Hi chickies!

I'm new to posting on this site, but today I really need some insight I have an older sister who will be a second year in college (I'll be a freshman ) who is a bit overweight (but still much less than me). I've been on a strict plan since the beginning of summer, but my sister stocks our freezer with choco fudge brownie ice cream. I had some for breakfast this morning and again just now. I've already lost 10 lbs in a safe healthy way, but I don't want to gain it back just because my house is full of tempting treats. I've asked her not to bring them into the house until we go to our respective colleges in the fall and my father has asked the family to support me. While I don't want her to feel like I'm imposing my strict diet onto her, I don't want to be constantly derailed...so I threw the ice cream out. If the food is there, I'll eat it...

Do any of you have family members like this? I don't want her to get in trouble with the parents, and I don't want to keep wasting her money either... Any advice on how to confront her peacefully?

You made the decision to go on a diet, she didn't.
You have to pull out your inner will-power to stop yourself from eating her food,
she has the right to keep what she wants in the fridge, and it's very insensitive, but what can you do really.

But I do support giving her a push into joining you with your diet.
Never a bad side to being healthy.

Do you think she is being insensitive by bringing it into the house? I do.
She's making it harder on you than dieting already is.

Ask her to get a mini fridge/freezer and keep it in her room. She will probably need one for college anyway. Or ask her to buy it, keep it in a brown paper bag and in the back that way you don't know its there. Out of sight out of mind.

It is hard and it really sucks, but you have to make the decision to make good choices for yourself. All you can do is ask her to be supportive but if she isn't willing then you can't force her.

I've found since my weight loss has become more obvious my family is inspired to make better choices too!

You've lost 10 pounds even with the temptations around, just think of what you will be able to do when that temptation is no longer there!

You didn't have the right to throw her food out. She has the same right to eat what she wants as you do. How would you feel if she threw your food out ?

Ah... While your sister is being insensitive to your efforts to be healthy, I don't think you should have thrown her food out. It's one thing to be supportive. It's another to put your own wants aside completely for another person.

I'm dieting. My husband isn't. Do I wish he would stop buying fudge rounds and keeping them in plain sight? Yes. But he has the right to eat whatever he wants. He's not the one who's overweight and struggling to get healthy; I am. So, instead of turning into a shrew, I simply keep 60 calorie Jell-O chocolate puddings in the fridge. Do they taste as good as fudge rounds? Heck to the no. But I have to learn will power if I'm ever going to make this work.

You have to learn will power. What will you do if you get to college and your roommate is a sweets junkie and keeps a ton of sweets in your shared mini fridge? What will you do when you get a job and the office has parties where all kinds of high-fat treats abound? You can't go around throwing out the office cupcakes or your roommates candy bars.

I have sympathy for you. Really, I do. But I think it's absurd to expect the people around you to diet right along with you. If my brother threw my food out because he was dieting when we both lived at home, I would have socked him one!

You don't get to control what other people eat, or what other people buy to eat.

I think you were wrong to throw out the ice cream, and I think you need to either replace it (and not mess with anyone else's property moving forward) or reimburse your sister.

I agree with what most people are saying. It's a test of will. It sucks when family members (or roommates) have tempting food when you're trying to resist, but there's not much you can do. If your family already is trying to support you, then you can let them know that having those kinds of foods around does hurt your weight loss. However, since they're not on diets, it's best to just ask them to put everything away where you can't see it. Don't leave bags of chips on the counter, put the ice cream in the back of the freezer, etc.

Good luck!

You shouldn't have thrown her food out. I'd be pissed if someone did that to me, demand they pay for it, and then go out and buy a new one.

Your whole life will be filled with temptations. If you go to work, and someone brings in donuts, are you going to throw all of them out, because someone was "insensitive" enough to bring them for the whole office?

