Help me deal with my picky girlfriend

In My Humble Opinion
61

Exactly. A power struggle isn’t going to make anyone enjoy any activity more- it’s more likely to do the exact opposite. And a power struggle is what you’re going to get if you try to reform her eating habits against her will.

Someone forcing her to eat certain foods whether she liked them or not may well be one of the psychological issues behind her extreme pickiness.

But you have to admit, she has a breathtaking lack of tact and social skills in this department. I mean, I don’t really get why people enjoy watching sports, but I wouldn’t accept an invitation to someone’s Super Bowl party and then ask if I can watch something else in the other room.

Or she could have been vegetarian or kept kosher or something like that. Those of us with that sort of dietary restriction do try to find a way to let a host know before we accept a dinner invitation.

62

Ignorance of good manners does not excuse rudeness, in the absence of truly mitigating factors (like, say, you’re from another country and honestly don’t know what is rude and what isn’t). If she can think, she should be able to foresee that a person who has put in the time and effort to prepare food and offer it to others in a social setting would not appreciate having their offering refused, with the “guest’s” preference for nuked crap out of a box made explicit when she requests to be served that “instead.”

Anyone who thinks that eating is merely a biological function to be endured needs to tend their fuel-needs at home alone in private, just as they do the rest of their biological functions. I mean, really: The girl might not have known how rude she was being – I’m willing to give her the benefit of the doubt and say she didn’t – but that doesn’t change the fact that she was really amazingly rude – rude enough to embarrass her boyfriend. I congratulate the host on refusing to make her anything else. I can’t imagine she’d ever be invited back again.

Which reminds me of another point – Doesn’t she see how this makes other people perceive her? I mean, what if the hosts were willing to indulge this behavior: “Tonight we’re having coq au vin with hearts of palm salad. And for Gina, a hot pocket. Here you go, dear.” It’s infantilizing. You’re not treated as an adult, a true guest who can be expected to participate fully in the ritual of the sit-down meal; you’re the equivalent of a four-year-old, given mac’n’cheese while “the grownups” eat “real” food. You become “that girl Incubus dates who won’t eat anything.” (“And then she asked Tony to make her a hot pocket instead! Can you imagine?”) Why would she want to be that person?

63

I find it funny that many posts point out that she is a grown up, and that just as many point out that she is acting worse than a 2 year old.

I work with a girl that eats like that. My sister in law eats nothing other than cheese pizzas and chicken fingers with french fries.

It drives me fucking batty. Now, my SIL is mildly retarded, spoiled and ill-mannered, she chews with her mouth open, smacking away. Her mother didn’t take the effort to teach her decent table manners.

My coworkers mother came to work with us for a while and told us very proudly how she never made her children do anything they didn’t want to do and guess what? Her daughter is always, always, always, always sick. Our company changed our sick leave policy because of her. She is good at what she does, in between the whining, but the whining never stops. Her stomach hurts! Jesus Christ, if I pounded down nothing but deep fried chicken every meal, my stomach would hurt too.

It’s self-centered and childish. It’s rude. Oh great, she can make you feel special for eating a SALAD? Good god, that is a pretty low standard. Seriously. How in the heck could you ask for something big when a SALAD is a HUGE accomplishment?

Put me in the corner with the folks who think her development in regards to manners AND food came to a halt in her 2nd year.

A freakin’ Hot Pocket? Those things are disgusting. She doesn’t know what food actually is does she?

64

Raise your hands if you’re suddenly craving ribs, corn, and salad.

::raises hand::

65

Yup ::raises hand::

66

That’s not what the OP said. He said she would eat fast food burgers with ketchup only, chicken in just one dish (with no variations on toppings), shrimp prepared in one way only (fried), and pasta with a single sauce on it.

It doesn’t sound like she’s willing to eat a variety of foods; it sounds like she’s willing to eat a few dishes, and that’s it.

I’m not sure what to tell you, Incubus. I’d never even have gotten past the first dinner date with someone that picky. Several of my first dates have been at my place, with me cooking. And I’d have been insulted if anyone asked to be given junk food instead of the meal I’d made from scratch.

I do agree that the rudeness is a bigger issue than the limited food, but her food options are so limited that she seems bound to run into standard etiquette problems.

67

Yes. Two couples that are good friends of mine went through a kind of “conversion” process after moving in together, synchronizing their diets, and I’m sure avoiding conflict was part of the reasoning.

In one of the couples, the husband is a vegan and the new bride gave up meat, but still occasionally indulges in dairy. He claims not to care, but I swear I sense some underlying tension about it when I’ve eaten with them. I predict that within a year or two, either she’ll have gone vegan too or their marriage will be faltering.

