"AITA for telling my girlfriend to stop sharing her food?"
My girlfriend always offers to share her food with everyone when we go out to eat. I’ve asked her why she does this, and she says it’s just how she was raised, to always make sure everyone else at the table is taken care of before she eats anything.
I’ve told her multiple times that, while it is an admirable gesture, she doesn’t have to do that, and that no one will judge her for not offering her food because they have their own meals. This isn’t just with shareable items, either.
She will offer bites of her burger, or pasta, or soup, and other things that are simply not easily split, usually ending up with another person taking direct bites or stabbing their used forks and depositing their saliva into her food. Aside from the ick factor, I have also told her that she really needs to avoid offering her meal when we dine out with my friend Brian...
Brian's type of person who has no self-control with food, and zero social awareness to understand that “help yourself” does not mean “you can eat all of it and I won’t mind." This has happened a lot in the past, where he’ll house 90% of a shared appetizer plate because the rest of us were talking and being polite, and he just assumed that meant we weren’t hungry.
I wouldn’t care as much if he paid for it, but he’s almost always broke, and doesn’t seem to understand what tax and tip are. If the item was listed as $11.99 in the menu, when the check comes, he’ll toss in exactly $12 and think he’s square.
I know most of you are going to ask why I’m even still friends with Brian if I hate eating with him, but please understand that he’s a really great guy and a reliable friend, he just has a troublesome relationship with food. That’s not the only facet of his personality, just the only one relevant to this post.
Last night, we were out again with friends, and my girlfriend once again offered her meal to everyone, Brian included. I didn’t want to make a scene, but I gave her a little nudge and she just gave me a shrug in return. Unsurprisingly, Brian ended up eating most of her food (as well as his own plate), and my girlfriend didn’t say anything.
On the way home, she asked if we could stop by a fast food place because she didn’t get much to eat, and I told her she should’ve just eaten the food she ordered instead of offering it to the table. I said this was exactly why I warned her, and that she’s seen the way Brian is with food, and that she shouldn’t have been surprised when he ate more than she was actually intending to let him.
I still stopped to get her something, but I also complained that I don’t enjoy paying for Brian’s meal, since he basically ate all of hers. I might have been harsh, but this has come up multiple times, and she knows I’m not a fan of it.
I could tell she was upset when I said it, and she still is now. She hasn’t called me an ahole, but she’s making me feel like one, and I think we’re both expecting the other to apologize first. So, AITA?
Here's what people had to say to OP:
idkareyousure said:
YTA it only takes 2 seconds to say, “Jesus, Brian, she said TRY.”
BlondDee1970 said:
YTA for blaming your girlfriend rather than addressing Brian's behavior. You'd rather fight with your GF than call out your friend.
PinkNGreenFluoride said:
YTA. You make every excuse under the sun for Brian's relationship with food, but expect your girlfriend to have her own issues around food 100% under control and to be responsible for managing Brian's on top of it. That's BS. No crap she's expecting you to apologize, you've been terribly unfair to her.
Have you talked to Brian about how he should decline when she offers, because of her problematic relationship with food? Which is apparently tied up in having been raised to take care of everyone else before herself?
You're judging and criticizing her for not having completely worked all of that out, while putting the exact same stuff on her, making her responsible for Brian. But you don't hold him to the same standard with her.
Usual-Dragonfly3791 said:
ESH. Your girlfriend for not having stronger boundaries. Brian for being selfish. Lastly and most importantly, you for not standing up to Brian for your girlfriend.
WifesPOSH said:
NTA. I think the ahole calls are a bit harsh. She literally let someone else eat her food to the point of needing to get fast food. I will stab you with my fork before I allow that to happen. OP is right, she needs to stop offering her food to everyone to the point that she doesn't eat.
Brian is still a problem. You think he doesn't know what he's doing? He's being an opportunistic f and no one is saying anything. I'd say you're NTA but Brian is not a good person. You need to change that mindset on your boy, because...I'm getting a warning for what I was about to call Brian, but you get my point.
zombiemiki said:
ESH. You need to actually talk to people. If your girlfriend wants to feed Brian, she can pay for her food. I feel like we’re glossing over Brian, though, who is always broke and eats all the food. Does he actually get enough to eat in general? What’s going on here?