Help me deal with my picky girlfriend

Running the risk having the post blow up in my face with people telling me how much of a control freak I am, etc. I need help dealing with an issue with my girlfriend.

She is a picky eater. Scratch that- she is the PICKIEST eater on the planet. People used to give me shit for being a picky eater, but I was NOWHERE near as bad as she was. There are so many things she won’t eat it is actually easier to list the things she will eat: Fast food (but no condiments aside from ketchup) popcorn, fried/breaded shrimp, Malibu Chicken plain soft tacos, pasta with marinara sauce, and meatballs. If there is something she doesn’t like in her food, she will painstakingly pick out all traces. If I accidentally order her a soft taco with lettuce, she will literally remove every single shred of lettuce until they are gone. Another time she asked if I could make her a PB&J sandwich. I didn’t have bread at the time so she asked if I could just give her a spoon of peanut butter as a snack. Unwittingly I didn’t realize she didn’t like chunky, and she meticulously spat out the chunks of peanuts and put them in a little pile on her knee as she continued licking the peanut butter :dubious: It comes to no surprise that she is obese. The obesity itself doesn’t bother me as much as the cause of it.

Now I know more than anyone, that when someone is extremely patricular about something, pushing them too hard just makes them even more entrenched. But this is something that, for the life of me, I can’t let go. When I don’t make an effort to try to help her improve her eating habits, I feel like an enabler. Talking to her friends about it, I learned that she had been this way her whole life, and to my benefit they’ve seen her try more new things and be less stubborn with me than with any other person. While this does make me feel special, at the same time I often feel like she is just humoring me and not really taking things seriously.

This past year I have been trying to eat better myself (and save money) by cooking my own meals beyond just popping something in the microwave. Cooking (in spite of numerous self-inflicted injuries and burned food) has been very enjoyable. However, my girlfriend has a tendency to stifle that enjoyment, since often I’d like to make more than just spaghetti or soft tacos over and over again.

Half of me knows I am going overboard about it sometimes and being very controlling- I’m not her parent and can’t force her to eat anything. Sometimes I wish it just didn’t bother me, and that she wouldn’t have to deal with me being such a control freak all the time about it. And yet, I know that her bad habits are going to have consequences in the long run and it seems so much better for her to fix them now.

IMO, there are two issues here. The first is her health, her weight, and her eating habits. Assuming you’re otherwise fine with her being fat, these are largely NOYB. And she will likely resent any attempt on your part to make them your business. She is an adult. She is the on who has to make the decision as to what she puts in her mouth.

But the second issue is the annoyance/drag factor of someone who literally only eats three or four things and picks through her food to remove things she doesn’t like. The first of these characteristics is stifling and boring; the second runs from being tiresome (picking lettuce off a taco) to being disgusting (spitting out and collecting peanut pieces from out of peanut butter).

IMO she can certainly eat what she likes and as she likes, but it is not incumbent upon you to cater to her habits. If she doesn’t want to eat what you like to cook, why are you still cooking for her? If she has to dissect and pick through the things she eats when she eats out, why are you still going out to eat with her?

IMO, you don’t have the right to complain about her eating habits generally – not your business – but you do have the right to talk to her about how they affect you – sucking all the fun out of both cooking for her and going out to eat with her, and how you wish she would be willing to be slightly more adventurous in her meals even if that just meant you got to cook something different once in a while. Otherwise, I think you just have to curtail dining as one of the activities you do together, which is a big deal – eating is an important social, communal habit. But your other choice is to try to rag her about her eating habits and I can give you a 99% guarantee that conversation will not end well for you.

She’s a grown-up- her bad habits are her responsibility and no one else’s. A lot of us don’t take too well to an SO trying to reform us for our own good- it feels like they think of us as their child, rather than as their equal.

I’ve learned that everyone has a “deal breaker” in relationships that may be totally different from person to person. I dated a girl for a while who absolutely would not drink alcohol… never had, never would, period. I thought it would be cool, someone who would always be DD. But honestly, that was the deal breaker for us. I’m a young guy and I like going out an having a couple beers with people. I never really noticed how many of my social events revolved around tossing back a couple cold ones… everything from barbeques to football games to birthday parties.

Anyway, that was a very healthy habit, but a way in which that girl and I just absolutely were not compatible. It got on my nerves when she asked why I couldn’t watch a football game without a beer or go to a pub and order a diet coke. I hated explaining to my friends why she wasn’t drinking. Deal breaker.

This may be a deal breaker for you. Only you know that. If her habits are ruining your newfound cooking hobby and making going out to eat not fun, well, maybe it’s time to cut bait if you feel you’re not going to get over it anytime soon. Otherwise, well, you’ll have to get over it.

Are you dating my sister? I’m what would be considered a picky eater too but nothing like my sister or your girlfriend.

The only food she seems to like are pretty poor food choices. I don’t think your going to get her to change. My sister was like that from the time she was a little kid and she’s in her 30’s now. Her son is 8 and eats healthier than she does.

She’s lost weight over the years but it was just a modification of her weird diet. She could stand to lose about 40 lbs, she doesn’t exercise and she smokes. All the fried food she eats makes my hair stand on end.

I begged her to get her cholesterol checked because I was really worried about her. I’m not a poster girl for physical fitness, but I watch what I eat, don’t drink or smoke and exercise regularly.

When her results came back her cholesterol was almost the same as mine is which is pretty good. Try to figure that one out.

This is going to be tough - as someone with food “issues” myself, I have to tell my husband to back the heck off sometimes (not pickiness, it’s other stuff).

As for advice, Jodi and wasson said what I would have, just said it way better.

Good luck. :slight_smile:

If she eats fast food hamburgers, why can’t she eat homemade hamburgers? Or burritos, or sub sandwiches or whatever fast food she likes? I am hoping that you’re overexaggerating also, because who can survive with absolutely no vegetables aside from ketchup and spaghetti sauce?

