Making healthy choices by cutting out certain foods can be rewarding, but it takes a lot of research and being aware of all the ingredients in various food products to achieve dietary goals.
A Redditor was happy to see their girlfriend who is not into sweets and, therefore, avoids sugar at all costs, found a new favorite treat she could still enjoy.
However, when they discovered something specific about her latest obsession, the Redditor found themselves in a quandary.
So they turned to the “Am I The A**hole” (AITA) subReddit for moral judgment on a hypothetical “Would I Be The A**hole” (WIBTA) scenario.
There, Redditor ProbablyAH asked:
“WIBTA if I don‘t tell her that the chocolate contains sugar?”
The original poster (OP) explained:
“Hello, my partner (f[female] in her 30s) is quite into sport and not much into sweets.”
“She stopped eating ADDED sugar ‘completely’ about a year ago. She doesn’t have a medical constitution, but just realized, that she‘s doing way better without the sugar.”
“She also doesn’t restrict my eating. For example, when we went to a fancy cake place I wanted to go to, she also ate cake, but was feeling a little nauseous afterwards. So she‘s not completely strict-strict, as sometimes she enjoys honey or if I bake something, e.g..”
The OP continued:
“Now to my dilemma: every weekend she makes coffee for us and does a ‘special blend.’ When she made it before she used cocoa powder, but changed to dark chocolate shavings. It‘s really really nice, but I realized some days ago that she doesn’t know that there is sugar in them.”
“She eats her yogurt topped with them and is beaming with joy, when telling me ‘they don’t contain sugar’. They do, she just had the wrong column when checking them.”
“I really love seeing her happy and I researched before and the chocolate shavings without sugar are 1. expensive and 2. I‘m actually not able to eat them (due to intolerance).”
“I also really support her otherwise, when cooking, baking, etc. I check twice as not to include any sugar. (I also realize on the other hand that she‘s mostly checking for Glucose and doesn’t care about fructose.)”
“So WIBTA if I don‘t tell her that there‘s sugar in her new found joy?”
They also clarified after some pushback:
“I put ‘added’ in, as people were confused. Sorry, I thought it was obvious, that one’s on my part.”
“The yoghurt used in the example she‘s eating has no added sugar. Yes she knows that there are different types of sugar. As I mentioned before, it‘s about added Glucose. Yes she is capable of reading.”
“No, she‘s not stupid, as the package has two different collums as it‘s baking chocolate and one type of them has no added sugar but sweetener.”
“Yes, I know that there are also health risks when consuming too much sweetener. It was a simple question guys.”
Anonymous strangers weighed in by declaring:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
- NAH – No A**holes Here
Redditors gave mixed responses.
“YWBTA. Lying to your partner for their ‘Happiness’ isn’t an option when their happiness is derived from something that has lasting effects on their health.”
“I would suggest looking into a disorder called Orthorexia. It’s an eating disorder centering around ‘Right Eating.’ Where anorexics obsess over weight and calories, Ortho’s obsess over Toxins, or Sugar, or Glycemic Index or liver function.”
“I know this because I have it(Also sugar avoidant, also have 0 medical reason to be such at this point but I get terrified that having a soda will cause me to die gasping like my mother). Your girlfriend sounds like she may have some food avoidance issues that bear further discussion, and it’s worth both digging into the cause of those avoidances, and becoming constantly aware o how they are affecting her life, an her emotions.”
“The fact that you’re worried about your partners reaction going sour if she finds out she’s eating her “Villain Food”, is what concerns me the most. Ortho, and all eating disorders, are not about the food itself, but the emotions around it, and the restriction and control fallacies, so ensuring that the ongoing approach to this diet is done in a healthy, non-disordered way is important, because a healthy diet can easily become ortho without notice of the people around the person.”
“If I’m completely off base, ignore me, but I want you to know about this illness because almost no one does and the symptoms can go from totally normal diet stuff to hospitalizable in a matter of months, and lots of people miss it because ‘Well they aren’t restricting calories or trying to lose weight!’ but a nutritional imbalance can kill with very little fanfare or outwards change.”
“And because many ortho’s, like me, are also bulimic, so ‘Well she eats cake now and then, she wouldn’t do that if she was obsessing’ isn’t necessarily an accurate statement.” – kharmatika
“Thank you for pointing that out and as well as your insight. I realize that this can come across as this, but I can assure you, that it‘s not medically. She‘s transparent and it has been checked, she‘s also not avoiding ‘unhealthy food’ if she wants to. But thank you and all the best to you.” – OP
“There are plenty of people who do well on less sugar. But it’s a well-known fact that if you cut sugar out for a bit, then you tend to notice its effects more if you have some.”
“It’s okay for us to have sugar, but in general, it should be a decent bit less than what is currently seen as normal, so she doesn’t sound like she’s being unreasonable.”
“Since she hasn’t noticed a difference in the chocolate shavings then I’d say they don’t make a big difference. But I would still let her know.” – Tikithing
“Sounds like she’s just being more mindful about her foods, which is good when it comes from a balanced state of mind. Like, when I needed to lose weight I cut out added sugar since that was an easy first step, but I didn’t demonize sugar and carbs and all that.”
“But yeah, maybe -pretend- you just noticed the contents of the package under pretext of checking for expiry date and go ‘hey babe, I just saw this, did you notice?’ Just a thought.” – RedRunner04
“YWBTA. A lie of omission is still a lie. She deserves to ha e all the information so she can make an informed decision on her own about what she puts into her body.” – TheGoodJeans
“NAH. She read the label wrong. You’re not lying to her, it’s not hurting her, and you have no obligation to tell her. Just pretend you never checked. She will figure it out eventually.” – Masta-Blasta
“NTA. If a grown woman doesn’t realize that a chocolate bar contains sugar, that is on her. It is her responsibility to read the labels of products.”
“At some point, she may learn. When she asks why you didn’t tell her, you can reply that you thought she had done her own research.”
“Neither your problem nor your responsibility.” – OldestCrone
“YWNBTA. As long as she isn’t eating them by the handful, the amount of sugar in a sprinkle is so minimal it’s irrelevant. Let them be happy.” – Prestigious-Use4550
“I don’t want to say YTA but also not exactly NTA either.. I think you coulda just nudged her with I think it contained sugar , or say hey I was just reading this over and saw it had sugar.. it’s obviously not hurting her either.. play it cool one day like you wanted to see whats in it cuz it’s delish or something.” – GuyFromLI747
Judgment was all over the place, with some saying it would be the girlfriend’s fault for not doing her own thorough research by studying the ingredients on the chocolate shavings, while others believed the OP would be the a**hole if he kept the truth from her while watching her indulging on something that goes against her principles.
In an update, the OP wrote:
“We talked yesterday, and I told her that the chocolate contains sugar. She looked at me a little confused and said: ‘Yes, I know? But I like it.’ “
After some negative concerns about the situation, the OP gave the following update:
“So the misunderstanding came about like this: She bought herself chocolate shavings without added white sugar and told me about it. When she went shopping some weeks later she saw her favorite ones (dark chocolate) and decided that it was not worth the extra effort for her to get the other ones. She also told me, they don’t have the same crunch, so she decided to go with the ‘regular’ ones.”
“So thanks to those, that gave me the ‘extra nudge.’ She smiled and told me I should‘ve told her directly. Have a great rest of the week.”
Lesson learned.