Need help w/ husband/child/food problem
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| Fri, 06-02-2006 - 5:54pm |
This is long. Sorry! But I am in some pretty serious need of some advice on how to handle a situation with my rigid, obsessive husband who's self-imposed food restrictions are starting to have an impact on our child and I'm concerned that this is laying the groundwork for an eating disorder for her.
My husband has a somewhat obsessive personality. To put it lightly. He focuses in one one subject and it becomes his passion. His obsession. Over the past 17 years his 'passions' have changed once in awhile, but much of his daily life revolves around his passion for religion, especially Judaism (although he is NOT Jewish. He's a Christian...kind of a Messianic Christian if that makes any sense at all), his distrust of the government and the AMA, and his distrust in any food item that isn't totally natural.
For the past couple of years my husband has talked pretty incessantly about Hydrogenated Vegetable Oils and how bad they are. He reads the label of every single box or can, and actually disdains anything that is in a package because 'you never know what's really in it.' He has given me such crap about occasionally (we're talking once a year) buying a bag of potato chips that I have thrown away the bag, unopened. He won't eat food if I have defrosted it in the microwave or used the microwave in its preparation if he realizes it. He won't allow fat free anything into the house. He also rants on and on about how fast food joints put 'plastic' cheese on burgers and I don't dare buy anything with an artificial sweetener or flavoring because he'll go on and on and on and ....well, you get the point.
Last year he read that avocados were great for lowering your cholesterol. So now he cuts up an avocado and has it on the table for every meal. And he became concerned about his blood presssure so he cut way way down on salt. And now he talks incessantly about how 'everything is sooooooo salty' and how bad it is.
And for the past 6 months or so he has cut pork out of his diet. This isn't necessarily due to health reasons, but because the Old Testament says so. I made chicken apple sausages one evening...wouldn't eat 'em because he thought perhaps they were made with pork casings. He eats as kosher as possible, according to his own sort of bastardized version of what is and isn't appropriate in the Old Testament. For example, it doesn't really bother him to mix dairy & meat products. But now he won't touch pork.
Personally, I think this pork thing is ridiculous. I think he has a tendency to take everything to the extreme, and I've grown terribly tired of listening to him go on and on.
However, the meat of the issue is that we have an 8 year old daughter who adores her father. She believes everything he says. She's built just like him. Tall and very lean. She used to be a very adventurous eater. She'd try anything. Oysters, caviar, escargot. Bring it on. But now she reads the label of every single ounce of food she's given to see if contains transfats. I have seen her give away an entire sack lunch provided during a school field trip because the chips and cookies had transfats and the sandwich was made on white bread. Her friend's parents have told me that Sophia has refused to eat food at their homes because she was offered something that she thought might contain an ingredient that her father would disapprove of. She won't eat cupcakes at school birthday parties because she's afraid of what might be in it. My daughter would rather go hungry than eat something that she thinks her father might disapprove of.
Last week she refused to eat a salad with crumbled bacon because she's afraid that her father will be angry with her if he finds out. She started crying and became anxious when she saw that I was frustrated because her diet is becoming further restricted due to his influence. She's also afraid to eat anything with salt in it (like popcorn).
Several months ago when I saw my daughter giving away her lunch, I confronted my husband and basically demanded a compromise. I wanted us to present a united front to our daughter and to agree (as far as she knew) that while we should always make healthy choices in the home and at the supermarket, that when she is at school or at friend's houses, to graciously accept whatever food she is given. I wanted my husband to acknowledge that transfats aren't necessarily 'good' for you, but to eat something with it once inawhile isn't going to kill you. He gave in and we did tell her this. but apparently he went back to her later when I wasn't around and told her that he REALLY did not want her to eat foods that he disapproves of, and now the problem is getting worse.
Anyone have any suggestions on how to deal with this? Another place you want to refer me to that might be able to better help me deal with this problem? He acts as if I don't care about our daughter because I'm not as rigid as he is about diet. I believe that by being SO restrictive, he's setting her up for problems.

