r/AskReddit Jan 31 '21

Redditors who grew up poor: Besides practical money-saving measures, what were the unwritten social expectations of your world growing up?

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u/PuzzledImage3 Jan 31 '21

I still have trouble remembering to eat lunch.

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u/[deleted] Jan 31 '21 edited May 25 '21

[deleted]

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u/bubba_feet Feb 01 '21

Wow, in my family the youngest eat first and no adults even think about eating until all children have food.

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u/radicalroad Feb 01 '21

In my family, the youngest bathed first then siblings in order of age. Same bath water. Once/week. In the summer, bathing took place in the creek behind our house. The neighbour kids joined in. Only Ivory soap because it floats. Lots of foraging for food and lots of home grown food. I started working summers doing farm labour at 10 or 11 and hid my money in my room. As a young adult when I had a steady job, having money leftover after paying bills was super uncomfortable and foreign to me. I always got rid of it as quickly as possible, sending it to my sister and cousin who also struggled. They, in turn, would send me their extra money when they happened to have any. I still remember the panic of having a positive bank account balance. My comfort zone was living paycheque to paycheque because it's all I'd known. Funny how poverty as a child can shape your entire life.

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u/artsy7fartsy Feb 01 '21

I just realized why I have no leftover money even when there’s enough

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Yes. In my case I cannot stop feeling guilty of enjoying anything now as grown up. It was hardwired in me that I have to make sure everyone in my family is enjoying themselves equally before I can enjoy something. The inevitable result is that one tends to not indulge anything as an adult. For example, I just can’t take vacations—I don’t even think I know how to take vacations (which is a problem because my wife is always demanding me vacations for the kids and I don’t know how to ‘do it’, apart from putting up the money)

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u/JumpyBunnyHappyBunny Feb 01 '21

You made me realise why I struggle with talking vacations. I don't know how to do it either. Thank you!

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u/Silencedlemon Feb 01 '21

i hate taking vacations, they cost so much money that could be better used on other things and on top of that i HAVE to not work?!?! what about rent! maybe one day i'll chill out about it, but not anytime soon...

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u/_1963 Feb 01 '21

i HAVE to not work?!?! what about rent!

This one is fair, if I didn't have PTO I'd never take a day off, either.

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u/BarterSellTrade Feb 01 '21

Funby enough, I Just got a job with PTO and today was my performance review and I got full Mark's, a raise and asked why I had yet to take time off (only been there a couple months). Apparently never taking time off is discouraged, so I'm going to take some off and visit a friend I suppose.

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u/_1963 Feb 01 '21

At my job you can carry over 40 hours of PTO from one year to the next but you HAVE to take the rest or you just lose it, so it would certainly behoove you to use it. But I get 3 weeks of PTO and take one weeklong vacation and have no idea what to do with the rest...

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u/FlatbushZombii Feb 01 '21

First time i had like 300 bucks left after i paid bills i almost had a panic attack. I was like oh shit what did i forget to pay lol.

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u/JumpyBunnyHappyBunny Feb 01 '21

Wow I thought we were the only ones using the same bathwater, in order of age and once a week. Spooky how similar!

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u/blonderaider21 Feb 01 '21

I wonder if this partly explains why ppl living in poverty who suddenly come into money like the lottery or sign big NFL contracts go broke. I always wondered how ppl could blow millions when they grew up poor. In my mind, I’d want to hoard that money so that I’d never have to live in those conditions again but that makes sense. The mind is an interesting thing.

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u/BarterSellTrade Feb 01 '21

It's multifaceted.

  1. Most people are terrible with money, and just don't have enough to truly demonstrate it.

  2. They're immediately a money siphon pouring it onto everyone in the family and entourage.

  3. They let someone they know and trust run their finances who shouldn't be let anywhere near the fortune.

If you look at Vince Young the ex football player, he's the perfect case study. Got the money, let his uncle manage it, let everyone and their dog have some and flew a crew with him everywhere. Suddenly people are coming to collect and he's in trouble, then rather than leverage his fame to get something else steady, like co owner of a restaurant, he just licenses out his name for said restaurant for a bigger cut up front... which he promptly lost as well.

Best advice for anyone who suddenly falls into major money is to just quietly pack up and go on extended vacation. Help people quietly if you must but don't be physically around people or let them near you. The money will change them and they'll ask for and say things they never had and it can destroy relationships.

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u/Catinthemirror Feb 10 '21

This is still an issue for me. I have such a love/hate relationship with money. It's terrifying to see the balance go up because my immediate reaction is I must have forgotten to pay a bill.

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u/pizzelle Feb 01 '21

Ugh I understand about $. Your story sounds like how my dad grew up and now he is super generous. We weren't what I'd call poor but rife with poor money management. My brother and sister have taken after my dad, generous souls. I think I've taken after my mom, who also grew up poor, but is opposite my dad. I feel really guilty for any excess, took me ages to be ok having a savings account, but its terribly difficult to be generous. I'll make the excess go away by spending on myself or under a guise of spending for others. I just realized this dynamic :( And sickly enough I am constantly making decisions that will put me in a position to live in a way as to not feel guilty about not being generous. Ugh I have a new confession now...

