When living with roommates, food might get designated as belonging to one person. Especially if everyone pays for their own groceries.
But what about in a family or between romantic partners? Is it still OK to label a food item as belonging to one person? Does it make a difference if the other person(s) already ate their share?
A spouse turned to the “Am I The A**hole” (AITA) subReddit for feedback on this issue.
JamesMojo222 asked:
“AITA for keeping food from my wife?”
The original poster (OP) explained:
“My wife loves fruit. She eats a lot of it and I, as the person who buys most of the groceries, try to keep the place constantly stocked.”
“She works out of the house most days. I work in. I do the shopping and make most meals. And I am happy to.”
“Apples, peaches, figs, plums, whatever is in season, it’s on our counter.”
“Right now it’s persimmon season.”
“We both like very different types. She likes fuyu and she likes them firm. I like any kind, but mostly hachiya and like them the texture of pudding. So I leave mine to ripen which can take days to weeks sometimes. Neither of us likes the other’s style much.”
“This week we got a bunch of each at the farmer’s market. I left mine be in a basket in the corner of the kitchen.”
“She ate all of hers by mid week and I got her more at the market and she ate those too. I just started eating mine today and offered her a bite.”
“She said, no, I’ll get my own. And I said, no way, those are mine. I’ve been saving them and you know how much effort it takes to get them the way I like it, and you don’t even like them that way.”
“She got upset at this and said this has been my thing our whole marriage. I designate food as mine. All food should be anyone’s to eat if that person wants it at that moment, she says.”
“I, personally, disagree with this. And I live my life leaving her what is hers, whether it’s half of the leftovers or half a piece of cake or whatever. I don’t just eat things. I consider her.”
“And I do my best to make sure she has what she likes around. And if I do accidentally eat the entirety of something she wanted, I hear it, believe me.”
“For the record, we currently have persimmons, tangerines, apples, and pomegranates in the house.”
“Am I the a**hole for keeping some fruit to myself?”
The OP summed up their situation.
“My wife wanted the fruit I was saving after she ate all of hers. I wouldn’t let her have it. She is mad at me for keeping the fruit to myself.”
Redditors weighed in by declaring:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
Redditors decided the OP was not the a**hole (NTA).
“NTA. If my husband buys something specifically for himself and asks me not to touch it, I don’t because I’m not a selfish little gremlin.” ~ Eastern_Condition863
“I buy stuff specifically for my husband and just don’t touch it unless he offers……. we must be magical unicorns or something to achieve this level of not being selfish little gremlins!” ~ Heeler_Haven
“I guess my husband and I are also magical unicorns. There are certain foods he loves that I don’t.”
“If he buys shrimp, I don’t ask where’s mine because I’m not eating those nasty little sh*t crawlers. If I buy bananas, he doesn’t ask where’s his because he isn’t going to eat a mush log.”
“If it’s something we both like, we split it. The only person I have to hide snacks from is my teenage son. He’s still working on sharing.” ~ Klutzy_Criticism_856
“It sounds like she only wants some of yours after she’s had two batches of hers. Doesn’t sound very equitable.”
“NTA, your wife needs to let you have what you have set aside for yourself. She has had plenty of her own.” ~ Miserable_Dentist_70
“My partner had this thing in the beginning of us living together where he’d run out of soda and drink mine. I started buying stuff I knew he didn’t like rather than deal with it.”
“At one point he asked why I didn’t get a certain drink anymore and I said that I could never be sure if I’d have one when I wanted it. He asked why I never said anything.”
“At the time, I hadn’t thought it was worth dealing with, so I just found a way around it. But he initiated a conversation about it, and from then on, he’d ask before having any of something he knew I bought for myself.”
“We both grew up with siblings and in his case, he figured anything was fair game unless it was specifically set aside for something. For me, I became possessive of things that were mine.”
“Now we communicate much better, but I still remember how irritated I would be coming home and wanting something, only to find out it was gone because someone else took it.” ~ Different-Leather359
“My brother has this issue. He thinks anything in the fridge/freezer/cupboards is fair game regardless of who bought it.”
“I’ve taken over a drawer in the fridge for my stuff and label anything outside of it or in the freezer. He gets super annoyed at this and will move stuff between the freezers so he doesn’t have to see it.”
“I’m househunting currently, and I find it hilarious whenever he suggests buying a place together. He makes comments like ‘I’ll have the annex and you’ll have the house and I won’t come in’.”
“Lol, no bro. I’m not dumb. When you’re hungry, you’ll come into the house and eat all my food, and you won’t replace it. No. NTA, OP. “ ~ ToDefeatTheHuns100
“My brother-in-law needs to learn this lesson. He ate the last piece of my gender reveal cake and multiple snacks when I was pregnant, resulting in many frustrated tears. My husband made a special snack zone for me after that to make sure it wouldn’t keep happening.” ~ MinsaSmoog
“NTA. Definitely not equitable. She’s only thinking about her wants in the moment, not how it affects you.”
“I have a similar dynamic between me and my husband. I like to eat a bit, regularly, over time.”
“My husband just eats whatever it is all in one sitting. Bags of chips, chocolates. So then I’m forced to either not get any or binge eat?”
“Absolutely not. He either buys two bags or I hide my snacks.”
“She’s being inconsiderate, perhaps not maliciously, but she’s just refusing to see or hear your perspective because it is not her perspective. It’s little things like this that build up and end up as a massive resentment soup.” ~ krfc87141721
“NTA. ‘All food should be anyone’s to eat if that person wants it at that moment, she says’.”
“Isn’t this a mentality we teach out of, like, toddlers?” ~ StAlvis
“Seriously, like, by this reasoning, OP’s wife could just grab food off strangers’ plates at a restaurant like a seagull.” ~ icameasathrowaway
“NTA. It’s easy to say that when you’re the ONLY ONE getting to enjoy the fruit. I have a 12-year-old and she would routinely eat all of something until I talked to her.”
“Now she stops when there are two, so her dad and I have a chance to eat at least one of them. How is it that my 12-year-old understands this concept more than your wife?” ~ Obvious_Huckleberry
“NTA. It seems like a pretty minor request, and she’s not being very reasonable about the whole thing. She’s being pretty childish, and if she gets this worked up over a persimmon, then I don’t even want to imagine what she’s like if something actually serious comes up.” ~ Tdluxon
“NTA. It’s not unreasonable of OP to expect to get to eat the fruit that OP selected and had to let ripen without his spouse eating it. It sounds like she had multiple portions of her own preferred fruit in the time it took for the fruit OP had selected to ripen.” ~ CuriousEmphasis7698
“NTA, your wife is selfish. Probably not even consciously, but she is. Maybe show her this thread. Also your fruit budget is unhinged!” ~ Successful-Maybe-252
“NTA. Some people are greedy.”
“I bought a literal mini-safe because I couldn’t keep food for myself from my husband and four sons. I would buy a dozen donuts, six people, everyone gets two, right? Nope, I’d go to grab a donut and there would be an empty box.”
“Everyone in my house eats like twice as much as me. My husband bought me two dozen dark chocolate truffles for Christmas once. I can have one truffle, put them away, then come back a few days later and have another. I like to savor food.”
“Well, I had a few truffles, then came back a week later, and the whole box was gone. I was livid. My husband said he thought I didn’t like them since I didn’t finish the box. In a week.”
“I ordered a safe, and now I put anything I want in there. It was an extreme solution, but living with five dudes that eat twice what I do meant I was getting frustrated way too often.” ~ TheGeekOffTheStreet
Sharing is caring but should also be reciprocal.
Sounds like OP’s wife needs a few lessons on how to share.