68

Not being able to see her body language or tone of voice, I interpret this as her being coy and teasing. “What are we having?” can be taken many ways, and the first one that came to my mind would definitely not be that she wanted to object to the food. Instead, maybe she wanted to anticipate the event. Too bad you had to let her down with something bad. :wink:

As far as Incubus’s gf, I cannot even fathom dating someone like that. My brother did for a while, and it was a big PITA for the rest of the family to put up with her.

As a side note, if you’re looking to improve someone’s food pickiness, send them into the Peace Corps. The same brother used to be a picky eater. Did a turn in the Peace Corps, where you eat what you can or you don’t eat, and now that he’s back? He’ll eat anything you serve him.

69

Or, who knows, maybe she wanted to bring along a nice wine to go with it.

That sort of thing is very difficult. Couples who keep kosher usually agree to one standard of kashrut for the household; they don’t each try to maintain whatever standard they had before moving in together.

70

Oh my God!
The ex sister in law only ate Chicken fingers burried in salt. A couple tablespoons full. Have you ever seen salt an eigth inch thick on a chicken finger? Hashbrowns done to a specific stage. Chief Boyardee cheese pizzia from the box. Her tastes in booze however included everything. She could handle a cheese only pizza at a pizzia joint if they didn’t allow any bown spot on the cheese when it baked. Try and guess how many times she got a pizza that she ate. On camping trips she did eat fire grilled beef tenderloin and bread sticks, but at no other time.

71

The best way to break down the food fuss, is to do something all day that leaves you exhausted and starving. You eat at least some of anything put in front of you at that point. It sounds like that would never happen to her though.

72

Here’s another vote for the girlfriend acting childish. Not only did she turn down the mother’s boyfriend’s homemade food, she asked HIM to make HER a hot pocket. It’s one thing to turn down the food, it’s another to tell that same cook to nuke some college student fodder for her. The least she could have done was say “I’d rather not have ribs” and then microwave her own damn hot pocket.

And good for Incubus’s mom’s boyfriend for saying no! I would have been too dumbfounded to say anything.

I’d dump her because that’s way too high maintenance for me. I’d rather not spend the rest of my life having to explain away her behavior and apologizing for her etiquette breaches.

73

I can see where that would be a necessity! I think with the vegetarian/meat eating families, they end up not having too much meat at home, because it’s too difficult. We socialize a lot with one of the couples, as they live close by. The guy, who is the meat-eater, likes to have a lot of dinner parties, as it gives him an excuse to make meat dishes for himself & the guests!

74

I told my husband about this thread and the pile of peanuts and his response was:
“As soon as she’s done making that pile of peanuts, she can get the hell out.”

75

I am a picky eater, though I can generally find something to eat at any resturaunt and I will just eat what I like when served food at a gathering. I have never been so crass as to ask someone to make me something else when they prepared something very carefully.
That being said, I do not eat seafood of any kind. If it came out of the water I don’t want to have anything to do with it and the smell kind of makes me ill. I can go to red lobster or joe’s crab shack and eat my burger and be perfectly okay with everyone else eating whatever they like, but the whole time I am praying for the smell to go away.

If you made me dinner and specifically made seafood knowing I don’t like it and won’t eat it simply because you feel I need to have the “experience” of eating something different I would have broken up with you right there. If you can’t make at least 1 thing you know she likes when you are purposely preparing food for the both of you that makes you rude as well, not just her.

Something tells me you would freak out if she pulled the weeds out of the garden and put them in a salad bowl next to an old pizza she pulled out of the trash and expected you to eat it. Essentially this is what you are doing to her when you make her food because you feel like she should try it. If you really want her to start trying new things, make yourself a fantastic smelling meal and leave her to make a sandwich. If you do this enough either you will realize you can eat without worrying about her or she will start to wonder about all the wonderful foods you eat and want to try them on her own. She is very rude for the hot pocket incident, but you are also rude for trying to force her to eat things she doesn’t want. If you can’t let it go and just accept her for who she is you should break up with her as much for her as for you. She shouldn’t have to have a boyfriend who feels he needs to change her.

76

My husband is a vegetarian and I’m not. Fortunately, he’s an incredible cook as well. It helps that we’re very tolerant of each other. I don’t cook meat in the house and he doesn’t freak out if my mom serves something with chicken stock in it. The hardest part is holiday meals–to me, Easter dinner means ham and Thanksgiving means turkey. But he’s cool with that, as long as he’s not expected to partake. He loads up on the side dishes and veggies instead.