Maybe you could find a cookbook and ask her to pick out a recipe that is least offensive to her and see if you can broaden her horizons that way?

Personally, I don’t think I could put up with someone that picky. I would always think of them as immature and whiny.

Cook what you want. Make her responsible for following her food preferences. Spitting out the peanut pieces might have been a dealbreaker for me. Maybe just say, “I cant watch you eat like that” and walk away. I think she is the control freak here. A lot of people have control issues about food for various reasons. Keep that in mind, that there may be some reason she really needs to be in control in this area of her life. And that may or may not be something she’s interested in working on right now.

There is nothing inherently wrong with having a limited diet, unless the diet itself is unhealthy. Trying to “improve” her eating habits, by forcing her to eat more varied foods is like trying to “improve” someone’s taste in music by forcing them to listen to songs you like, when she’s already said she doesn’t like them.

Jodi is right on, it’s not any of your beeswax, except how her habits affect you directly. Food is one of those things where we think we can pass judgement on others, as if the target doesn’t understand whether or not she’s happy with her current food choices. It’s sort of insulting, if you think about it.

Also, don’t expect an adult picky eater to get un-picky. My dad got sick last year and couldn’t eat a morsel of food for 2 weeks, all his nutrition was through a glucose drip. He lost a ton of weight, and when he got back on his feed, he was still just as picky as ever about what he ate. No high calorie protein shake for him, it has a “weird” texture. :rolleyes:

Dating someone with eating habits this pathological is like dating a drug addict. You can’t change them so you have to decide whether you can handle them the way they are or move on to somebody else. Chances are, you can do better than a pain in the ass like this.

Jodi nailed it. People can eat the way they are going to eat, but you don’t have to cater to it if you don’t want to.

My husband is a picky eater. I very rarely cook for him. He’s on his own.

He is much much much much better than he used to be, but I’m much much much much happier now that I don’t have to care.

Looking the list over again, it’s really not all *that * dramatic. There are workarounds for everything. I don’t think it’s any different than someone who is a strict vegan or vegetarian or has other dietary restrictions in terms of finding things that you both can eat.

If I didn’t know any better I’d swear you were dating my ex-girlfriend. Her pathological pickiness wasn’t the reason she’s my ex, but it certainly isn’t one of the things I remember fondly.

Like Jodi said, obsessive pickiness can be stifling and boring, and it can really suck the joy out of the dining experience, particularly when you eat out—when the person is completely unwilling to try new things, and has a detailed list of special requests, the failure to precisely meet any one of which is likely to induce a pouting fit and/or unpleasant confrontation with the server.

Exactly—it’s the kind of thing that one may expect from a child, but in an adult is really unappealing, and (IMO) a relationship deal-breaker.

My wife exhibited some picky eating behavior when we first met, largely due to her being foreign-born and unfamiliar with a lot of “American” cuisine (such as Thai, Mexican, and Chinese food). She’s still not a near-omnivore like I am, but has come an amazingly long way and we’re able to find meals that satisfy both of us no matter where we go.

Excepting Indian food, for some reason. I love it; she can’t bear to be anywhere near it. Can’t win 'em all.

I don’t think you’re a control freak by any stretch, Incubus, but I do sympathize. Good luck.

I can’t offer much, because it would be a deal breaker for me, and I would have noticed it by the third date.

The first real date I had with my wife was going over to her house and cooking for her. We spend hours together in the kitchen each week, not to mention our trips to new restaurants, foreign grocery stores, farmer’s market, the regular grocery store.

Enjoying eating together is as important to me as enjoying sleeping together, and the scales probably tilt more toward the “eating” part with each passing year.

Honestly, if you need help coping with this habit so early on in the relationship, you should probably just consider it a deal breaker and walk away now. It’ll save you a lot of time and stress. She’s probably not going to quit being this way any time soon and you’re probably not going to ever stop finding it aggravating.

This is one of those things that over time can greatly affect how you view someone and erode whatever good feelings you have about them, no matter how hard you tell yourself that it shouldn’t matter.

Maybe that’s why it wouldn’t bother me so much. Don’t get me wrong, I like to eat, but food isn’t a big deal to me. I don’t enjoy going out to dinner, and hate food shopping.

Holy crap, are you kidding?

She likes burgers, chicken, shrimp, pasta. Even smooth peanut butter. You have a lot to work with there, she eats beef/chicken/seafood and pasta. She just has weird eating habits.

What does she have to eat for you to stick around? :smiley: I doubt if she can be your partner on Amazing Race or make it on Survivor, but it’s not that bad.

I can’t help but view this sort of behavior as being incredibly juvenile and hinting at far deeper and more distressing issues. My sister-in-law (24) is a total headcase like this when it comes to eating, and the only thing more irritating than it is the way that my wife’s parents completely indulge and cater to it at every opportunity, derailing what would have otherwise been pleasant meals for the rest of us.

Of course, she may get the hint when you have to “work late” every night, and you come home with hot sauce on your collar.

Seriously, I wonder how you could help someone like that if it were appropriate to do so. It’s possible that she has something physical wrong with her and she doesn’t know how to articulate it. I heard about a young boy who would only eat cookies – turns out everything else gave him severe reflux.

But much more likely, it’s psychological. I’m constantly amazed at how many issues people can have around food. I think that “nothing can touch anything else on my plate” and “I have to finish one thing before I can start on another” are the top two.

Do psychologists sometimes specialize in these things? Some overeating issues, sure, but pickiness?

Question-could you have dealt with it if she didn’t constantly ask about your drinking habits? If she had just been content to drink her coke, while you’d drink a beer, would that have worked out?