I saved my clothes by switching from antiperspirant to deodorant. I’m allergic to some natural brands but others are fine. I have used both roll ons and the rock kind with success - it can take some trial and errors but not ruining the clothes makes it worthwhile.
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Just got back from out of town last night! Saved money on the trip by packing lots of snacks and lunch for the car ride there. Right when we got home I started cooking - this was the best food plan I’ve ever had for travel! I kept a bag of potatoes and a bag of carrots in the house while we were gone, and when I came in I immediately took sausages out of the freezer. I unpacked and cooked at the same time and just made a big sheet pan style meal by baking it all (diced potato and carrots and garlic first, tossed in spices and oil, and baked that ahead of everything else, then added the sausages, then topped with thinly sliced purple onion until those crisped up. Perfect just came home meal! I also have grocery delivery coming today which is perfect because I had PT this morning (terrible planning example) and I am beat.
It was worth it though! First night we’ve spent away since pre-covid! It was nice to be in a hotel and socialize so much and their kids are awesome. We might vacation together next summer on a more extended basis!
If I can just pick the tiniest bone, lol
I always forget that not everyone eats the way I do. Big eaters, you will feel me on this, I am sure. DH’s family is super nice, fun to be around, welcoming, etc., but they are not from a big hospitality culture like I am. Like you have to ask for things like water, etc. and they want you to help yourself, which I’m used to because a lot of people here are like that even though I don’t prefer it. But the portions!
Y’ALL.
At one point they offered to cut my dinner chicken breast IN HALF before serving it to me and I was like “no!!!” and practically leapt over the table to protect it with my body, lol. At first I thought it was a size perception thing, bc people do sometimes assume I don’t eat very much, but then they did it to their pieces! Like they each ate half of a piece of chicken. In my family the only people who eat partial pieces of chicken are like…babies?
Then the next day we had salad with the leftovers from the chicken they had grilled and I honestly could have had double the serving I took but there wasn’t that much so I was like…I didn’t feel like I can take the amount I really want? Because then there wouldn’t be enough for everyone. But they seemed like, totally fine, for hours on just that. I was so happy when we went out to eat, lol. I ate a giant pile of squid 
and I finally felt better! Now I know for next time- like if we vacation with them at the cabin up north um…I am going to make sure I buy us lots of extra food and cook several of the nights, lol.
I asked dh and he said he was hungry the whole time too and pointed out that we were both the last ones eating at every meal, lol. We kept stuffing jerky and nuts into our faces in the car! I felt like my energy was so much lower though; not eating enough tires me out really fast.
ETA: Oh and just in case this came into anyone’s mind: they are not poor. I’d never complain at all if it were a “this is all we have” situation.
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On portion sizes - I feel this every time we visit certain family members. I have definitely been like “Oh I have a ton of snacks squirreled away for my kid to eat in the car, yup, that’s the reason why.” But also in case we adults need snacks later.
We were out of town this weekend too and accidentally had an extra meal planned for last week (quesadillas), that was very handy because when we got home I was able to make it for dinner instead of us having to rush out to the grocery store at the busiest time of the weekend.
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I don’t understand it! Are they wizards? Like how can you have energy to do anything if you’re not putting fuel in??? I CRY ALCHEMY!!!
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One person who is like this is also the “start cleaning up the nanosecond I’m done eating” so I’m still eating while stuff is being cleaned up around me … I just have to remember when I’m visiting to focus on eating rather than talking and try to get as close as I can to shoveling my food in without actually shoveling my food in.
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This sounds v stressful 
I kept rushing too because I didn’t want everyone just…sitting and waiting for me. I guess with servings they must think, “there are no leftovers therefor this was the right amount of food!” whereas I would think, “uh-oh, there were no leftovers, what if someone wanted more and didn’t get enough?” and then I’d double it the next time, haha.
They’re super nice though! Like otherwise it was a great time. I just couldn’t figure out a polite way to say, “You have to feed an AllHat more than this for it to thrive.”
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OMG YES.
