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Adult Nephew Doubled My Grocery Budget
Sorry for the long post. tl:dr, My nephew is eating everything except the floorboards and I need ideas on how to keep up that still gives him his 'protein'.
For the last three weeks my 24yo Nephew (Jr.) has been living with me. My sister adopted Jr. at one years old when she married his father. The father died when he was 12 and my sister had him live with her husband's mother thereafter.
My sister is not stable, and is not able or willing to support him. She has opted out of the situation. If I ask her to pitch in, she will just see it as an opportunity to beg or con me for money for her vices.
His grandmother needed to move into assisted living and Jr. had no where to go. He worked for an Amazon warehouse in his city. Since there was another Amazon warehouse in my city that he could transfer to, his grandmother asked if I'd take him in until he could get on his feet. There weren't any other options for housing for him at the time, since he lived in a much more expensive city then, and I had liked him when he was a kid, so I said we'd try it out.
I still mostly like him. He's got a great personality. He goes above and beyond to show how much he appreciates my taking him in.
However, the problem is that he's a giant of a man with a giant of an appetite at rest, and he's doing 12 hour shifts running around the huge Amazon warehouse all day.
Jr. is 6'8" and has to be over 400 pounds. He's not fat per say, but he's one sandwich away from it. Most of his bulk seems to be muscle.
The agreement is that he lives here rent free while saving up for an apartment. I'm providing room and board. I knew that the grocery bill would go up with him here, but I had no idea by how much.
As an example, a frugal meal I make is a homemade chicken pot pie in a regular sized pie tin. My mother (who also lives with me) and I eat a slice each for lunch, a slice each for dinner, and that leaves us half a pie for the next day. I figured now that Jr. lived with me, he'd eat the other half of the pie for a meal.
No. Half a chicken pot pie is not enough food for one meal for him. **He needs an entire extra pot pie baked for him**, and then he'll still eat the four slices left over from my mother and I's pie.
I can't cook him a steak with mash potatoes and green beans for a meal. He needs two such steaks and plates. If I make a large batch of stir fry I have to make sure I serve my mother and I before he gets to it or he is going to eat all of it for one meal.
I tried to get smart and make big batches of rice and beans just to fill him up, or stretch out the meat sauce for spaghetti, but he can't stand it. "Aunty I need protein! A man's got to have meat to get by! How you expect me to get by with no protein!" He literally gets sad over it.
Just like he literally gets happy when I make him a large amount of good quality food. He loves to eat. Food is his obsession. **All he watches on TV are food programs.**
We had a full pantry before he came to live with us. It has been wiped out. Either I'm using everything to make his titanically huge lunches, or he's at home eating everything that remotely qualifies as food. Can of maceral? Gone. Instant mashed potatoes? Gone. Granola bars that I bought to put in his lunches? Gone. Spam? Gone. And I don't even think of making brownies or cookies anymore because my mother and I will get one each if we're lucky before he inhales them all.
I like to keep mini marshmallows around to make ambrosia. He found them in the high cupboard over the refrigerator and inhaled them in one go. The same with the canned pineapple, cottage cheese, and mandarin oranges.
He says that his binging on his days off makes up for how he's starving all day long at work. **Yes, even with large coolers full of massive lunches.**
It's getting so I never know if I'm going to have food available for my mother and I. I took out some ground turkey to defrost it and he came to me asking if he could have them all. "No. That is for dinner for all of us." Thankfully he asked and didn't just inhale them.
The amount of extra grocery trips I'm having to make has gotten ridiculous. I can't even stock up on things, because having extra food around just makes him eat everything faster. It hasn't even been a month yet, but it's cost hundreds of dollars to keep him fed.
And he's not a terrible person. I can tell he feels bad. He keeps asking me if I'm good with money, because I know he feels guilty. He took on cleaning the house from top to bottom once a month so I didn't have to pay for housekeeping anymore (I used to pay for a deep clean once a month).
He has zero willpower. If I tell him not to eat something I see him fighting with himself over it. Like his muscles and stomach are screaming at him for fuel. He's got an insane metabolism added to his size and the amount of running around he does at his work.
**Asking him for money to help pay for groceries is going to extend the time he's in my home saving up to move out.** And I don't want to do that. When he moved in the agreement was 90 days. With his income he should afford rent, transportation, and everything easily, but that will just leave him $500 a month for food. There is no way that will buy him enough for even half a month. Plus, I'm sure he'll buy giant steaks and racks of ribs since that's what he wishes I would make for him all the time. I don't know how that's going to work out, but I'm taking one problem at a time.
I signed up for this, so I'm stuck, at least until his time is up. I just need some idea on how to keep this man fed, a long with the rest of us, without it costing over $1,000 extra every month just for him. Does anyone have any ideas? **Moral support is appreciated also, this was a bit of a vent.**
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Sorry for the long post. tl:dr, My nephew is eating everything except the floorboards and I need ideas on how to keep up that still gives him his 'protein'.
