Helena, you have been seen and heard. I have one exceptionally picky eater, one who resents all eating rules, one with a huge appetite, I want everyone to eat healthy. I do have one advantage and secret weapon - DH is an exceptional cook!

Oh my word, Helena, I surely hear you. For me, it's not a daily source of stress (it's just Mr. A and myself and he is very easy to please). But the extended family, oy.

I will give you two chuckles. One, a former sister-in-law used to have one of those faux-farmhouse painted signs on the wall in her kitchen that said "There are two choices for dinner: 1. TAKE IT. 2. LEAVE IT"

Second, I'm attaching a favorite Roz Chast cartoon called The Last Thanksgiving. Last Thanksgiving I drove myself nuts with pretty much this cartoon crowd around my table, but that's once a year. What you're describing is much more stressful.

Also, in case it helps, I will say that when my son was a child and the cousins visited in the summer, I would set up one section of a shelf in the refrigerator labeled THE HELP YOURSELF SHELF. Everything on it was reasonably nutritious and the kids could take whatever whenever. Baby carrots, grapes, string cheese, peanut butter crackers, you get the idea. Your family's shelf would have different contents, of course, but I found that if I was alone in the kitchen stocking that shelf, it was less frazzling than having kids underfoot asking me for snacks all day. There might be a way to adapt that practice for your frustrating situation.

Completely different issue over here, but right now I’m really feeling you on family members thinking they world revolves around them.

I say if they can cook for themselves, let them do it, at least some of the time!
Here I'll cook on my days off, or if I'm off work earlier, and let the fam fend for themselves otherwise. I definitely prefer to eat healthier than DH, and mom is more like me in eating. I'm veg, DH isn't, but he doesn't like cheese, which I do. He likes to get way more junk food than I would, but he does some of the shopping cause I hate it. I go to the farm every week, and bring home fresh produce, and have everything washed and cut and ready to go so the weekdays are easy. For quick stuff, we have microwavable meals. If DH wants meat he does it that way.

When I cook, it's Beyond Burgers, pasta, beans and rice, salads, falafel, couscous, quinoa, veg tacos, curries, stir fry veggies, avocado toast- things I know he and mom like. I leave the cheese off DHs.
I don't mind cooking cause I prefer healthy food to microwave meals, but I definitely don't consider it my job to feed everyone all the time.
ETA I do not meal plan. I Just keep staples like grains, beans, nuts, sauces, olive oil, fresh and frozen produce handy to whip together. Nothing I make takes more than half hour including prep.

Oh my gosh everyone, I'm so sorry I'm not responding to each comment individually but I have read every one and am SO appreciative to all of you! Thank you for sharing your laughs, shared commiseration, suggestions, tips, tools, therapeutic support and kindness with me!

The resources around the Ellyn Sater institute are amazing and have some terrific reminders and tips - thank you so much!

Rachy, I laughed at your rice story ... as a girl raised in an Irish household, it was always potatoes. In Ireland a boiled potato was always served as a side, even when the main was pasta And I'll be honest, I never turned it down - carbs for life!!

It is so helpful to hear everyone's different stories about their kids, friends and relatives ... a great reminder that this is not a 'me' issue. I was feeling like a right failure, but now feel a thousand times better so huge love to everyone for sharing.

Peri, thank you so much for your supportive comments! In fairness part of it is because he works a super-stressful job whereas I work from home part-time ... so the division of labour makes sense. However, you are right where there was definitely a bit of a 1950s vibe happening that needed to be corrected and to his credit, DH does *try* to be supportive and has gotten much more careful with his urge to critique! And I need to be more clear about what I want and need - not a strong point for this people-pleaser but I'm working on it! I realize I've taken on the responsibility of making everyone happy, which of course never works, so I'm working on correcting that mentality, starting with making myself happy once in a while

Bijou and April, lol!!

Suz so glad your baby has gotten through their struggle in such a positive way xx

Thank you thank you thank you all, I can't say it enough. My gratitude list had this community as the number 1 item this a.m. and it's true as can be. You are all amazing xoxoxo

I hear your frustration. Helena. Cooking for Mr. ND is enough for me to tear out what little hair I have. He sometimes will make a sandwich even when I have cooked a nice meal for us...GRR!!! Anyway, I just make what I like and if Mr. ND eats it, that's great. If not, I've decided not to sweat it anymore. He's an adult and can feed himself.

Well, I hear you!

Here's my recipe for you...

Put on some music that you love. (Stephane Grapelli was my cooking music at one time, when we had records for gosh sakes.)

Pour yourself a glass of wine.

Put a tablecloth on the table. Put candles on. Light them.

Pull out some pretty platters and pile them with what you've already bought...good news, ANYONE can buy these, not just you. And anyone can actually put them on the table, though you may need to inspire them.

Two or three of these things: rotisserie chickens, humus and veggies, baguettes, olives, sliced meats and cheese, tortillas. Fresh fruit, simple salad (already washed lettuce and bottle dressing). Meals can simply be assembly, not complicated recipes.

I once read that Alice Waters of Chez Panisse restaurant said her favorite meals started with toast! Toast! I once knew a family that in the summer had "corn feeds" where they'd only have corn, piled high.