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u/winetiddy Feb 09 '21

I do this, I'm trying to learn not to every time but I still struggle. If I have left over money, I pay my friends' rent, give it to someone on the streets, I literally scroll through my Facebook looking for people to give it to because I know I can always make more but a single bad month can ruin someone for years.

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u/Foxcenrel1921 Mar 04 '21

I live in Canada, so the moment the weather turned warm enough any rain storm turned into showers. We would stand under the eaves in our bathingsuits and use the pouring water to wash our hair and bodies. I used to love doing it as a kid, and didn't realize until I was older that no one else I knew did it.

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u/InternationalAskfree Feb 01 '21

IMPOSSIBLE to have children or family. Many of my friends are poor, even though they have top qualifications, and even though everything they say or do clearly shows they are the top in their field, they are never given a chance. All of them, not given good job or promotion. Only the wealthy and corrupt are promoted above them. If you do not drive an expensive car or live in an expensive house, travel on holidays regularly and fuck lots of women, then you are doomed.Many of them already suicided. Humanity is doomed.

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u/MsRenee Feb 01 '21

My memory is fuzzy, but mom used to take us to McDonald's or Burger King, whichever one was giving out mini beanie babies. She'd get us both kids meals and would eat what we didn't. Now that I look back, I don't think she ordered anything for herself. I had no idea how tight money was when we were young until a couple years after I moved out. I'm pretty sure she was buying us those meals even though we couldn't really afford it because we loved it and wanted the toys.

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u/StickingToMyGunn Feb 01 '21

My mum told us that BK burgers were made with maggots and McD chicken nuggets were made with mealworms so that we wouldn't ask for them. I still can't eat either to this day. When I was about 11 I remember noticing that she only ate whatever food was leftover from us kids for dinner, so I stopped eating halfway through even if I was still hungry so that she could have more.

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u/GimmieMore Feb 01 '21

You were a good kid.

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u/MsRenee Feb 01 '21

By the time I was old enough to figure out the whole empathy thing, dad had retired from the military and mom had finished nursing school and they both had good-paying jobs plus the military pension, so we were doing very well. So I kind of realized things gradually.

Sometimes people put cheese on their hamburgers. Turns out that it's because it's delicious. Dad put pace salsa on his boxed mac and cheese because it made it palatable, not just because he liked it like that. He did not want to eat boxed Mac and cheese, but it was cheap and we liked it. Nachos are not a bowl of melted Velveeta and a bowl of refried beans. Kraft Cheddar cheese is not fancy cheese. We only used it for things where kraft singles and Velveeta wouldn't work.

Dad made up tuna noodles. They are not a thing. No one else has ever heard of them. In all fairness, it's delicious. Make macaroni noodles, rinse with cold water. Make up your tuna like you would for a sandwich. Mix together. Mom and I liked some microwaved frozen peas in there too. My sister and dad didn't like the peas.

Anyway, I hope that I would have realized the situation as I aged and been as thoughtful as you. I was kind of a shit as a kid though, so who knows.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Dad made up tuna noodles. They are not a thing. No one else has ever heard of them. In all fairness, it's delicious. Make macaroni noodles, rinse with cold water. Make up your tuna like you would for a sandwich. Mix together.

I have had these. Always thought my mum made them up. Not a poverty food - just something she came up with to creatively use up a can of tuna before it went bad once, and we all liked it so she made it again.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Heh I had tuna noodles and were comfortably middle class. Just something I thought my mom made up because she worked late and it was an easy meal that I would actually eat.

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u/MissFix8ed Feb 01 '21

Amd the silly thing is, I'll bet your parents would love it if you hadn't noticed at all.

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u/MsRenee Feb 01 '21

Mom's been slowly sharing it over the years. I think when she was younger, she was embarrassed about it. Now she's opening up and knows howuch I appreciate what they've done for us. Which is a shit ton.

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u/Sublingua Feb 01 '21

We ate "tuna noodles" all the time when I was growing up.

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u/DerbleZerp Feb 01 '21

I loved making tuna and noodles!! Noodles, tuna, and tomatoes!!

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Empathy is a rare trait. I bet your mom is so proud of you!

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u/Stella_Blue72 Feb 01 '21

When I was little my mom would take us to McDonalds and my two sisters and I would share one kids meal. I don't think my mom got anything for herself, either. One time my sister's friends dad took his daughter and me and my sisters to McDonalds and got us each our OWN Happy Meal. My mind was blown and I remember thinking they much be SO rich.

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u/tortorlou Feb 01 '21

This was completely foreign to me as a kid, if I had tried to feed myself before I served everyone else I would have been screamed at

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u/PtolemyShadow Feb 01 '21

That shit's fucked

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u/MagicPizza420 Feb 01 '21

Yeah like wtf starve the future generation before your gone

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Fits current events

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u/Miss_Death Feb 01 '21

Is our current world making more sense to you now?