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Sweetie, big hugs to you. This is an awful situation to find yourself in. My first thought is to get your daughter away from him, but because you don't mention wanting to leave - I won't jump straight in there.
Instead, I think you should be trying to address your husband's mental health needs. We're not only talking obsessions here, but paranoia too. It can't be a pleasant atmosphere!
Have you ever spoken to a health professional about your husband? Or what about family counselling? Perhaps if he could see the damage that he's doing to the family, he may seek help. I'm also wondering if he uses illegal drugs of any kind. There are a number that can lead to paranoia (I was reading about hydroponic cannabis this morning)
In short though, I believe that it's going to take some fairly drastic action on your part to get him to see that this is not acceptable. And even then, his paranoia may tell him that he must never change.
I suppose the big question you must ask yourself is: If he were to never change, how much longer do you want to keep your daughter in this environment?
sorry that I don't have an easy answer.
You want to present a united front so he goes behind your back and tells her what he wants to? He doesn't see that as problematic or pitting the child between the parents? And she was just never supposed to tell you right?
I wish I had some advice for how to handle this. But if your H insists on being this rigid and basically forcing it on your DD, she is going to have problems. I'd get her into therapy and talking with a dietician or something.
Jen
Welcome to the board, Mom_inlimbo ~
I agree with everything that's been said here. The real issue is your husband, not your daughter. What he does (and is doing) will (and is) having a huge impact on her and yes, I agree, it's setting her up for eating disorders down the road. Unless he changes, nothing will change, and it sounds like he only appears to agree to change, but goes behind your back and further sabotages his own daughter.
I want to also make it clear that I agree with Aisha that my first thought is to get your daughter out of that situation. I would also agree that your husband should seek therapy, but based on his distrust of the AMA, I'm sure he isn't any more trustful of therapists. Quite frankly, your husband does sound incredibly obsessive and unbalanced. He seems not to be able to recognize that eating these things himself as a child doesn't seem to have harmed him, he doesn't seem to recognize that his actions are having a direct impact on his daughter (bursting into tears, refusing food for fear her father would be mad, etc.), if he were thinking rationally, he'd recognize that his actions are damaging her, but he doesn't seem to see that. What does he think of the changes in her, and in her fear of eating the wrong thing? Let me know, okay?
I would agree that your daughter seeing a therapist would be a good thing, but I can't see that it would be anything but confusing, seeing a therapist who tries to help her unravel the very clear messages she's getting from her father, only to go home to him and be inundated with them until next week when the therapist works to undo more that's been done. It seems like it would be only doing damage control, and minimally at that, more is being added than is being taken away on a daily basis. The bottom line is that living with someone who is emotionally unbalanced is a damaging, unhealthy situation to remain in.
I would suggest perhaps you should make an appointment yourself to speak with a therapist who specializes in child therapy and explain what's going on. From there perhaps it will be clearer what your best steps are.
What about you? I understand your concern for your daughter and your attention to that problem, but it can't be easy for you living with a man like this either. How are you doing? What do you think?
~ cl-2nd_life"Experience is what you get
when you don't get what you want."
~ Author unknown
"Ignoring the facts
does not change the facts"
But I wanted to say that I agree...at some point I'm going to need some professional help, not only for myself, but for my daughter, and my husband will probably reluctantly go, not be happy about it, and then come away from the experience with the same opinion that he had going into it. He's sort of like a broken record. Just sits in the same groove all the time. And it isn't that he doesn't realize that his actions are having an impact on our daughter...it's that he doesn't realize that his actions are having a NEGATIVE impact on our daughter. He thinks it's FABULOUS that she reads every ingredient label. He's fostering obsessive behavior and just has no clue that that's what it is.
I'm pretty sure that when I finally talk to him about how she cried over eating bacon because she thought he would disapprove, he'll be secretly thrilled that she doesn't want to eat bacon (she'll be more like him), and not realize that it's about the anxiety she goes through.
