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I Don't Know What To Eat...

The Female Dilemma

By Samantha ReidPublished 6 years ago 3 min read
Top Story - December 2017
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Ah, the female dilemma.

Now before anyone jumps down my throat about this: if you are female and know what you want to eat every time someone asks you, then I applaud you for that. You are steps ahead of many individuals and you need to hold onto that decision-making ability. You are truly gifted as a member of the gender.

If you are like me, and many other females, when people ask you what you want to eat, you kind of look at them in panic. It's not because you aren't hungry. In fact, you are likely starving, and that's usually the problem.

You've waited so long to get food that anything would really do. You don't have a hankering for Subway or Dairy Queen or Montana's. You just want to be able to put something in your mouth to stop your stomach from growling. You are edging past the point of hungry and into the territory of "hangry" where no decisions get made.

You just want another person to make the decision and then you can go eat. And if the other person is also female, then it will either be a problem, or you'll just pull into the first restaurant you drive by. It's really a coin toss.

In my experience, the problem really arises when the other person is male, and this is not to hate on the men at all, but they just want to make you happy. They want to feed you what "you" want. That's a noble intention, when you're hungry, but when you've hit "hangry" they just need to pick a place and take you there.

It is almost as though the female brain shuts off when it hits a certain point of food deprivation. Perhaps it is because we think about so many different things at once; we can jump from topic to topic all day long, and when we finally have to make a decision about a singular issue, we've expended all of our energy.

I don't know what it is. Perhaps it's just a me problem.

I know women who know what they are going to eat every single day. I know women who make the same lunch every day to avoid having to think about it. I know women who just skip lunch because they forget to eat. And I know women who can plan five-course dinners every single day for a week and never have the same dish served.

This isn't a universal issue. It's a fun thing to joke about and it has become a bit of a stereotype because, yes, a lot of women can't make up their minds when it comes to food. I don't think it's a harmful stereotype. After all, things become stereotypes for a reason, because enough people do them for them to be considered true for a population.

As a female, I find it very difficult to make up my mind about food. There are rare occasions when I know exactly what it is that I want to eat. And even on those occasions, I will let someone else make the choice, because deep down, I will just be happy with food. I can always find something to eat, no matter where we go.

Maybe I have low standards when it comes to food. Maybe I'm just indecisive. I don't know for sure what the problem is, but asking me what I want to eat will never really get you far. I will rarely have an answer for you. And most of the time, if I do have an answer for you, it might not be one that you like.

So, do your indecisive female friends and girlfriends a favour and pick what you're going to eat. If they don't want to eat that, they will tell you. We are always certain of what we don't want to consume.

Or maybe ask them to guess where you're going to eat. I had heard that suggested recently and it's not a bad solution. You'll state the first place that comes to mind and maybe that's really where you wanted to eat all along.

Whether it's indecisiveness or simply being "hangry", take it easy on us friends/partners. We are doing the best we can here. We don't like not knowing what to eat either and we've been dealing with it a lot longer than you have.

gender roles
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About the Creator

Samantha Reid

I have been a creative writer for over 10 years, an academic for 7 years, and a blogger for 3 years. Writing is my passion and it's what I love.

Follow me on Instagram @samreid2992

Find me on Twitter @SgReid211

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