Ask Eric: Dieting routine irks mother-in-law

Dear Eric: My son’s wife is the chief breadwinner. They keep their finances separate; he pays half of everything, even though it is a real stretch for him.

After giving birth, she wanted to return to her “pre-baby weight,” so she signed up for an expensive diet plan in which all the food comes semi-premade in a box. My son has had to provide his own meals. They do not sit down to dinner at the same time.

When she does her auxiliary grocery shopping, he has to pay for half, because a lot of that is for the baby and their cat. But she does not buy groceries for him specifically.

It’s been nearly three years, and my daughter-in-law has not returned to her exact pre-baby weight because she does not adhere strictly to the diet, but she looks fine. She is a good cook and seems to enjoy aspects of cooking. But she continues this expensive diet and is not responsible for feeding her husband meals.

This is something I find unacceptable, but I know that things are different today. There is a part of me that feels it is the wife’s duty to make dinner, just as it is the husband’s duty to mow the lawn and take out the trash, and that she is staying on this diet because it absolves her from having to plan meals and fix dinner. I struggle to have a good relationship with her, so I say nothing. But what are your thoughts on this?

Eric says: You’ll be much happier if you stay out of their food fight. Because from what you’ve written, it’s not a fight for them, only you. Maybe this arrangement doesn’t work for your son, and he’s tired of making his own food. But he’s an adult, and he doesn’t need his mother arguing for him. If it’s a problem, he and his wife have to be the ones to solve it together.

A simple solution, I should think, would be for your son to add his groceries to the list with the baby’s food and the cat’s, thereby sharing all food costs equally. Or he can start ordering the prepared meals, too.

You’ll find it easier to have a relationship with your daughter-in-law if you release her from your expectations (and keep your eyes off her scale).

Dear Eric: From time to time, I hear a piece of gossip about somebody that I know. I usually neutralize the comment by saying, “I find that hard to believe.” And sometimes I add, “I don’t like to believe comments like this unless I’ve had that experience myself and I just haven’t seen it.”

Recently I was told to be careful because a person I know had been dealing with alcoholism in the past. I found out that this was not true, and that my other friend might have gotten the wrong idea because they worked at an alcohol center as an advocate.

Should I go back and talk to the original gossiper to share the alternate story?

Eric says: In the play (and film) “Doubt,” there’s a real barnburner of a monologue in which a character compares gossip to feathers from a down pillow, carried off on the wind, that the gossiper is instructed to collect and stuff back in the pillow. “It can’t be done,” the gossiper claims, realizing the magnitude of their act.

Gossip can be framed as simply relaying information, but in the instance you’ve laid out, it seems the gossiper was throwing feathers out recklessly. Personally, I wouldn’t trust this person’s account going forward.

You’d be doing everyone a service by going back to the gossiper and correcting their story. You might also remind them that spreading stories not based in fact has consequences — it can harm the person being gossiped about and it makes the gossiper untrustworthy.

Send questions to R. Eric Thomas at eric@askingeric.com or P.O. Box 22474, Philadelphia, PA 19110.