Start having a conversation jar to shift away from complaints about the food to other subjects, they are really fun.

Basically shifting from duty to joy.

Here's the music https://open.spotify.com/album.....1iurxsjTtw

ND high five to picky husbands! And Judy this sounds wonderful ... I think I shall do this at least once a week ... a lovely grazing table with something for everyone (and plenty for me )

It's frustrating how unappreciative people can be towards what food is made and served to them - it's a problem not only at home but when people eat out as well - or even sometimes when they are guests at other people's houses! UGH! Expectations for what they want far outweigh a lot of people's willingness to contribute to what they get it seems. You've gotten great advice here - self care has to be a priority!

Judy, that sounds great!

Also, Helena, when my son was growing up, we had "Every Man or Woman for Him- or Herself Night" once a week.

I like your new strategy. Stick with it. When DH retired I gave him the important job of cooking. It has not worked. I do not believe in making special meals for anyone simply because they do not like it.he makes hot dogs for the grandchildren. I consider hot dogs child abuse. Luckily most gets thrown away.

Oh my. I sympathize even though I’ve not really had this struggle. My attitude would be what my mom’s was: this is what is being served. Eat it, or make something yourself. Maybe that sounds easier said than done, but I have little love for cooking (although much more for it now than I did a couple of years ago), and I would have very little patience for criticism after all that effort. Thankfully my husband is hugely appreciative of my newly-developed cooking skill, and thanks me every time I cook, even if it’s just pasta with jarred sauce and some steamed veggies on the side.

Janet, that is very much easier said than done when certain foods/textures make people wretch! As I mentioned above, the “take it or leave it” approach might work with allistics, but not with everyone.

One more quick little suggestion, haha.
https://www.instagram.com/reel.....MyMTA2M2Y=

Yes, I grew up like that too, Janet. My poor mother, we (five kids) probably complained about the food, but there was never another choice, so we ate it. (We had to wash the dishes starting at a young age too...but that's another thread). As teenagers, if for some reason we weren't home at the dinner hour, we missed dinner..so mostly we were there! The idea of making separate meals or saving a dinner for someone who's not there just wasn't happening during those years (we were born in the 50's). I think my mom felt responsible for serving a dinner each night, and she did without fail, thank you mom...for seven people!... but after we reached a certain age, while there was dinner on the table, she didn't make herself responsible for us eating it. That's an impossible thankless job!

Oh Helena,l hear you!One of the many things women have to do that gets no credit at all is try and please everyone with their diets and usually foregoing their own needs in the process.l often wonder how people coped in the old days where what was on the table was all there was so you ate it or you starved.l guess they ate it!I haven’t read everyone else responses but having had experience of extreme fussiness in family members l feel your pain.l can’t make this go away for you but l can tell you what l did.l don’t know if any of this will help but here goes.No snacks in between meals for anyone if you aren’t hungry enough to eat your dinner you don’t need snacks,ditto pudding.(l know ,harsh!l hardly recognise myself)l would accommodate likes/dislikes that were reasonable ie my daughter can’t tolerate chillies on the other hand she’s never knowingly eaten a vegetable so that’s not reasonable!l also handed pack lunches over to school dinners so l didn’t know or care whether she ate it or not.l never made any comment on whether things were eaten or not,just cleared it away,it’s really important to try and take the emotion out of it.l know ,not easy.
Now she’s older her health is up to her so l just cook and put it on the table,if she doesn’t want it ,more for me!DH is also Uber fussy but he’s a grown up so can take care of himself,l do still compromise for him as it’s harder with a partner isn’t it.l always have loads of veggies which l will share but if he doesn’t eat them ,l do.ll also think it’s important to minimise the effort of cooking.By all means go healthy but don’t sweat over it for hours.It’s much harder to be un-emotional about food when you ve invested so much time into the preparation.
Getting the kids to cook once a week with the proviso that it is healthy so they can see the amount of time and effort it takes to produce a meal can help although that in its self can be very stressful l know.
Maybe go out yourself once a week with a girlfriend and have a healthy meal together and leave them to get on with it!

I found myself wondering after I posted and reading Cardiff Girl...if the shift from the "old days" you referred to where you ate what was served, to now, is a shift of focus on the part of the parent...?

I hear parents today say: "I just want my children to be happy". I think what my parents were focussing on was: "I want to provide for my children". And they did, they provided us with a home, and food and clothing. The happiness was up to us, within what was provided to us. In many ways, we were "raised" not parented, which has it's plusses and minus's. We got to experience much more and make mistakes...and build confidence in the process. I hope I did that with my own sons.

The catering to and helicopter parenting I see today seems to be trying to make someone ONLY happy. But then, do the children get to learn and cope with unhappiness, or distress, or boredom or any of the other things one has to endure in life? Do they get a chance to learn to regulate themselves?

And if you've ever tried to make someone happy it's a very slippery slope to, well, a bad relationship...(as opposed to say, experiencing life together). "Oh they aren't happy, I'll try harder," and then they still aren't happy..."okay it's up to me"...it's unhealthy for all concerned. And let's face it, babies are often cranky, children can be grumpy and teenagers can be downright surly, so if we think our job is to make everyone happy then we will feel like a failure when they aren't. Maybe "provider" is healthier!