For the last three weeks my 24yo Nephew (Jr.) has been living with me. My sister adopted Jr. at one years old when she married his father. The father died when he was 12 and my sister had him live with her husband's mother thereafter.
My sister is not stable, and is not able or willing to support him. She has opted out of the situation. If I ask her to pitch in, she will just see it as an opportunity to beg or con me for money for her vices.
His grandmother needed to move into assisted living and Jr. had no where to go. He worked for an Amazon warehouse in his city. Since there was another Amazon warehouse in my city that he could transfer to, his grandmother asked if I'd take him in until he could get on his feet. There weren't any other options for housing for him at the time, since he lived in a much more expensive city then, and I had liked him when he was a kid, so I said we'd try it out.
I still mostly like him. He's got a great personality. He goes above and beyond to show how much he appreciates my taking him in.
However, the problem is that he's a giant of a man with a giant of an appetite at rest, and he's doing 12 hour shifts running around the huge Amazon warehouse all day.
Jr. is 6'8" and has to be over 400 pounds. He's not fat per say, but he's one sandwich away from it. Most of his bulk seems to be muscle.
The agreement is that he lives here rent free while saving up for an apartment. I'm providing room and board. I knew that the grocery bill would go up with him here, but I had no idea by how much.
As an example, a frugal meal I make is a homemade chicken pot pie in a regular sized pie tin. My mother (who also lives with me) and I eat a slice each for lunch, a slice each for dinner, and that leaves us half a pie for the next day. I figured now that Jr. lived with me, he'd eat the other half of the pie for a meal.
No. Half a chicken pot pie is not enough food for one meal for him. **He needs an entire extra pot pie baked for him**, and then he'll still eat the four slices left over from my mother and I's pie.
I can't cook him a steak with mash potatoes and green beans for a meal. He needs two such steaks and plates. If I make a large batch of stir fry I have to make sure I serve my mother and I before he gets to it or he is going to eat all of it for one meal.
I tried to get smart and make big batches of rice and beans just to fill him up, or stretch out the meat sauce for spaghetti, but he can't stand it. "Aunty I need protein! A man's got to have meat to get by! How you expect me to get by with no protein!" He literally gets sad over it.
Just like he literally gets happy when I make him a large amount of good quality food. He loves to eat. Food is his obsession. **All he watches on TV are food programs.**
We had a full pantry before he came to live with us. It has been wiped out. Either I'm using everything to make his titanically huge lunches, or he's at home eating everything that remotely qualifies as food. Can of maceral? Gone. Instant mashed potatoes? Gone. Granola bars that I bought to put in his lunches? Gone. Spam? Gone. And I don't even think of making brownies or cookies anymore because my mother and I will get one each if we're lucky before he inhales them all.
I like to keep mini marshmallows around to make ambrosia. He found them in the high cupboard over the refrigerator and inhaled them in one go. The same with the canned pineapple, cottage cheese, and mandarin oranges.
He says that his binging on his days off makes up for how he's starving all day long at work. **Yes, even with large coolers full of massive lunches.**
It's getting so I never know if I'm going to have food available for my mother and I. I took out some ground turkey to defrost it and he came to me asking if he could have them all. "No. That is for dinner for all of us." Thankfully he asked and didn't just inhale them.
The amount of extra grocery trips I'm having to make has gotten ridiculous. I can't even stock up on things, because having extra food around just makes him eat everything faster. It hasn't even been a month yet, but it's cost hundreds of dollars to keep him fed.
And he's not a terrible person. I can tell he feels bad. He keeps asking me if I'm good with money, because I know he feels guilty. He took on cleaning the house from top to bottom once a month so I didn't have to pay for housekeeping anymore (I used to pay for a deep clean once a month).
He has zero willpower. If I tell him not to eat something I see him fighting with himself over it. Like his muscles and stomach are screaming at him for fuel. He's got an insane metabolism added to his size and the amount of running around he does at his work.
**Asking him for money to help pay for groceries is going to extend the time he's in my home saving up to move out.** And I don't want to do that. When he moved in the agreement was 90 days. With his income he should afford rent, transportation, and everything easily, but that will just leave him $500 a month for food. There is no way that will buy him enough for even half a month. Plus, I'm sure he'll buy giant steaks and racks of ribs since that's what he wishes I would make for him all the time. I don't know how that's going to work out, but I'm taking one problem at a time.
I signed up for this, so I'm stuck, at least until his time is up. I just need some idea on how to keep this man fed, a long with the rest of us, without it costing over $1,000 extra every month just for him. Does anyone have any ideas? **Moral support is appreciated also, this was a bit of a vent.**
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| 5,000 mlx | |
| 34 | |
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lentils - high in protein have kept families alive for 100's of years. They are cheap, come in a variety of colors and accept many flavorings.