I think you're absolutely right about finding a child therapist, maybe one who specializes in body image, and talk to him/her myself to start getting the tools I need to start working on this from home.
And you're right. It's not easy living with him. And I'm not happy with him. I put on a good game face, but in my own head I left him about 3 years ago. I'm doing okay though. He's out of town a lot, and well, I have a very fulfilling life in just about every other way and a lot of friends who support me and realize that he has some annoying issues, but (perhaps because they know him) are at somewhat of a loss on offering any help for the situation.
Mom_inlimbo, I don't understand at all....
You're not happy living with him and have emotionally divorced yourself from him three years ago. His behavior is damaging to your daughter, you can see it at this point and it's easy to see it will cause her much more damage in the future -- issues that will be problems for her for the rest of her life. Why are you staying with him? He's bad for you, bad for your daughter, I don't get it. You're thinking that taking her to a child therapist would be good, but already know that he'd go through the motions and recant it all to her at home. He's hurting your daughter. Doing her emotional damage. You haven't really been there for three years. I've seen women who stay "for the children", but this situation isn't good for the child either. Why are you choosing to damage you and your daughter's lives? I know I've asked some hard hitting questions, but I really don't understand, I'm hoping you can explain.
~ cl-2nd_life"Experience is what you get
when you don't get what you want."
~ Author unknown
"Ignoring the facts
does not change the facts"
I posted my situation on more than one message board, and someone came up with the term that I think helps explain my husband. It's called Orthorexia, an obsession with eating healthy foods that happens when people take the concept of healthy eating to such an extreme that it becomes an obsession. A "fixation on righteous eating." I found an essay that was pretty eye opening, and I think might help.
My husband and I have lots of other problems. Many of them I believe stem from having to live with someone who has an obsessive personality and him trying to influence his obsessions onto those he lives with. So yes, I've distanced myself from him emotionally in order to continue to live with him. But don't you think it's a more loving thing to try to find a way to solve the problem rather than just give up on him and walk away, and try to take away his child? Other than his tendency to obsess on something (whether it's food, religion or something else) and his tendency to pressure our daughter into following his obsessive path, he's a sweet, gentle man and a good father. He truly loves his daughter and would not KNOWINGLY harm her, physically or emotionally. I am trying to help him understand that he is emotionally harming her, and he is, slowly, beginning to understand.
Let me get this straight. You're staying with a man you no longer have feelings for and who is doing serious and life long damage your daughter because you feel you're able to buffer his affect on her -- recognizing that she's showing serious symptoms of his effects NOW? You say you're "getting through to this man, who you believe has a diagnoseable mental illness and whom you are sure would not be amenable to help from a trained mental health professional? Never mind that you believe you're able to make progress where a professional couldn't, you've also said while he agrees with you to your face he goes behind your back and reiterates to your daughter what he wanted her to do in the first place, you also say he secretly loves that she's becoming like him. How is this "getting through to him"?
In your shoes I would be out of there in a second, if not for myself, but for my daughter's sake. In situations such as abuse and mental illness, the court modifies visitation and custody to fit the situation. Not only that, but most often custody is such that mom has kids M-F, dad gets them every other weekend. Even if custody was set at what is typical, I can't see how being away from him 12 days out of 14 wouldn't be a blessing and a real help to her mental health.
This makes no sense to me.
I have a hard time giving up. Perhaps I should be in counseling over that. Instead I've decided to stay and try to find a way to get help for something that perhaps I've been slow to realize was having an effect on our DD.
I know my husband. I know what he will listen to and what he won't. I know what he places on a pedestal and what he tosses off as garbage. The reason I came to this board was to help solve the problem...hopefully by finding someone who could recognize what was going on and could lead me to some more professional research or a holistic professional who's opinion my husband WOULD believe in. And I think I may have found it.