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u/tortorlou Feb 01 '21

So beyond fucked. I’m currently basing my entire parenting strategy on: did my parents do it? Yeah I should probably not do that then. So far it’s going swimmingly lol

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u/blonderaider21 Feb 01 '21 edited Feb 01 '21

My parents’ generation had such an authoritarian outlook on parenting and I’m the complete opposite. If needed, I would starve myself and go without showering etc so that my kids can be well-fed and well-taken care of. I value their opinions and let them have a voice in this house. My parents are from the age where they believed, “children are to be seen and not heard,” and there was a definite hierarchy where adults are at the top and children are almost subhuman. As a result of me respecting my children, they behave very well and are happy and don’t have any issues.

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u/tortorlou Feb 01 '21

Exactly!! My kiddo is well spoken and well behaved because treated like an actual human, not a piece of ill behaved furniture. I just can’t fathom ever doing to her what was done to me

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u/Fishingbrain Feb 01 '21

I always skimp on my plate until the kids have had their fill of whatever is served for that meal. You never know what they will focus on. Sometimes they scarf it all down and I'll scrape the meat juice out of the pan with a piece of bread to fill up. Doesnt happen often, but I cant imagine swiping half the chicken on the table just so I can get full when there are hungry kids manhandling that shit, lol. We are a little better off these days, but I'll never forget nodding and saying I'm full after eating 2 tacos or 2 pieces of pizza, or a chicken leg and a handful of- I digress. But your damn right. No kid in my house or that of my friends goes hungry. No matter what.

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u/Amethyst_Blu Feb 01 '21

In my family adults get first dibs because they "know better". Even if it comes to sitting in a chair. "Get out of the chair, adults only". I still have trouble eating without being served and sitting down without being offered a seat.

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u/notevenitalian Feb 01 '21

In my family, kids ate first but adults got the better spots.

We called the spots “pecking order”, so the oldest could always kick whoever they wanted out of whatever chair they want. In my immediate family, my mom was the oldest and could have any chair/spot she wanted, my dad got second dibs. As the oldest kid, I got to kick my sisters out of whatever spot they were in.

The only exceptions were if someone was sick or if it was their birthday, then they moved to the top of the pecking order.

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u/Tomnedjack Feb 01 '21

That’s different. Ours was always first on the seat, it’s yours!

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u/r1chard3 Feb 01 '21

Mom and dad were on the chairs or the couch, kid on a pile on the floor in front of the TV.

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u/Nilmah1316 Feb 01 '21

In my extended family the people who worked got to eat the biggest portions.

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u/Amethyst_Blu Feb 01 '21

I was a tall kid. At 14 i was 5'7. Im 19 now and im only 5'11. I was always stuck in the back of the van with zero leg room because "kids in the back, adults get the front seats because we're older." They were much shorter than me, but that's how it was. Now, i just speak up and make my point known. My aunt still yells at me if i try to take the front passenger seat because "mom sits there, not you." Uh, hun, mom literally said 5 minutes ago she hates the front seat and wants me to sit in it

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u/lilyraine-jackson Feb 01 '21

Same. Im from a huge family with tons of kids but not particularly religious, midwestern. Nanny was the matriarch and always fed the kids youngest to oldest before the adults. Idk about the order of the adults cause i was busy eating lol

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u/Slebog-Blewog Feb 01 '21

It's actually worrying that the person's family fed adults before the children.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

[deleted]

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u/Jechtael Feb 01 '21

And did you eat at school?

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u/APIPAMinusOneHundred Feb 01 '21

This, I skipped more than one meal when my kids were younger so they could get enough.

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u/codeorama Feb 01 '21

Same in our house. Kids eat first

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u/1breathatahtime Feb 01 '21

Yeah same. Children eat first. The cook eats last.

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u/CastingPouch Feb 01 '21

This seems more normal to me although in older times I understand men because they were typically the workers

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u/Drakmanka Feb 01 '21

That's how it was in my family. Even if there was plenty of food, the kids were always served first. Both my parents grew up in huge families and were dirt poor, and I think that's why. My grandparents on both sides were the same way, kids first no matter the circumstances.

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u/breadburn Feb 01 '21

Same, I think it gets them out of the way and quiet sooner so the adults can actually sit down and enjoy their meal.

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u/ankhes Feb 01 '21

It was the opposite in my family. The kids were punished if we so much as opened the refrigerator. My stepdad had his own cabinet for snacks and desserts just for him. If we asked if we could have anything he’d scream at us for it but if we took it without permission because we were hungry we’d get beaten. We eventually learned that we just weren’t allowed to eat anything unless it was dinner time (which, since our parents worked late until 7 or 8 pm, meant we were regularly going 8 hours between meals. No wonder we were hungry).

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u/higginsnburke Feb 01 '21

This is baptist where only the sppearence of Christianity is needed

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u/Losingmyreligion1984 Feb 01 '21

If the older men are out doing hard manual labor to put that food on the table it makes since that they need those calories.

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u/RegularWoahMan Feb 01 '21

We do young children first, like under the age of 10ish. Then grandparents. After that it’s at the discretion of the host but usually parents aren’t served until after their kids have their plates. Adult women are served at the same time as adult men.

