I've a long habit of not eating dinner or much beyond a small snack in the evenings. This guy I'm dating he's slightly chubby but has high cholesterol, high blood pressure, he's Italian and thinks Italian food is God's food. I play along and just get the seafood and try not to smell the bread. He's a gourmet and loves food. He mentioned how he wants a wife that cooks and tossing him a protein bar isn't going to cut it.

I wouldn't mind cooking I guess, which would entail learning first. But it goes against my grain to consider feeding a person, whose diet is making them sick, more bad foods. So it could work in my favor taking control of the kitchen.

Is it craziness for a LCber to marry a foodie? The alternative is we keep separate kitchens and I dine at fine restaurants for free.

I don’t have an answer, but I worked years ago with a woman of Italian descent. She was a tiny, skinny thing, but she *loved* her food, her pasta, her rich sauces. She loved to eat and she loved to cook. She definitely had the “food is love” mindset.

She had met a guy and they really hit it off, and for a while she really thought he was “the one”. But he was a raw food vegan! She wanted to cook for him but he would never eat anything she cooked! He would come to dinner with her big Italian family carrying a bag of raw carrots and broccoli (or whatever) and eat only that.

It drove her crazy. He didn’t mind her cooking anything she wanted and told her he loved her no matter how she cook or ate. But she was the one it bothered, and she finally broke up with him as she said that, in the long run, she could never be happy with a man she could never cook for. For her it was an insurmountable obstacle. I guess you need to think about the long run and how if would affect you. And are there places to compromise?

With an Italian cook and a raw-food vegan not much!

Merpig that's hilarious!!!

Hi. I think this is really one of those things that you have to negotiate as you go along. Ultimately, YOU are responsible for what goes in your mouth, and HE is responsible for what goes in his. I'm on my third serious relationship since going LC almost 16 years ago now. I made it work. My ex of 9 years was a non-LCing vegetarian, but we were both happy with our food. If the fact that you refrain from certain foods makes him look down on you, that would be bad news.

The reason it worked for me with the ex, and it currently works with my DH, is that when I went LC, I made the decision to take over the kitchen and make cooking my hobby. Do you see yourself as the cook in a serious relationship? Does that idea unnerve you because of the sexism? There's no right or wrong answer. If you're going to share in the cooking, he has to take your dietary needs seriously. He doesn't have to adopt them himself, he just has to respect them.

I think the only conditions under which I could NOT make it work in a relationship is if he criticized me, and/or tried to force me to eat exactly like he did. Only you can figure out your comfort level with that. I don't pressure my husband to change his eating. If he ever wants to change it, it has to be his decision. I know what healthier foods he likes, and I throw them on his plate, and we joke about it. Just the other day, he said, "Green beans?!! What the f*** is this?!!" But he eats it, and we laugh. And I eat my food. And that's it.

Hope that helps a bit...

(ETA) I consider myself a foodie. It doesn't mean you can't tell yourself "no" to the things that are going to make you feel like crap and/or kill you.

I still think of myself as a foodie, even tho I've gone from eat everything to low carb. Husband isn't much of a cook, so he just eats what I cook. He hasn't been thrilled with a few of my lc offerings, but he'll eat whatever I put in front of him. That's the way he's survived for the past 31 years.

I don't eat in the evening & we eat different breakfasts (he still likes his oatmeal), but we're retired, so we still have lunch together. He's been able to adjust to having lunch later - between 1 & 2 - & that's been working for both of us.

He still eats in the evening & either I cook something for him or he scrounges for leftovers.

There has to be compromise of some sort, but since I have diabetes, the compromises are mostly on his side.

Interesting. Outside of chocolate that I eat for anxiety and black moods, I mostly eat for low blood sugar and energy. I've never been a cook, I'm the one that caught the microwave on fire and burned boiled eggs.

The bf has genetic epilepsy and he read up about LC and has taught me to cook some Italian veges he's really supportive but I think he wants a marriage like his parents had. I don't see myself working graveyard and fitting in working out and sleeping in the daytime and cooking 3-course dinners. I've even thought if I worked part-time I could fit all that cooking in. Trading one unpleasant chore for another. If I had to do the cooking and cleaning I would consider it slavery.