Also, I know my daughter. And I know that at this point it would serve my family better to approach the problem and try to solve it rather than to separate the family and ignore the problem.
One thing...I said that my DD had given me the 'impression' that he had said some things behind my back after our 'united front' discussion. Turns out, according to my husband, that I was wrong about that. It was only an 'impression' that I got from my daughter because she is taking him so seriously.
I don't know for sure that my husband has a diagnosable mental condition. I am afraid that my daughter will end up with one if he continues to keep talking to her the way he does. He has become aware of the effect of his actions and words through the discussion we had over the weekend, and I believe that he is going to try to temper the words that come out of his mouth. Not just about the food...about other things as well that I don't need to go into here, but he realizes that he has been extremely negative and that it has had an impact on her, he feels bad about it, and I think he's going to make a commitment to work on it.
I know you're all trying to help, and I appreciate that. I also know that you're opinion is based solely on the brief spotlight into my world that I gave to you during a moment of crisis. There's no way you can understand the other 95% of my world that also plays into why I make the decisions I make or do the things I do. But thanks for trying to help.
You gave many examples of his obsessive behavior spanning 17 years, and not restricted to food. You cited religion, government and the AMA as other obsessive targets. Considering his long history of obsessions I cannot imagine that you alone would impact any of them, and considering the length in which he’s been obsessive, it seems highly unlikely that any lay person could.
In your posts you said:
“I put on a good game face, but in my own head I left him about 3 years ago.”
“at some point I'm going to need some professional help, not only for myself, but for my daughter, and my husband will probably reluctantly go, not be happy about it, and then come away from the experience with the same opinion that he had going into it.”
“And it isn't that he doesn't realize that his actions are having an impact on our daughter...it's that he doesn't realize that his actions are having a NEGATIVE impact on our daughter. He thinks it's FABULOUS that she reads every ingredient label.”
“I'm pretty sure that when I finally talk to him about how she cried over eating bacon because she thought he would disapprove, he'll be secretly thrilled that she doesn't want to eat bacon (she'll be more like him), and not realize that it's about the anxiety she goes through.”
I am not trying to argue with you, but you seem to be backpedaling. I have no doubt that your husband has positive attributes as well, however, his negatives are extremely harmful.
Your husband is in need of mental health treatment, but you can’t make him go. Your daughter is in need of respite from the emotional problems her father is giving her. I know leaving is not easy, there’s no question about that and if I inferred that it was, I apologize. I’ve reread your initial post as well as your follow-up to make certain I didn’t misunderstand. I came away more alarmed and concerned that I did on the first read. I suggest you read what you wrote without trying to justify his behavior or minimize the effects and see how it seems in black and white.
Again, Mominlimbo, I know it’s not an easy situation, but minimizing it won’t make the end result any less sad.
I am choosing to approach in a way that other people here disagree with, which is, instead of leaving him, by finding a way to reach my husband about a problem that I finally know has an actual name: Orthorexia. I got the name from another person on the boards who recognized the symptoms and put me in touch with a website for a doctor who comes from a holistic, health food background who has found people who are unhealthily obsessed with eating healthy.
I know my husband. I know his obsessive personality. From 17 years of experience, I know the best approach to him. I know I couldn't do it on my own. That I need to approach it as if I was him...by getting as much information I can get my hands on about Orthorexia so that I can speak knowledgeably about it when I suggest that he look into it. There's a self-test he can take on the internet. I think he'll be able to recognize himself.
But he's not so obsessed that he wasn't shaken by the reality of the impact his negativity and obsessive personality is having on our daughter. He got it. You'll just have to take my word on that.
If I'm backpedaling, it's because much of what I wrote prior to Saturday afternoon was written in a state of anger, and I'm feeling much better now that I have finally spoken to him about my concerns. I'm not acting like there's no problem anymore, but I am giving him a chance to work on himself, and giving us a chance to do some healing and rebuilding. I think it's a good start.
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