Okay, that's my rant over :).

Well said Judy!

Don’t give up. Our picky eater moved to Japan and now literally eats anything… including chicken feet and animal eye balls, and a very wide assortment of seafood parts that I would choke on. Tomato sauce or pizza sauce do not seem so bad to him now.
Half the family would turn up noses at squid ink pasta, but that is not on the menu anyway. I very what I eat only at supper and then eat very little and low carb. DH complains that I do not get enough protein but he likes a big slab of meat that I find disgusting, do I stick to veggies and add a few carbs with potatoes or low carb pasta or even bread, wrap or tortilla.

What Judy said.

I hated freaking salmon cakes. Mom made them with canned salmon and they were disgusting. She didn’t serve them often, but when she did, I knew I had two options: eat it, or not. I could eat the other items being served (probably green beans and potatoes or something like that), and maybe toast a piece of bread if I just couldn’t make myself eat the salmon cake. I was a picky eater growing up (my sister likes to remind me how few vegetables I actually found acceptable), and now I eat darn near everything. But I learned to not expect the world to revolve around my wishes, and to tolerate eating some things that I did not love. Sometimes I actually learned to appreciate them in time. My parents worked hard to provide for us and also made some meals that they knew I (and/or my older sister) loved,but we learned not to expect that every night’s dinner would be our favorite. Maybe it’s because my parents were children of the Depression who learned to be thankful for what they had, without complaint. So, yeah, I know what Judy is saying.

Oy, I can relate and offer sympathy - I read your post but haven't read through all of the replies. I think I'm still suffering from PTSD from this very similar situation. Probably why I detest cooking shows too. Anyway, I put up with it until high school was over. This on top of all the other household stuff is a lot! Hope that you and your family can come to a solution together!

Ugh, I have nothing to add except sympathy. It’s exhausting and it’s never ending, cooking for a family—doubly so when you’re trying to eat healthy yourself but have to cook enormous portions or different foods for everyone else. Hang in there and don’t forget to take care of your needs, too, Helena. The family will survive.

The people at the Food Network must have heard you. They’re debuting a new show tonight called “It’s CompliPlated,” that features chefs making meals for judges with a variety of picky palates and preferences, allergies, and so forth. The winner who makes the most judge-pleasing meal gets $10,000.

I thought of this thread while reading this article https://cupofjo.com/2022/08/09.....ouse-tour/ the other day. While it's a house tour...and such a good one, in that it's a very real looking, lived in, and loved home in this day and age of instagram perfection...she touches on cooking for people who's preferences and needs don't overlap at all and this link https://cupofjo.com/2020/01/27.....-children/ about how to raise gracious kids.

Wow Helena - I feel for you. Sorry I did not read any responses. I am wfpb vegan nutritarian and my husband, who is now on board, was not on board and my son who body builds has just an awful diet A it's easier when they finally go to college, where I am now. But I used to cook three separate meals. On vat of something healthy for me. One vat of something my husband would eat that was not too egregious. My son got made what he wanted - why because in the end it was easier to do that than to argue. If my kid wanted horrid stuff I did not fight about it. You want cookies for dinner fine. Why because he has finally realized that he needs to take responsibility for what he ingests. So now he eats less egregious stuff - lean clean meats and chicken grilled, eats some salads and a few veggies like broccoli. He still has too many sweets but he's better. Most cost effective is batch cooking. I use a lot of recipes from joel fuhrman's website, minimalist baker, power plates by gina hamshaw. This week it's chickpea mulligatawny. A vegan chili, soup or baker of something veggie, plus salad goes for the week. My husband is not 80 lb down on wfpb and is pretty much on board, except when he's sneaking my son's junk but how will be cleaned out soon when college resumes. So now it's two entrees. Eat it or forage. I still check with my son each week, it changes what he wants and I simply find it easier to accommodate. Yes it would be great to have the family "meal" but it has never worked for me. There is no wrong. There is no have too. There is no competitive mommy prize. Just please make something for yourself to eat. Having to sub optimally forage through the junk is not ok. Once you have something nutritious and delicious to eat each week it will get better. Hugs to you. I love love love to cook and can tell you this stage sucks!! Hang in there!!

Helena, I hear you. The PTSD remains.

Everyone picky in a different direction. Everyone complains. Wants a freshly prepared meal every night and No one eats leftovers.

From infancy, all I hear is: ‘Mom, you need to feed your kid.’ Have no clue about a super sensitive sense of smell or sensory integration or EDNOS. The theoretically good advice of ‘letting her feed herself or she’ll eat when she’s hungry’ means she doesn’t eat …. or gain weight. Ellen Satterly’s book isn’t helpful.

Eventually the picky eating is recognized as an EDNOS later ARFID and we find the right help! And it’s not all my fault!

Today we have a fine adult who manages her own issues with food. All good now …. except sometimes the PTSD creeps in. And we still have multiple different dishes for different people at a meal. But now more people cook. And no one complains. And they eat leftovers too.