A few details first: My mother is 70, celiac, with RH, and spinal fusion. She is mentally sharp, and she is physically capable of cooking for herself. She lives with us but has her own section (in-law suite) with her own kitchen.
Problem - Mom hates to cook for herself and gets angry at us for not catering to her dietary needs all the time when we cook.
We cook a few times per week (usually Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday) we order out once, and then often visit friends on the weekend in the evenings or eat leftovers.
My husband and I have 2 kids that live with us, and 1 grown kid who is married with a child and often needs our help (they are moving and doing renovations). We both work full-time and have very busy lives, so cooking is pushed to the wayside and we do what we must to get through the days. And we have time, we try to enjoy ourselves a bit and not stress.
Mom has special dietary restrictions, no gluten, and low-fodmap foods, everything makes her poop..literally everything. This makes her list of foods that she actually eats super small. We don't eat that way (it's unhealthy), we enjoy a variety of foods and vegetables and we don't have time to prepare something special for her all the time.
She has all these rules on how to cook the food, etc. It's exhausting. So we typically cook our dinner and let her eat whatever she wants from it. Often times she will take none of it, and then complains and slams her door shut and mutters that she has to cook again.
This is draining for us, as we are not her special food restaurant service/chef, etc. and we don't have the energy to constantly make multiple food items, which end up not getting eaten!
Plus she is capable of cooking! What do we do? How do you handle an expectant mother that thinks we are supposed to cater to her when she is totally capable?
30 Answers
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She demonstrates anger, unrealistic expectations, OCD about rules for cooking, irrationality, and these are all concerning mental behaviors. It will only get worse.
It's time for her to live somewhere else where she can be managed by professional caregivers and her diet will be served to her by chefs trained in such matters.
Such is life.
Because she doesn't want to cook does not give her a pass go card.
I would sit her down give her options: Order In at her expense, move to AL or cook herself. Time to set some boundaries and stick to them.
Good Luck!
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I would not cave in on her rants
I think you need to sit mom down and explain what you just told us. Your lives are too busy to serve as her full time chef and dish washer. You are sorry, but if she wishes to continue to live with you she will need to take care of her own dietary needs, and when she is no longer able to do that she will likely have to move somewhere that can accomodate her better than you are able to.
Your house. Your rules. As we used to say to the teens.
Will she like that? No. But then life is full of things we don't like, isn't it. We just have to live with it.
If she is capable of cooking, she should cook for herself and not be catered to bc she's an elder and using that Get Out of Jail Free Card too often. Living with you is a privilege that carries responsibilities with it and doesn't mean she's waited on hand and foot.
Get rid of the mindset that you have to cater to moms every whim. Either she needs a higher level of care in AL or she agrees to pull her weight in your home by not being such a burden with her food requirements. Have a heart to heart talk with her about expectations from BOTH of you moving forward.
Good luck!
Maybe remind her that if she wants to remain independent, she needs to do for herself as long as she is able. 70 is not all that old. Why is she giving up already? She may live another 20 years.
Using my 20/20 hindsight, I'd like you to consider that she may have dementia. I know you said she's mentally sharp and physically capable, just as my mother appeared to be until recently. She could fool people into thinking she was perfectly fine as little as 2 years ago. But her behaviour towards us became demanding and unreasonable years and years earlier. There was no reasoning with her. I suspect that, as tasks became more difficult, she took it out on us. I could be wrong. Just keep it in mind.
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