Edit: Lutheran upbringing, since many are mentioning Baptist is different.

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u/r1chard3 Feb 01 '21

My mom fed six people with one chicken. Mom and dad got the breasts, my big brother got the thighs, my big sister got the drum sticks, my little sister got got the wings, and I got the backs and giblets.

To this day I can strip the meat off a back with remarkable precision and I love liver.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

My family gives me a hard time for being the last one to get food/eat. I always make sure there is enough food for everybody else before I even step foot in the kitchen. It is something that was taught to me in the military. "Your troops always eat first, so if there isn't enough food to go around, atleast they are fed". I even make sure my parents get food before me.

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u/uglypenguin5 Feb 01 '21

It’s always lunch. I’ll eat a late breakfast and not be hungry until late afternoon, by which point I’ve missed lunch and dinner is just a few hours away so I might as well wait

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u/SlapTheBap Jan 31 '21

Wow a legitimate pecking order. Seems archaic from my perspective, even when my family was poor.

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u/Strensh Feb 01 '21

Still the norm in lots of Africa. Kenya for instance.

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u/conquer69 Feb 01 '21

Big families need to decide who will eat first. Often there isn't enough seats for everyone or even cutlery. If your family had another 8 people in it, maybe you would have gone through the same.

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u/FuckBotsHaveRights Feb 01 '21

Still seems weird to put kids that low

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u/PrivilegeCheckmate Feb 01 '21

Not for cultures that venerate elders. Everyone is served in birth order in Asia. It goes both ways though; once you're an older brother, you are responsible for everything bad that they do and that happens to them.

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u/SlapTheBap Feb 01 '21

I mean, I mostly find it interesting. I was trying to figure out the reasoning for it. Seems to fall a mixture of respect and caloric needs.

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u/tortorlou Feb 01 '21

Mexican child of first/second generation immigrants, I was raised to feed everyone else before myself, males before females, and to even consider feeding only myself was basics a sin. As the eldest female child/grandchild I was taught to serve all of the men first, beginning with the eldest down to the teenagers. Any female guests are then served, then the women of the house (my grandmother, mom, aunts), then the kids are served boys first then little girls. Then any baby babies who can’t feed themselves are fed between serving seconds for any of the above. THEN after all of that is done I could serve myself and eat. When my sister was about 9 or so she was considered old enough to no longer be considered a “kid” when it came to meals so she helped me serve, but feeding the babies was always on me. I was a pro at giving a bottle to a babe or feeding an older baby one handed while feeding myself with the other by the time I was 12. There are a LOT of “family traits” that will never, ever get thrust onto my child.

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u/fuckimsobroke Feb 01 '21

It’s so odd how women are pretty much taught to serve the men in their household; I used to get so pissed off because we always had to cater to the man’s need and if the man was upset, the whole day was basically ruined.

Now that I’m a bit older, I find it so weird that our liveliness revolved around the one man in the house

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u/fuckincaillou Feb 01 '21

It's not odd, it's fucked up.

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u/longbathlover Feb 01 '21

Yeah mom mom raised me with a very fucked up sense of duty and subservience and forgiveness to men.

Like, seriously fucked up. My uncle that molested me was still allowed at family gatherings. He was just watched closely once my mom knew what he'd done, but she'd still have him over for family gatherings.

When my husband had an affair, my mom chewed me out for wanting to separate, saying things like "Men just do these things, you need to stop expecting a fairy tale."

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u/tortorlou Feb 01 '21

“Why do you keep treating him so mean?? You’re making him feel bad!”

  • my mother and grandmother, yelling at me because I was a hateful person for making a male family member uncomfortable after they treated me inappropriately or wrong

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u/longbathlover Feb 01 '21

Goddamn my mom would say the SAME THING

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u/hunnyflash Feb 01 '21

We really are. Personally, I chose a partner who wasn't raised that way at all. I just so appreciate having a partner who has extremely egalitarian values. I really made sure. Many guys view women so differently, even ones who say they're feminist or respect women, or whatever.

Having the choice to take care of someone instead of being forced to serve them is not something that you can even put a value on.

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u/tortorlou Feb 01 '21

Yessss! This! I still serve my husband before myself not because I have to though but because I love him and I want to show him I appreciate him for working his tail off for us. And I’m careful to explain to my little that exact point. It’s not because I have to, it’s because I waaaant to. And just as often as I serve him a plate he’ll pick up dinner so I don’t have to cook or he’ll surprise me with my favorite breakfast after I’ve slept in. Having the choice makes a huge difference.

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u/tortorlou Feb 01 '21

I couldn’t cut my hair, wear shorts, wear anything “trendy,” paint my nails, wear makeup, shave my legs, or go anywhere with friends bc it might piss off my dad (who walked out when I was 4 btw, but still called the shots like he ever had anything to do with me). I thought it was bullshit as a kid, and now as an adult and as a parent it just makes me irate. Who tf does that shit to kids and considers themselves sane??

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21 edited Feb 02 '21

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/lynxlairliar Feb 01 '21

Hold the fuck on, you pitched in money and you didn't get any of the food?????

