This is more of a long useless rant I guess, so thank you for reading it lmao.
My girlfriend and I have been together for a decade and moved in together 3 years ago. Even before moving in I was a bit nervous because we clearly do not have the same standards when it comes to cleaning nor do we have the same amount of money. Still, I love her a lot and it’s an amazing relationship. BUT.
From the start, we agreed to a 50/50 split on the cost of groceries and other bills……..except she goes through all the food so GODDAMN QUICKLY. That, and eating most of it without bothering to ask “hey can I finish this?”. I’m pretty low on cash so I check for discounts every week and go to grocery stores that are quite far from our place. I do most of the grocery too (but to her defense, I would be critical of how much she bought butter or carrots for so I can’t blame her at all for that lol. I suggested we go together to a specific grocery store with some insanely good prices to find a balance but she doesn’t like that place so, not happening. Gotta carry all of it myself).I don’t know if maybe it’s because she’s an only child (I grew up with four sisters), but it seems like she has no idea how food is equally shared in a house.
Like, when we first moved in, there was this one situation that upset me right away. I only drink one specific soy milk in my coffee and she knows it. It’s pricy and the grocery store I go to get it is about 30-40 minutes away from my place (can’t drive, I’m epileptic) so I usually buy four at a time. I opened one in the morning, and when I got home from work MORE THAN HALF OF IT WAS GONE! This would normally last one week! Told her it would be appreciated if she could get her own since this is only for my coffee, and I’ll quote her, she was like yeah okay, I don’t really like it anyway. THEN WHY DID YOU DRINK MORE THAN HALF OF IT???????? We have a grocery store and a drugstore a block away! This was super heavy to carry, it was almost 30 degrees outside! She will still ask occasionally to have some because she didn’t bother to go buy milk for herself.
Whether I buy cream cheese, or chips, or ice cream, or cucumbers, or bread, or butter, or tomatoes 3/4 of it is gone two days later. When I expressed frustration over this, she told me to put my name on stuff I don’t want to share..but like…stuff like butter is needed for a lot of cooking, it would seem odd to put my name on it. Still, I’ll walk in the kitchen to her putting butter on a toast which is all cool, but she’s not using a knife, she putting whole fucking tablespoons of butter on that toast!
Last week, I bought this package of instant Indian food, it was on special at 2,50$ and I was curious about it. I honestly expected it to be bad, but turns out it was pretty good. She told me she hates stuff like that cuz her mom used to make it all the time (tho not this specific brand or type of product tho). Told her to “have a taste, but I’ll take the rest for my lunch tomorrow”, I turned around and she had finished all of it!!!! I was so pissed. I didn’t say anything cuz the next day was her birthday, but what an inconsiderate thing to do.
I’ll finish on that, but today, I stopped by the grocery store. I was super exhausted once I got home, the bag was heavy and she could see I was tired. Bought some canned corn to add to a meal. I take maybe 3-4 tablespoons of it to add to my plate. Once again, I turn around and she helped herself to most it. Is it that fucking hard to ask “hey, can I have some?” ?? That’s what I do. I don’t want to bring up the matter with her again, but maybe I’ll start doing what she asked and put my name on the stuff I don’t want to share. Ugh.
tl;dr : My girlfriend never bothers to go buy and carry groceries, yet goes through all of the food without ever asking if I was planning on having this for my lunch or if I want any before finishing it.
Update 28/02/2024: Thanks everyone, like I said this was more of a ranting post than me asking for advice, still I received lots of good advice. One thing I felt wasn’t expressed well is that what really frustrates me is: going out to buy most of the food, expecting it to last a week, and then having it gone two days later.
So, we sat down and talked about the whole matter. I tried to express my frustration in a way that didn’t sound like “you eat too much and all of my stuff” because that’s not what this is about. She understood that being almost the only one going out and carrying the groceries sucked and that we should take time to do it together. We’ll also try sitting together and have a look at the weekly discounts to make a better plan for groceries/lunches for the week. That way it’s also less pressure on her to budget the food and how much we’ll pay for it.
We decided to each have a “special” shelve of food we want to each keep for ourselves and some that is still 50/50 like butter, eggs, olive or vegetable oil, spices, noodles/pasta etc., since it’s used for meals we share.
And finally, I didn’t tell her, but I’ll make an effort to stop being so intense on keeping track of every single thing she takes in the fridge.
ps. We’re both girls