Mom asks to go food shopping with me once a week. I go alone 5-6 times a week. I buy produce, rice, and whole grain cereals. When Mom goes she buys cupcakes, caramels, candy, cookies, and frappuccinos, usually several of each. I am NOT looking for a "let them eat whatever they want" versus "why do you even have junk food in the house?" debate. I just try to strike a balance on that.
What concerns me is the waste. I try to make sure we have some of everything because it's inevitable that she will want whatever I didn't buy. She's obsessed with the worry that she'll run out of cupcakes or candy, so she gets more before she's eaten what we have.
Before I arrived, they bought a new fridge and kept the old one so they'd have room for everything, even though there were only two people and Dad barely eats. She buys more food than either of them can eat and he tends to buy things he used to like but now forgets to eat. Neither of them replaces lids, tops, or covers the food with foil or saran. Food goes bad either because it dries out or there's just too much of it.
Mom likes to buy a whole roasted chicken, but then only wants a chicken sandwich once. Two weeks will go by before she wants another and by that time I've fed the chicken to our dogs and cats so it isn't wasted.
Night before last, she bought 3 boxes of instant pudding even though we already have 3 boxes at home that we've had for 4 months.
Do I just resign myself both to the madness AND the waste?
She used to walk to shopping where she used to live and when I cleaned out her house when she sold it, there was so much food waste - with duplicates and triplicates on everything. 2 freezers filled with so much meat and she never made any of it!
Sounds like you need to start making some decisions for her or refuse to take her with you.
I am finding my Mother is returning somewhat to her childish ways so I treat her like a child when she acts like one. Not my favorite thing to do !
Hope the best for you.
You might also try something I do for myself, set her her own spending limit for "treats" and give her a calculator. She will have to make a decision instead of being impulsive.
Otherwise just know that your pets are probably really happy about the situation :D good luck!!
When we had to move mom out of her house we took a huge amount to be donated to a local women's shelter, but that was mostly canned and packaged or frozen food. With these kinds of sweet foods your mom wants it's now or never.
You can either continue to let mom go shopping once a week, or you can curtail it. (And why are you shopping 5 or 6 times a week?) Maybe she just wants to be out and about? What about mall walking? No buying!
Is there an activity that you can get your mom involved in, to redirect her? What about baking a cake or cupcakes or cookies once a week? It can be from scratch or a mix, it doesn't matter, but maybe that is something she might enjoy?
Otherwise, is she still able to walk or do any sort of exercise?
P.S. If dementia is involved I believe in adapting to my loved one because adapting and learning is over for them.
ice cream bars, ice cream cups and popsicles etc ,coffee, a cold beverage in a cafe on every floor that she never ever visits but wants to order and pay for from Target. She has eaten junk food her entire life. She’s 92, there are way more things to battle than her not cleaning her plate.
But I too wonder why on earth you go to the grocery basically every day. Maybe take her to a movie or something instead sometimes. Or when you get home freeze what you know she won’t use. My mother and stepfather did that as well. Groceries continually but ate out every day because they were too tired to cook after shopping for groceries. My mother never went hungry a day in her life but imo it was out of boredom
I was born in 1933 during the depression. My mother went 3 days without food in 1931. That marks you. Then in 1940 both my brother who was 2, and I who was 6 were very ill, grocery stores were not open the hours they are now. My dad was working long hours out of town and not home when the stores were open. My mother didn't drive and we ran out of food. She had to leave both Bill and I alone to go to the store. I vividly remember her turning off the gas and electricity at the meter, and the water outside the house. Then warning us not to move off the couch unless the house was on fire, she hurried to the store. She swore that would never happen again. She stockpiled food. Every summer we would can a years worth of food.
When I left home in 1952, I was determined to make it on my own. I was still in High School and I went hungry at the end of every month. I remember not eating lunch (no money and no food). My friends would want to share but pride wouldn't let me.
For those of you who have never gone hungry, because you had no money for food, you can't even imagine the effect it has on you. At one part of my life, I had to have a little food with me all the time. If I went two blocks to get gasoline, I would have an apple or banana in my purse, it was a security blanket.
That said, I hope to God I NEVER have to live with either one of my children or have to depend on them. All the health food addicts don't seem to remember that your parent lived to 90 or something eating what you consider junk food. Also, when you have lost all your family of origin, all your friends, your body is failing, you are in pain all the time, taste, hearing, sight, is going or gone. All you have left is eating, who cares? All of the "I don't allow them this, or allow them that" grates on me.
That said, it sounds like her mother is maybe in dementia and if she has hoarded all her life, it isn't going to stop now.
The Serenity Prayer, is a good idea.
Regarding the Chicken, I like the idea of using the leftovers, we do it all the time. I love chicken and dumplings.
On the roasted chicken type things, cut it up when you get home and put pieces into little sandwich bags in the freezer. Easier to get a sandwich amount out when she wants it.
You may never get it completely under control, but perhaps can keep her more on track if she is actually making the list herself and comparing it to what you have plenty of already. The extra refrig could also 'break' and then she would be more limited to space to keep things.
It bothered me so much with all the wasted food until I decided to rein it all in. So much better now. Not perfect, but better. She has always been a food hoarder, so I can’t blame it on old age. It’s just that she depends on me now to bring the food in and I don’t let her hoard. It was my time too that was being used up in this hoarding situation. Crazy thinking is my thoughts to it all. It was so mentally unhealthy being a part of it for a while until I woke up and realized I had some control over this.
Sometimes one needs to pick and choose their battles. You are not going to change your mother's shopping compulsion, which is a form of addiction. It could be worse - she could be on QVC shopping network almost every day.