Your sister bringing food she wants to eat into the house she's living in, isn't being unsupportive of you. It's living her life the way she wants to (even if you don't agree with it, and she has the right to make her own food choices without needing your permission). If she's tries to bully you into eating what you don't want to - that's unsupportive. Having food she wants to eat in the house she is livin in, is completely reasonable behavior.


Are you going to have a roommate or housmates in college? Are you going to eat or throw away their food or demand they not bring certain foods into the house or dorm room?

That's not going to work very well. People are going to be very upset if you eat their food or throw it away without asking, and if you try to tell them what they can or can't bring into the house, you're going to have some serious problems.

You might think "That's different, I would never think of touching or eating a roommate's food.". Then why would you eat your sister's food?

If you are going to be living with other people, think of it as practicing self-control around other people's food now, because food issues with room mates get ugly. I brought a dorm fridge and my freshman room mate didn't. I told her she was welcome to share the fridge and the first thing she said was that I wasn't to eat any food she put in the fridge (it made me regret offering to share the fridge). I never would have dreamed of eating her food, but that one unfriendly exchange really set the tone for the relationship. I avoided my dorm room as much as possible, because I hated the rude room mate (she made a lot of other demands and paranoid comments so it was more than the fridge issue, but I saw a lot of room mates having rocky relationships over food issues).

Use a sharpie marker and write your sister's name on any food in the house that she brings in. Pretend it's a room mate you have never met and are rooming with for the summer - every time you go to eat her food, imagine what a college room mate would say if they came home and found their food missing.

If you're going to be living alone, you get to dictate what comes into your living space, but when you live with others you can't ask everyone to change their habits to suit you (well you can ask, but most aren't going to).

You need to learn to live with temptation around you. It'll always be there unfortunately, but you can build up the willpower to resist it. Think of this time with the temptations in your own house as a test for the future.

Your sister didn't choose to change her lifestyle and it's very rude of you to impose your changes on her and it was EXTREMELY rude of you to throw her food out! If YOU want to change your life, that's great (and you should be proud of the weight you've lost) but forcing your sister on that path won't help her at all.

I'm changing my lifestyle. My family isn't. There is SO MUCH junk food around me each and every day that it's ridiculous. I have to dodge my family constantly offering me more portions at meals and always wanting to go out. I've learned to resist the temptations in the house and learn the magic word of "no."

The world we live in will not change to adapt to our lifestyles, we must work to ensure that we can continue to live healthy lives in a world so bent on making us unhealthy.

That was not a nice thing to do, I agree with everyone else about that. If I was her I would be furious. Like someone else mentioned, she is not on a diet and can eat what she wants. My husband is not on a diet so I just have to make a choice whether to eat what he has or what I know will help me lose weight. My sister even asked me if I was ok to cut a chocolate pie for guests at her house the other day (she was busy and she knows chocolate is my weakness) That wasn't insensitive if her to have it there or to ask me to serve it. You just have to learn to have the will power to make the choice that is right for you and not try to control what other people in your life are doing.

Ditto! I couldn't have said this better. BTW, my husband also does not have (and never has had) a weight problem, and although he is not a big junk food eater, he does like to keep some treats in the house for when the mood strikes him (he can keep a chocolate bar in the house for a month; why can't I do that!).

I think this is the biggest take-a-way lesson for the OP (and for all of us). We cannot change others. We can only change ourselves.

I'm sure your sister will forgive you but kick your butt if you do it again. Sisters do this stuff all the time. Just don't do it again

So, now what? You can't really do this again. Why not write on some tape "X's ice cream!!" (your sister's name) so you can look at that every time you peek inside the freezer (or don't look in the freezer!). A humorous solution to your problem. I'm sure your sister won't mind.

I've lost 40lbs (twice...). My sister is still around 250lbs and will continue to be so for a long time, by her choice. Just as you have the right not to eat it, she has the right to eat it. The power comes from within you. This is NOT the first time you will face this - now, as a mother, I must supply endless amounts of delicious full-fat cheeses, breads, avocados, creams, for my 14 month old. We need to learn restraint !Good luck.