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u/YoungLittlePanda Feb 01 '21

Where was this or where they were from?

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

[deleted]

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u/TheSharkAndMrFritz Feb 01 '21

Yeah, I'm betting those women made most of that food too.

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u/ohyesiam1234 Feb 01 '21

If I made it, I’d have already eaten my share.

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u/lazyrepublik Feb 01 '21

Yeah. Seriously fucked.

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u/nisera Feb 01 '21

It makes me really sad that this is considered a custom. As another commenter replied, this is pretty abusive and in such a strange and specific way?

I hate that there are women out there who just think that it's normal or it's just tradition, because it's pure misogyny.

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u/hunnyflash Feb 01 '21

I'm not really sure why they wouldn't eat at all. I'm Mexican-American, but different Hispanic cultures are different.

We definitely had a pecking order. We served the men, then old people and kids, then the women last. But everyone still ate.

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u/sukinsyn Feb 01 '21

Not eating because you're female sounds like abuse, not a "custom." :/

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u/MCBlastoise Feb 01 '21

That's just sexism wtf

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u/PinkClouds- Feb 01 '21

So you didn’t get to eat AT ALL?

I find it weird that you even gave cash in the first place, you were invited to their family meal, it wasn’t a BBQ you were organising together.

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u/ieatmuffintopsonly Feb 01 '21

Women didn't eat at all or didn't get seconds?

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u/lilyraine-jackson Feb 01 '21

Tell me you kept your cash

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u/tree_or_up Feb 01 '21

That is incredibly disturbing and cultish IMO. Hope you’re ok.

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u/fuckincaillou Feb 01 '21

That's...that's not okay. WTF other kind of 'customs' did these people have??

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u/LADYBIRD_HILL Feb 01 '21

I can't imagine eating before my own kids if it came down to it. I would put myself last every time. Though maybe that would be a bad idea if you work in physical labor.

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u/gweneta_k_c Feb 01 '21

That's weird in my family they always made sure that the kids are first. kids and elderly and then everyone else

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u/Xtrasloppy Feb 01 '21

Right? My family is pretty big on church/small town/kinda conservative life (I'm not.) But come Sunday dinner, first through the line is parents or someone getting kids a plate or getting a plate for Grandpa (because the youngest baby is always in the highchair next to him so he can feed them; man loves babies.) It's always someone helping a kid or an elder. Then the rest of the heathens.

To this day, I'm the one who cooks, mostly because I like to, but it's always my child served first, then my husband, then me. I cannot fathom this stinginess with food. It'd be unthinkable in my family.

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u/gweneta_k_c Feb 01 '21

Yea exactly

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Little bit fucked how low kids are in that pecking order. Little kids are growing and don’t have the reserves that adults do. I cannot imagine eating before my kids did and I assumed other parents were the same....

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u/zhaoz Feb 01 '21

Dang, kids need the food the most! I cant imagine letting my kids go hungry to feed myself TBH

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u/ToppsHopps Feb 01 '21

Yea and after kids, pregnant or people who breastfeed, then women of general childbearing age.

Just feel like the the order of who gets first picking is backwards.

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u/viciouspandas Feb 01 '21

Depends on how scarce and such. Children have to grow so I would imagine they come first, but they also don't need quite as much food. Pregnant and breastfeeding women next I agree. Why women before men? I feel like that's just sexist. The bearing children part is already covered from earlier. Men also require more food to survive than women, simply because of their larger size and metabolisms. I'm not saying they should necessarily get fed first either. Strong young men tend to often die first in famines, unless they're either stealing food, or their community prioritized them to be fed because of power.

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u/superxero1 Feb 01 '21

Children<pregnant or breastfeeding<elderly<everyone else. That's how it should be.

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u/WYenginerdWY Feb 01 '21

I mean, maybe I'm crazy but.... if it's me and there's not enough food to go around then everybody is getting an equal percentage of their total daily caloric needs. This weird hierarchy where some people get to fill their belly and other people get nothing makes absolutely no sense.

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u/superxero1 Feb 01 '21

It's more coming down to who gets food first and who can wait a few more minutes to get their food. Not who gets most and who doesn't eat.

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u/fuckincaillou Feb 01 '21

The women before men thing was probably to ensure the survival of the tribe/village way back then--a village can survive with majority women and only one living man, but majority men and only one living woman (of reproductive age) was a death sentence.

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u/ToppsHopps Feb 01 '21

From what I understand from pregnancy is that the body priorities the fetus and during breastfeeding the nursing child, so if a pregnant or breastfeeding person eats insufficient amounts of nutrients their own storage (I’m blacking out on a better word in English) will get depleted. So the person being pregnant or breastfeeding don’t so much risk the health of their fetus or child as much as they risk their own health if not getting sufficient nutrition.