As for the girlfriend,

this rings so true to me. I had a friend whose husband had very similar tastes to Incubus’s girlfriend. They turned down a lot of social invitations, especially to dinner parties, because he didn’t want to eat what was offered.

77

Are you sure that’s how she meant it? I could see myself saying that as in, “Oh, that sounds great-what are we having?” I often ask because I’m interested, not because I’m picky.

Totally-it’s not her pickiness, it’s her complete and utter lack of manners.

pbbth, again, this is a person who:

And she did this at someone else’s home. That’s beyond disgusting.

78

Yes, in the sense that giving someone a gift-wrapped diamond necklace for her birthday is exactly like giving her a chunk of dried dog vomit wrapped in a soiled diaper.

Which is to say not at all.

79

You know, the more I think about this thread, the less I sure I am that I agree with the point of view that this girl is too picky, rude, and childish to put up with for any length of time.

Now yes, asking for a Hot Pocket rather than trying the food that had been cooked for everyone’s enjoyment is kind of sad.

And yes, since this girl has no known allergies, religious restrictions, or other reasons she can’t eat certain foods, just extreme pickiness, it’s hard to feel a lot of sympathy for her, and easy to find her annoying.

On the other hand, sometimes as a good host one does need to make accommodations for someone else’s food choices, whether it is mere pickiness or has something else behind it.

And so my sister-in-law ate leftover lasagna with her daughters–not yet two and not yet four–while the rest of the family ate a meal containing significant quantities of (fake) crab meat. And she ate a small portion of lamb (and normal-sized portions of side dishes) the day we had lamb. And sampled a couple of dishes she wasn’t sure she’d like on other occassions, knowing that if she didn’t like it, there was other food available to her–and we wouldn’t force her to eat unfamiliar food or go hungry till the next meal. (Sister-in-law has come a long way since she married my brother. She was never as picky as this picky girlfriend we are analyzing, but there are a lot of foods that she didn’t used to like. She’s expanded what she’s willing to eat significantly in the more than 5 years that I’ve known her. I think part of this is being married to my brother, who will eat just about anything except pickles, and part of it is just growing up. She cooks, and I think having control over what goes into her meals has helped her to develop a better sense of just what she really does and doesn’t like. She’ll never be as adventurous an eater as my brother, but that’s ok.)

On other occassions, I’ve helped entertain a gentleman who can’t eat lactose or gluten. This means no flour and no dairy products. This can be a nuisance–either one is fairly easy to skip, but needing to omit both becomes a hassle, especially if one is thinking “I’ll serve 7-layer mexican bean dip (with cheese and sour cream), and mini-cheesecakes, and fancy Christmas baked goods” . . . On one occasion we fixed a whole bunch of foods he couldn’t eat–because we were hosting an Open House for 30–but made sure he still had a selection of foods available. On another, we made sure that 80% or more of the food did not contain dairy or wheat. And he and his wife were so pleased that I’d fixed “Five layer Mexican Bean dip” just for him, it was silly–but he’s been places where people didn’t bother to acknowledge his dietary restrictions (and yes, they knew in advance) and were unable to offer him anything to eat.

So Incubus, if you want my advice, you need to think about whether your picky girlfriend’s eating habits (as they are now) are something that you are willing to put up with for the rest of your life/the duration of your relationship. It’s ok to think that she should change her eating habits, or her response to being offered food that isn’t to her taste. But you need to consider whether you are willing to put up with them for the long run if she doesn’t make changes.

And I think you need to back off on trying to change her. I understand the temptation, especially when you are offering food which is enjoyed by most people and which is healthier than her usual preferences, but she is an adult and responsible for herself. If she’s been a picky eater all her life, eight months isn’t very much time to try to establish new habits. Give her choices, don’t treat her like a child, and don’t let making her eat better become the centerpiece of your relationship.

80

Assuming all else is relatively well, it would probably be stupid to break up over this, I agree with you on that. Everybody has a bizarre idiosyncrasy or two (or twenty), and the more you know someone the more you’ll find. Food is one of those things that people can be quite strange and stubborn about, so I wouldn’t bother trying to fix it so much as decide, as **tdn ** suggested, whether it’s a priority, or whether you can let it go.

The rudeness aspect? Who knows what her thought process there was, but I’d let her know that it pissed you off. If you can’t discuss it with her (and the fact that you’re posting about it here suggests that), then probably there’s problems in the relationship that *would * be worthy of considering parting ways.