Summary
The biggest issues with SirB and my families are around meal timing- no one has ANY urgency to eat, they’ll do tiny snacking all day and just eat one dinner like… whenever it happens? 9-10pm when I want to be asleep, and it takes like 3 hours of 6 people aimlessly puttering to make it? And by 6:30 I’m ready to stab someone 
but yes SirB’s family literally has no food in their house, and when they do cook it’s not nearly enough. Or it is, but only because they’re awful cooks and you don’t want to eat much and you’re left hungry either way. 
near as I can tell, there’s 3 main mechanisms for all of them eating so little. 1, late at night snacking. 2, lots of alcohol. 3, every few days they go to restaurants or fast food and eat 4000% of any other day on those occasions. Oh and I suppose point 4, my MIL being basically a foot shorter than I am
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I think its a thing with people who snack a lot to not eat full meals. Also depends on carb and fat ratios. I’m gluten free so snacking on pretzels or cookies isnt usually in the cards for me. I don’t have enough money to regularly eat pints of sugar filled berries. I never drink soda, regular or diet. If they do anything like this regularly it, I would guess it reduces the amount of calories they need at meals. Or if they dont ~exercise much, especially if car dependent. I walk constantly but dont really do athletic exercise/gym and I feel I have higher calorie needs on some days than a person who goes to the gym for an average workout but otherwise doesnt move all day.
I eat massive amounts of food, especially at lunch. Like an hour lunch break was barely enough time to refuel as much as I’d like to. I also prefer to get the calories and satiety before I need it, not refueling after I’m already physically exhausted and cranky. Some people don’t understand that hangry is optional.
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Quit calling out my Anxiety! I had to go to therapy to learn this lmao. Simple truths…
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Hahaha, I mean its common but I dont accept hangry as an excuse for anything if the food source was available.
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!00% fair. Mostly the hanger was me turning on myself. I hope. Lol
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When I wait too long to eat (hangry) I feel like I can’t eat very much? Like I feel almost nauseous, so I always try to eat when I first get hungry. I think this volume eating difference must be a snacking thing- I don’t eat a lot of snacks unless I’m working out a ton and need extra on top of meals. If I’m not working out a lot my calories are almost all from meals. They also ate a lot when we went out to eat, so maybe it’s just like: restaurant food and snacks is most of their food but when they have actual meals at home they eat less- and it just so happened we were kind of dependent on them cooking the first day and a half. Next trip I will suggest a restaurant a lot sooner!
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Reading all this brings out considerable frustrations on my part. We recently had company with two preteen/teen daughters. Hubby makes breakfast here on Sundays, usually pancakes. With 5 people here, 2 being those kids, I asked him to triple the recipe, which normally serves we two senior adults. He only doubled it and we ran out of pancakes. When I called him on it he said it was just the right amount…there were none left!
I was some ticked! I had thrown everything I could at that table in the way of toppings and asked if anyone wanted eggs. There was nothing left…nothing…. I was embarrassed. Hubby is like “What’s your problem? There’s nothing left!” 
I’ve been on the other end of this too. My sisters are frequently judging what I eat and how much. I find I have to eat regular balanced meals at certain times of day. If I don’t then I’m absolutely ravenous for the next one. Plus I get incredible sugar/salt/fat cravings. Think potato chips, cinnamon buns, etc…. Sorry, fresh fruit and veggie sticks don’t cut it for me. 
.
This last trip I wasn’t eating regularly. On Day 5 we headed to DSIS#1’s house. We skipped lunch and ate sticky buns around 2 PM while travelling. Hubby thought that totally acceptable. I was too tired to complain. By the time I reached DSIS#1’s place I was desperate for food! She didn’t feed us until 8 PM.
My system can’t take it. I found old sugary junk food in containers in her dining room and ate some of that, all the while under her judgemental eye. After consulting with her adult daughter, I cooked supper for a more reasonable hour the next night.
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It’s good to know other people have this happen too! Mostly because I’m working really hard on assertiveness in therapy and I often think things are rude to bring up, or can’t be asked, but then there is a super obvious way to just say it. So I’m weirdly relieved that other people also haven’t figured out a way to be like…I need more food than you are giving me, lol.
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My disjointed thoughts and off topic rant.
The no food left thing may also be from a culture where waste is Bad.
Also, I don’t eat much and I physically can’t eat fast or I end up gagging. I “snack” by having 6 set small meals a day, and if possible front load my food in the morning when I’m awake enough to eat it.
I have problems when my hosts serve my plate, because then i waste food - i will not eat what i don’t want to eat.
I don’t serve my guests enough and I am working on learning that. As a host, YES PLEASE TELL ME YOU’RE STILL HUNGRY and also give me a moment to work it out because I can’t give you food off the top of my head, I have to think about it and I am a slow thinker.