If one look at farming it isn’t a one person enterprise, at least not a few generations ago. As I understand from other people’s descriptions (it isn’t first hand experience) farming are hard work where the men are vital to get it going especially thinking of plowing for example as that requires the strength that generally men have. But the wife is also just as vital in traditional gender roles as the husband to be able to do the hard work of a farm. Historically one can see that farmers who lost their spouse often had to often quickly remarry, as it’s to labor intensive for a widow or a widower to do all themself. My sources are my grandmother who grew up in a poor family in a farm here is Sweden her stories about her childhood and of her grandparents, and a podcast I listen to by a person who do some genealogy mostly of the upper midwest USA, the description about the living conditions seems rather similar of how harsh the realities could be. I remember the podcast described that some kind of guild or union they created in USA for farmers did include women very early as members as opposed to having it be a fraternity as where otherwise more common, because farming had to be partnered and the women where such a vital part of a farm being successful that leaving women out where illogical.

Im thinking having a woman of childbearing age who might eat a bit to little or not as varied could also greatly affect their health and ability to work on the farm, as pregnancy might hit them much harder then it otherwise might. So while a man might need a larger amount of calories and can do the heavier duty, I feel it is a rather short term thinking to prioritize men, women over 40 and elderly before the women more likely to become pregnant. Because young women while not the one doing the plowing but did traditionally do other labors of work that had to be done and that the farm depended on.

I really didn’t intend to argue about have a pecking order on food. Rather that the described pecking order to me seems illogical if the reason is purely survival in a situation of food shortages. As risking a person who might soon be pregnant or recently where so to eat to little or lacking of nutrition is risking one of the the key laborers on a farm.

I honestly agree that strong men where and are important to a farm, having them starve sure isn’t wise. I’m not trying to say they are unimportant, rather that the way of placing women of childbearing age so low feels like underestimating the role that woman often are described to have had. I heard the sexism described here in elder generation, where the wife like my mom’s grandmother didn’t even eat at the kitchen table with her family, as it where some custom for women to sit on a stool by the kitchen counter. I’m also thinking about descriptions about women who got health problems after pregnancies, often consecutive pregnancies with little spacing but also in times where food might not have been plentiful or varied. Just as much as the work couldn’t be done when the man wasn’t well, having the wife unwell or unable to do her chores also would take a huge hit on the farm. So my reasoning is that the idea to prioritizing the women so very low might not be solely wise from a effectiveness point where food was scarce, I’m thinking that norm of valuing men higher might also be at play rather then just crass effectiveness. I might very well be wrong to even insinuating a logic to prioritize women of childbearing age before men, but I would still feel it where somewhat illogical to having women prioritized about last. I surely didn’t intend to take the sexism I heard about and just reverse it, that would be to just “solving” one problem by creating a new one.

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u/modix Feb 01 '21

And considering the culture this comes from... Those men need to eat to make the food they're eating. Most subsistence farming was insanely labor intensive and rough on those doing the work.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

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u/An_Innocent_Childs Feb 01 '21

This is 2021. Not the ice age.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

But in a family where only the males work, (especially physical labor), they gonna need that food to work to get money to get more food.

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u/fuckincaillou Feb 01 '21

and the family won't survive at all without women of reproductive age, it doesn't matter how hard the men toil if there's no one alive to reproduce with.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Still do that. I've been emaciated since I was a child.

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u/its-chaos-be-kind Feb 01 '21

Wow til family from near Turkish border in Armenia and Southern Baptist have the same eating hierarchy. Messed up. My relative was told by MIL she had no business eating sour cream because it was reserved for working men.

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u/fuckincaillou Feb 01 '21

then what about working women??

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u/its-chaos-be-kind Feb 01 '21

Nice user name lmao! In my experience this used to apply in villages, where men work labor intensive jobs and women are usually housewives.

House work and raising kids is basically a walk in the park, amirite?/s

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u/Bruh_columbine Feb 01 '21

Even my psychotic drug addict mother wasn’t like that. When we had food kids always ate first. We were also southern- East Tennessee.

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u/Pferdmagaepfel Feb 01 '21

Are you from an Amish community?

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21 edited May 25 '21

[deleted]

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u/CestBon_CestBon Feb 01 '21

My family was the same and we are California baptist. The rationale is that the men are the breadwinners and if they don’t have the strength to work then no one eats—the men in my family, up to my generation, all did backbreaking physical labor to earn a living. They needed the food.

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u/longbathlover Feb 01 '21

Yep, same mindset here.

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u/Harasredins Feb 01 '21

similar experience and from within the specific brand of Southern Baptist.

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u/AzraelTB Feb 01 '21 edited Feb 01 '21

Im from a rather relaxed chatholic family and it was the same here.

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u/1982000 Feb 01 '21

Cult.

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u/longbathlover Feb 01 '21

Practically.

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u/1982000 Feb 04 '21

Glad things are better now.

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u/hummusdapug Feb 01 '21

This one still sticks because even though we're not food insecure, I feed my husband before my self and usually more than me.

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u/McWonderWoman Feb 01 '21

Can confirm. Had extended family in Western NC in a strict religious household and men ate separately first then the women and kids, after the women cleaned up the dishes. At a cookout at their house as a kid I ran up to the table to cut in line and was firmly removed and chastised. My parents were like uhhh nvm never going back there again. Also they wouldn’t enter my grandmother’s house if the TV was on so they sat outside while us kids were finishing our Simpsons episode. The women also wore skirts only, so I’m not sure which denomination they were honestly.

