon fillets between seven adults. We had McDonalds on the way home.

She is obssessed with weight and thinness and covers it up as being interested in 'health'. It's not..... anyone who cuts a banana into thirds for her teenage DD as bananas are fattening and she can only have a third of one each day has a problem.

The 5 salmon fillets between 7 adults, and cutting bananas into thirds, this is EXACTLY my mother. She'd go shopping to make dinner for four of us (all adults) and come back with two chicken breasts, a head of broccoli and six new potatoes. Not joking. I wish I had a photo of my partner's face when he saw that.

To this day I can't eat a whole banana in one go, this is not a good thing.

Not read the whole thread. Everytime he sends you an article on greed etc send out every back showing how dangerous the other extreme is with a 'thanks dad but I don't want to become like this again due to your obsession'.

You may not want to upset him but he has endangered your life with his problem.

And while I'm on a roll: she often used to buy clothes for me that were two sizes too big, then say, "oh, I thought your size looked far to small for YOU" - innocent face.

It took me years to learn that this was not accidental or just her being forgetful. She genuinely saw me as two sizes larger than I actually was.

Sorry that sort of made sense. Your dad will find details it hard to stop and change at his age so I think you have to reinforce what you have done everything he slips.

Oh please ignore the weird auto corrects

Gordon Bennett - this thread is an absolute shocker. OP you have done brilliantly and as others have said, have been incredibly generous to your dad. He is very lucky.

It's amazing to me that so many people are so obsessed and mad about food and diet and weight and so many people are passing on these toxic messages to their children. I am overweight and you know what - it's really fine. It's not that big a deal. Reading this thread you'd think being a bit overweight was akin to ebola.

My stepmother is a food nut as well. Luckily she doesn't usually comment on other people's weight but she is constantly evaluating others by her ludicrous standards (and yes she would go to the shop and buy four small potatoes with which to make a roast dinner for 5). By contrast my mother would go and buy 20. Neither is quite right but my mother is saner.

When we were children and visiting for the weekend my stepmother would announce at breakfast that we were not having lunch today because we were having a big dinner. So at 7 years old you'd see the whole day stretching ahead and by 3pm there'd be this awful hunger and still four hours to go until any food was allowed. We would never, ever have gone into the kitchen and helped ourselves - not even to an apple. That's how much food was controlled. We were never told off about it - we just knew that food was under someone else's control completely.

OP you have done a great job and your DP sounds great too.

I had a friend years ago who had four daughters and she was very much like this with them. They were all strongly encouraged to be very competitive in sport and athletics, which is great, but I think it's because my friend was paranoid about them being anything less than super thin. As they each hit puberty she stressed about every ounce they put on and she once said to me that she dreaded the thought that any of them might end up with bigger boobs than her as she found big boobs really unpleasant to look at. My friend was thin and small chested.

We went there for Sunday lunch once and I found the way the children behaved around the food really odd. They seemed very ill at ease and unsure about what they could and couldn't help themselves to from the serving dishes. Their mum watched them like a hawk as they each served themselves and they kept looking up at her for a sign that they may have taken too much, or that it was ok to take a bit more. I got the impression that this was a perfectly normal mealtime occurrence for them.

We went there for dinner once and when we left my DH said he felt like he'd eaten at a health farm. Everything was tiny, lean, low fat, dry and bland. I mean if you cook like that for a dinner party what's your normal dinner like?

Another time at a party, the older two girls (teenagers) helped their mum hand the food around and again there was lots of looking at mum for reassurance that each child had not grabbed too many crisps, or whatever. I am a generous, laid back over-caterer by nature and I found it very strange to witness all this very rigid portion controlling.

They were all very intelligent, conscientious, high-achieving girls as well, (Dad is a GP) so I hope they didn't spawn any anorexics.

OP, I think you've done amazingly well, with your email and the response to your dad's response. I think your DP is being fantastic, and I think he's absolutely right to say that he'll likely never 'own' it or change, but you can teach him how to behave when he's with you. Spot on.

Going by my dad, I don't think your dad will stop making these comments immediately, it's so ingrained in them, almost unconscious. I think there will be slip ups, but you can develop a strategy for dealing with them.

Thanks everyone for sharing your experiences, it is good to know that I'm not alone. I think a surprising number of people have issues around food and their weight but that some just don't realise that their viewpoints are worrying or unusual.

Seabream my mum is like yours. She eats like a mouse at meal times and the thinks I eat heaps. She will comment on the amount I eat, despite knowing of my ED history. The other day on skype she said she was off to make her lunch and I asked her what she was having - 2 ryvita with cream cheese, she said. I expressed surprise that this didn't sound like much and she looked completely shocked and said 'It's lunch, you aren't supposed to eat a lot at lunch'. When I went to stay with her last year, she took me and my brother to the pub. She asked DB what he wanted and he said a steak sandwich and chips, so she said 'Right, one steak sandwich and chips and me and wolves shall have a salad shall we - do you want to share one?' I was so pissed off I said, no I'll have a steak sandwich and chips too even though I didn't really want one!!

So yeah, both parents are problematic. Mum isn't staying with me at all while she's in town for the wedding because she generally winds me up and i really don't want to fall out with her. With mum though, I am slightly more tolerant of the comments because i feel she has been indoctrinated with this bizarre attitude to how much is normal to eat and it isn't her fault. Inrestingly, if you put out biscuits or chocolate my mum doesn't know when to stop and her weight fluctuates greatly. I think she is just hungry all the time :(

Feeling quite anxious and exposed after the email. I don't talk to anyone about my ED issues except DP and my counsellor and have a lot of shame tied up in it. I know that it isn't something I should be ashamed of though and perhaps the way to move forward is to work towards being more open with my parents about my problems and how I feel.

Also, I run too. My mum has never been sporty so doesn't understand the importance of fuelling for exercise at all. SO annoying when you've been on a long run and someone is trying to make you eat bloody ryvita!

Well done OP. You've handled all this brilliantly.

I think it is good to understand perspective but not in OP's case.

Well done OP. You have done so well.

FWIW it wouldn't help if your DP steamed in on your behalf - have a Google of 'drama triangle' for why.