Husband can eat like a pig, but shouldn’t cook like one

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 14/12/2017 (3171 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: My husband eats like a pig and he’s a skinny rail. I eat like a pig, and I look like a pig. He protests when I diet because he says I won’t keep him warm in bed if we’re both skinny.

And he loves my curves. The trouble is my doctor says I now have curves on my curves, and my weight is dangerously high with my diabetes, so now I’m on a strict low-carb diet.

My husband, in self-defence, has taken to cooking and baking and is really good at it. He’s actually gained some weight and it looks healthy on him. For me, walking into the kitchen with baking laid out on the counter every day is like walking into a torture chamber. What do I do about that thoughtless guy? I love him and he’s getting so hot looking now that his bones don’t show. Me, I’m still a tub of lard.

— Tortured Fatso, Transcona

Dear Tortured Fatso: Most baking can keep well in the freezer until 30-60 minutes before you eat it. Insist your husband freeze the covered goodies except for what he wants to eat then, or until you have people over.

The rest of the time you should be able to walk into the kitchen and not feel tempted and tortured. Remind him you’ll be alive a lot longer to keep him warm and happy in bed if he’ll help you keep temptations out of the way.

Perhaps you could take on more of the other household tasks and he could do more of the cooking, and cut down on the baking. Maybe you can trick him!

See what he could do with a few shiny new low-carb cookbooks with lots of inviting pictures — a kind of challenge that will also help you, his beloved.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: My mother has always been a nasty woman. She still dotes on her two lazy-ass boys who can do no wrong, and now they have wives who pamper them and have spawned a bunch of brats who have no manners.

At Christmas, she gets into gear and plays the role for the neighbours. It is a day that gives my two sisters and I panic symptoms for a week, like we are going back to be unloved young girls in the old house with Cruella and the boys.

This year, we girls have decided not to attend and are having Christmas with each other at the farm house of our youngest sister. I have been scared to tell her we’re not coming. How do I handle Christmas presents? We all usually just give gifts to our mom, and she gave nice gifts to the grandsons and cheap thoughtless gifts to the granddaughters. Sometimes she didn’t even get their names quite right on the tags.

Should we stop giving her presents?

— Ungrateful Daughters, Winnipeg

Dear Ungrateful Daughters: Your gift to yourselves is not having a week of panic attacks and a lousy Christmas any more. If there are any guilty feelings, do something today to stop having them.

Send her a Christmas plant with a card to be delivered ASAP, and say in the card, “Merry Christmas, Mom. We’ll be out of town this year for a few days so won’t see you for dinner, but hope you have a great time in the city.”

Then stop worrying about it, and you will have a better Christmas all around. She isn’t worried about you.

She’ll get to be with her precious boys and you are about to have the best Christmas of your life. Congratulations!

Miss Lonelyhearts
Advice Columnist

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