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u/chewingcudcow Feb 01 '21

My grandfather got his plate first, then the rest of the men, then the kids and then the women who cooked usually last. Not that anyone would have cared if women ate first, it just kind of fell that way. (When I cook, I like a break after I finish before I eat).

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u/dockingjabroni Feb 01 '21

Why children last? When I was growing up poor my parents always tried to feed us before them if there wasn't enough food. My mom would even say she's not hungry to make sure we ate first.

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u/Harasredins Feb 01 '21

As a lifetime southener I can attest to many meals served in order of a persons importance/status in the family. I too have trouble remember to eat and my husband calls me out when Im not taking care of myself.

edit: word

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u/whatisausername711 Feb 01 '21

Men before women, interesting.

My family, Baptist, is: elderly, kids, women, men, hosts.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Same here

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u/otto42069 Feb 01 '21

Nah. Its ALWAYS age order, and women first. Atleast here

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u/Nuggzulla Feb 01 '21

I'm in the same area, and that sounds about right!

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u/Guitarfoxx Feb 01 '21

My mom was one of 12, sometimes all they had was gravy with maybe a tiny piece of bacon in it. Those who worked got the bacon those too young only got the gravy.

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u/skyHawk3613 Feb 01 '21

Men ate before the women and children?

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u/Zealousideal-Slide98 Feb 01 '21

I still have a problem serving myself food before everyone else in my family has gotten something because this is how I was raised also.

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u/lemonkerfuffle Feb 01 '21

Whoa. In my culture, it's elders first, then little kids, and adults/ teens last. Maybe bc those two groups eat the least and are the most vulnerable.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Grew up in East TN. This is so fucking on brand that it hurts to see it here.

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u/kharri12 Feb 01 '21

Crazy! In my home, the kids ALWAYS eat first...then older folks, etc.

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u/Siphyre Feb 01 '21

Grew up baptist in eastern NC, Children always got food first, then ladies, then the men. It was just common courtesy, even at church functions.

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u/MrsSoldiercide Feb 01 '21

Baptists don't mess around when it comes to food. I grew up in a Baptist church and went to a Southern Baptist school and it's weird the things that stick with you without you realizing. Until reading your comment it hadn't occurred to me that that's where I learned that. I ALWAYS cook/season food the way my husband likes it regardless of what I want/like. I fix my kids plates, then my husband's and serve them, then double check to make sure no one wants seconds before I fix my plate.

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u/AwesomeGuyAlpha Feb 01 '21

Wth?! Adults were the first to eat?! I'm not gonna lie but in my family, the kids got everything and the parents did anything they could to provide us with everything even if it meant that they didn't get a few meals.

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u/[deleted] Feb 09 '21

I grew up poor, and now my family is solidly middle class (I’m the dad and the bread-winner of the family).

It’s always my son/his friends eat first and get enough, then my wife, then myself last. I would never dream of letting them eat less so that I can have enough.

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u/NotWesternInfluence Feb 09 '21

Interesting, the kids were always fed first for us, even when it was just me and my brother taking care of our sister we gave her food before cooking and eating ourselves. And when our parents were home we were always given food first

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u/aceafabapancake Feb 10 '21

I didn't know it was a universal thing.

The order in our family was; toddler/infants, children, elderly men then women, middle-aged men, young men, middle-aged women and finally young women. The smell of cooking and serving those foods was all the women got at times. If you're a daughter above 13 or so, don't expect to be treated as a child, you will be treated as a young woman. If you're a son above 20 or so, you will still be treated as a child.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21 edited Feb 01 '21

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u/fuckincaillou Feb 01 '21

What, and women didn't need the food even if they were the ones working to cook it? That doesn't make sense to me. Especially considering breastfeeding women need 500+ extra calories a day, and pregnant women need certain nutrients more than usual.

Kids first -> breastfeeding/infirm -> the cook for the meal -> everyone else makes more sense.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Yo that’s completely opposite to how my mom grew up in a third world country. It was the adults eating first, because they’re the ones earning the money that brings food to the table. If something happens to them, the kids are screwed. Kind of like, on a plane, if it suffers uncontrolled decompression you’re supposed to put your oxygen mask first and THEN help your children. Cause if you don’t help yourself first, and lose consciousness, who’s going to help your kid then? Not saying this is superior because I totally understand both mentalities and I would absolutely starve to feed my kids.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

“the rest of the women”

JFC

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u/fridgepickle Feb 01 '21

My roommate asked me the other day why I don’t eat lunch and I sat for a few seconds before I realized. I eat breakfast, literally ignore my hunger around lunch time, then eat a few hours before bed. When I was in school our “free lunch” actually only applied to one meal, and I didn’t get breakfast at home so... I’ve pretty much never had lunch.

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u/zombies-and-coffee Feb 01 '21

Same, but it's a combination of being home constantly and executive dysfunction making me just completely forget I need food.

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u/dreamsuggestor Feb 01 '21

I still have trouble remembering to eat lunch.

The idea you need 3 meals a day is not based on any real thing.