BUT ALSO for the love of dog one reason I dont know how to host is because of the culture that has Mum/ older ladies shoo everyone out of the kitchen, because in my generation they forgot to let at least the younger women back in to learn, and there’s this generation hole of knowledge. My MIL does this and apparently I’m more upset about it than I realised because her son is SO stressed about hosting and social events because she never passed on the knowledge and hoards it and it is a big problem for us because he is already stressed by social things for other reasons. Gaaaaaaah.
Also I’ve eaten at so many houses where I simply cannot eat the food or they serve way, way too late and seem to get by on infrequent meals or are just working on a different timezone to me. I always take snacks to get me through.
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This made me laugh so hard.
I am not about food portions being selected and served to me. One of my friends is like this in CO and she and her husband cook exactly three portions of food when I come over. So I always make sure to eat a snack before I go for dinner, because I know I’ll still be hungry! But I grew up with aunts who were major food pushers, so it’s so weird to be served a specific portion of food, and like…that’s all there is! An exact amount for everyone to have exactly one small serving. My Nonna would be rolling in her grave, haha. I thought everyone always made enough to have leftovers for a week, and to send people home with their own leftovers, too! If I run out when I serve guests I feel really self conscious, like I assumed no one wanted to take home any for tomorrow.
I also think a lot of people aren’t necessarily very in tune to their hunger, energy levels, mood and all of it’s interconnectedness. I know I need to eat XX amount at XX time if I want to keep being happy and delightful to be around. I think a lot of people maybe don’t realize like, oh I’m really wiped out and annoyed, I should eat a snack or meal. If I’m with people who maybe don’t eat as much/as often as me, I’ll often suggest like…hey we should get a snack, and what do you know! Everyone is happier after haha
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Oh yeah. So I am around people who can eat larger meals infrequently, so they do! I can’t, my body doesnt work that way, so they THINK i eat less but its just spread differently through the day.
That said I idolize the nonnas of the world and aspire to be able to make enough food for everyone to take some home.
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The waste thing hadn’t occurred to me @LadyDuck but I know some people don’t eat leftovers? Which like…is totally bizarre to me. But yeah if you don’t eat leftovers and you don’t like waste you’d pretty much have to skew towards less food.
That’s why I don’t ask! Because I feel like (and maybe this is v unfair) if you run out of food you’re probably not super comfortable hosting, and probably can’t whip something up/don’t have a backup meal waiting in your fridge? Like I don’t want people feel like they are scrambling or messed up or something because I know a lot of people have so much anxiety around hosting.
That’s so fascinating! Do you know why they didn’t pass it on?! In my family you (if you’re female) start helping in the kitchen right away, from a really young age. I feel really lucky because it doesn’t feel like something I had to learn at all, just something natural. I also generally like it though, like I enjoyed serving in restaurants too. I have a heart for that type of thing. It makes me feel connected.
Haha, yeah you would relate! 
That’s a really good point. My body is so fucking high maintenance I’m like, unfortunately in tune, lol.
This is exactly why I always have appetizers and grazing snacks too! I noticed early in my hosting that some people like to graze rather than eat a lot at once. I like to have stuff I put out before anyone arrives and that just stays out the whole time people are over- and there are always a few pickers who go back for more hours after dinner! Once I had a dinner party that lasted so long we ended up taking alllll of the leftovers out of the fridge and reheating them and eating again, lol. After that I decided having grazing snacks was a good bet for the future because it was kind of a huge PITA to clean everything twice (sans dishwasher at the time).
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I felt these words in my soul.
(ETA cut away to the scene of young BJ, just a CNA, passing out cold on a patients bedside table in the hospital because she missed lunch)
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I dont know. But like, we are asking to help and my MIL will not let us even help with the dishes, my grandma wouldn’t let us help, grandma on the other side expected her own kids but not us, my parents wave us away (or especially if its dinner I might be so tired I’m falling over anyway, though my parents tend to serve me at a more reasonable hour closer to 6pm). It is so frustrating. My family are similar but not as bad? I dont know why! Probably I’m too close to the source to work it out. My family are getting better at involving us in potluck style now that we are OBVIOUSLY all adults. Nothing to out you off like constantly offering and being turned down, but now we are more insistent and no longer phrase as a question “we’re bringing food. X Or Y?” I am the eldest grandchild and in fact our oldest cousin is a year younger than my youngest sister (so a decade older than me), there was never a warm tumble of cousins to help or anything. My children are in danger of the same and I am trying hard to change it for them, involving in the kitchen and serving even if I can’t give them cousins their own age. I’m closer in age to my aunts on one side than my cousins.
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