1. I prefer to buy fresh produce, which doesn't last as long as other foods
2. Mom asks for something that often and it's always something we don't have. I try to put it off but it's easier to just go along.
3. I don't have time to shop the whole store, so I grab small amounts. I drop Dad off at noon mass but it's only 30 minutes and he's always late arriving. The store happens to be closer to the church than home, so I go while he's in mass. If I'm late picking him up, some of the older ladies at church will fret and wring their hands and berate me for making him wait.
If it is her $$, please allow her the luxury of a settled mind.
Does she live with you?
If so cut her shopping trip with you to once every other week. If she asks if you are going to the store tell her you do not need anything this week.
Is she pushing her own cart or putting her items in yours?
If she places items in your cart take a few things out and leave them as you go through another aisle or if you can distract her at the check out tell the checker you changed your mind on these 3 items. And then remove the duplicate items or the most perishable ones.
Your other option is take many of the items that you can example the boxes of pudding, cans, packaged candy and the like and return them the next time you go to the store.
The chicken by the way can be turned into soup or chicken salad or casseroles. Or even frozen no need to give it to the dogs and cats.
RE: 2 refrigerators: The day I met my DH, he had 2 refrigerators, one for "on sale" fruits. 34 years later, we still have 2 refrigerators, only now I've lost DH. I would be totally lost without my 2nd refrigerator and for a few years we actually had 3, one was out in the carport! I am a Peanut Butter Addict (I admit it) and when I found a sale on Peanut Butter, especially at a Discount Grocery, I buy it! The fridge in the carport was full of peanut butter and before you ask, yes, I ate it all eventually. I also keep my "dry goods" groceries like pasta and dry mixes in the 2nd fridge. I live in Mississippi and it helps to control not only spoilage but also I don't have to worry about bugs.
But now I freeze my peanut butter : )
P.S. I do Not throw out food - I put it outside for wildlife to eat if I no longer want it. Throwing away food is a Sin to me. Feeding wildlife is more like giving back to nature.
However, food shopping/cooking is one of my mother's few pleasures, she just loves going and browsing. It's one of the few things that I can entertain her with. And prep/cooking keeps her busy in the house, though it has to be supervised.
Food has always been a big part of their lives and there isn't much enjoyment left in their waning years so I'm not fighting this battle. They have money, it's theirs to waste. I let them buy/eat what they want, but they don't eat a lot of junk so I don't have to worry much about that at least.
I feel exhausted most of the time so I'm letting this issue slide.
I understand your frustration though. Can you surreptitiously remove things from the trolley as she puts them in? Would she notice?
I used to leave big things in the back of their cupboards (boxes of pasta/tissue) so that the cupboards always appeared to be very full. It didn't always work, my mum started putting coffee under the bed! :)
Unfortunately , you will have to cut mom out of the shopping trip.
Create a reasonable list with her weekly, and you must do the shopping.
Made life so much easier.
It's up to you to decide which is the lesser of these two evils. Myself, I'd go for the disciplinarian approach and stand over her until she'd written a list before we set off, and turn purple if anything went in the trolley that wasn't on the list, and plan menus minutely. Your mother, in any case, is *always* going to want what isn't in the cupboard - I don't blame her, I've just sighed and huffed myself because I don't want Bourbons or shortbread with my cup of tea, today I want custard creams and there aren't any - and so unless you bring the entire store home you're stuck with that problem anyway, and so you might just as well put up with moderate background grumbling. But you may not want to be dictatorial about it, and you may not be a habitual list maker yourself, either.
Or, you could put the (emptied, clean) containers all together on the kitchen table and make them look at the fifty dollars they're content to throw away each week.
Or you could try ecological or global food distribution based guilt-tripping. I don't myself think it's their fault that children in Eritrea or the Yemen are dying of starvation but I do think we perhaps owe it to them at least to be mindful of our good fortune.
Does your city run a food waste collection and recycling service?
My MIL is like this. Still mentally and physically intact and almost 80, but no memory of what food she buys. She lives alone. Her pantry is overflowing with canned goods and boxes-- an army could walk in and they'd be set. Once she asked me to clean it out for her, which I didn't mind doing. The second I tried to toss anything, I was met with "that's still good!" or "that hasn't gone stale!". Ummm yes, your opened bag of cereal from 2016 has indeed gone stale. She didn't even notice a can had exploded and was dried up, stuck to the shelf!
I don't get why she asked me to clean it, when she wasn't willing to part with anything. She's not a hoarder either. Just has the "I'll pick up a can of tomatoes while I'm here at the store" idea and forgets she has 3 cans at home, and she seldom cooks.
Anyhoo. Maybe collect recent receipts from the store trips, add her items up and show her how much she has wasted. Once she sees the numbers that may make it more "real" to her.
When she came to live with me, she'd squirrel away boxes of cookies, crackers and cereal in her bedroom until it became moth infested. We were fortunate not to have mice. When she went to live at memory care, they allowed her a reasonable little stash of goodies in her room but she overdid it and her room became overrun with ants, prompting them to throw it all away. I thought for sure she'd have a stroke, she was so angry. Now they have a shelf that is just for her stuff in their dry storage area off the kitchen and she has to ask when she wants it. They check the dates and throw out whatever goes bad. Her latest obsession is little cans of chicken salad with crackers. When I take her shopping, she tries to buy 8-10 cans at a time. I've been putting my foot down lately and making the facility the bad guy, as in "Mom, they won't let you bring all that in - they don't have the room to store it." God help them if even one can goes missing. She'll know. She can't remember her own birthday or where she put her hairbrush, but if one can of chicken salad is missing, she will know.