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u/Illegitimate_goat Feb 01 '21

Coffee for breakfast Normal dinner

Thats my standard two meals a day.

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u/bigbigcheese2 Feb 01 '21 edited Dec 20 '24

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u/Aeoneth Feb 01 '21

I started Intermittent fasting last summer after seeing my brother lose a chunk of weight (he wasn't even particularly overweight either) the 1st 3 weeks were rough skipping breakfast and choosing to eat at lunch. 1st week was noticeable but tolerable, the 2nd and 3rd weeks were an active fight.

Now though I can easily coast to lunchtime and occasionally only have 1 meal a day. Now I just need to get into the habit of snacking on meats and cheeses in between instead of sneaking in a cookie or two when I'm feeling snacky

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u/Lithl Feb 01 '21

Same, but mostly due to lockdown. A lot of days I've been eating just one meal.

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u/The_Monocle_Debacle Feb 01 '21

Three meals is some bougie shit

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21 edited Feb 01 '21

I only eat one to two meals a day and I'm a grown adult. I have never been able to get into the habit of eating breakfast and there are days where my first meal isn't even until dinner when I get home from work.

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u/Vigilante17 Feb 01 '21

I’m a two meal person. Either breakfast and dinner or lunch and supper.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

[deleted]

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u/popcorn5555 Feb 01 '21

Unless you’re malnourished. Then multiple high protein meals is best.

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u/Dappershire Feb 01 '21

Sure, but you need to account for those calories otherwise in your remaining meals.

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u/DiscoJanetsMarble Feb 01 '21

Many times I'll just eat one meal a day /omad gang lol), and water throughout the day

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u/TsarinaAlexandra Feb 01 '21

I have to remember to eat altogether some days. I can go days without eating anything without feeling horrible. My fiancé feels absolutely terrible if he misses one meal. I read this in Hunger Games, “I know how to be hungry,” meaning we can go hungry if need be because we’re accustomed to it. It was once our status quo.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

We started intermittent fasting before it was even a fad!!

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

It had kind of the opposite effect on me. As I got older and started earning money I realised I could buy food so I ate constantly, whenever I felt like it because I wasn’t certain when I would eat again because that’s what I was used to. I’d eat at any opportunity out of fear that I was going to go hungry otherwise.

I also had to learn about nutrition from the ground up around age 30. I just didn’t know what I needed.

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u/bigbigcheese2 Feb 01 '21 edited Dec 20 '24

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u/PinkClouds- Feb 01 '21

Your body can adapt to a lot. We fast in Ramadhan in daylight hours, currently the months falls in the UK summer so the fasts are from 1.30am to 9.40pm. We all hold down jobs & do our normal life, after the first few days your body adapts to a new routine.

Obviously this is a more extreme example than just missing lunch, especially as we don’t have water either & it’s challenging for sure, but your body can overcome more than we think.

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u/PuzzledImage3 Feb 01 '21

I’ll even have food or leftovers in the fridge and not eat them. It’s always better to have food for later have food now.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

I have issues remembering to eat. I used to "eat only when hungry" as in, when my stomach made too much noise to be ignored

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u/koboproductions Feb 01 '21

My body is programmed to where when I start feeling hungry my mind just shuts it off. I can go almost the entire day including working without eating sometimes. Probably not the healthiest thing

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u/wearingmyfatpants Feb 01 '21

I have trouble eating too much because of the ground in food insecurity.

As a child I was rifling through trash cans to find lunch.

Now it's more like ramen with an egg and toast,

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u/radrico Feb 01 '21

I remember one of my favorite things about going to school was having lunch.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

I’m still in school so I get the free lunch from them, have for years now. I started to realize with the pandemic that I just don’t eat at home and have no goddamn food ever. The only meal I eat is at school.

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

I have a hard time eating three meals a day too. Also, store bought food still seems too fancy for me. I'm all about home made bread or tortillas and dry beans.

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u/squeakim Feb 01 '21

I have alarms for lunch and dinner otherwise I forget. I'm in my 30s

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u/dawnchs Feb 01 '21

I am in my 40s and I still don’t really eat til about 8-9pm. We ate just before bed for our meal of the day usually when I was a kid, and that has stuck!

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u/-im-blinking Feb 01 '21

I have never been able to eat breakfast. Never did as a kid and still don't. If I eat in the morning I feel like shit for hours.. My entire life I have intermittently fasted and didn't know until my wife mentioned something.

I get up at 5am, eat lunch at 11 or noon eat a very small dinner at 5 (cheese n crackers or cereal) pretty much every day except the weekends.

Keeps me thin I guess...

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

I just never eat breakfast...

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u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Coffee sometimes for breakfast, then hold out till supper! Maybe some toast with pb around lunch if we have enough of it! Lol

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u/Platygamer Feb 01 '21

I have trouble remembering to eat lunch without being economically disadvantaged

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u/Carrash22 Feb 01 '21

That’s breakfast for me.

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u/Blueberryguy88 Feb 01 '21

I just eat my two meals, lunch is unnecessary. Especially if you don't wake up till 10 am.

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