Thanksgiving host refuses to let her influencer cousin, Britt, bring “Instagram food” to dinner after last year’s shaming: ‘I told her if she can’t eat what’s served, she’s welcome to come after dinner’

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Etai Eshet • Editor
Oct 15, 2025 3:00 PM EDT

Listen, I get it, I'm all for taking care of your health and staying on top of nutrition, it's important, and honestly respect to anyone who puts in that work. But when your macros turn into your entire identity and you can't enjoy one bite of real food, the celebration loses its flavor. If your commitment means everyone else has to tiptoe around basic joys like gravy and pie, that's not discipline, it's just exhausting. Sometimes it's better to drop the fitness crusade for one meal, grab a plate of stuffing, pour yourself a drink, and share a laugh with your people. Life's about moments, not meal plans, and holidays are supposed to be fun for everyone, not staged for content.

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  • Thanksgiving used to be about stuffing faces and ignoring calories, but now the menu doubles as a battleground for likes and macros. Every year you prep for a family feast and hope nobody brings drama as a side dish. Enter the cousin who treats every meal like an audition for her next fitness reel. She rolls in with meal-prep containers and poses with “clean” pie while everyone else just wants gravy and peace. Last year she made the whole affair look like a nutrition PSA and called your recipes “trash” for her followers.

  • AITJ for refusing to let my cousin bring her “Instagram food” to Thanksgiving?

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  • I host Thanksgiving every year. I love cooking and spend days preparing everything from scratch. My cousin "Britt" (24F) recently got into health/fitness influencing and now refuses to eat anything that isn't "macro- balanced." Last year, she showed up with her own containers of "high-protein stuffing" and "sugar-free pumpkin pie," then took pictures of herself eating them while everyone else ate my food.
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  • She even captioned one, "Some people still eat trash at Thanksgiving lol." This year, I told her if she can't eat what's served, she's welcome to come after dinner for dessert or bring one discreet dish to share.
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  • She called me controlling and said I'm "punishing her for being disciplined." Now my aunt's saying I'm excluding her and being dramatic.
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  • But I just don't want another holiday turned into a photo shoot. AITJ?
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    via gpointstudio

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • Cobbler Practical8443 Hosting means respecting the host. Britt isn't "disciplined," she's rude. Bringing your own food is one thing, mocking everyone else for eating normally is another. She can post her chicken and quinoa after dinner.
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  • Family holidays have taken a wild turn. Instead of fighting over who gets the drumstick, it’s now about who can out-health the dinner table and get the best angle. The quest for the perfect macro turns into the perfect storm when someone brings curated meals to a communal feast. Sharing is cool until it becomes a performance, and suddenly everyone else’s plate is an afterthought to the influencer’s food diary. Parents will call it exclusion, but hosting should not mean catering to Instagram trends while the mashed potatoes wait for their closeup. Nobody wants a holiday replayed as digital content or shamed for eating food that actually tastes good. Giving a heads-up on the dinner boundaries is about saving the occasion from a second helping of awkward, not punishment for a side hustle. Sometimes, the only thing that needs balancing is the mood at the table, not the macros.

  • DVDragOnIn Let Britt host. She can prepare enough of her delicious, macro- balanced food for the whole family and then the photo shoot is the point of the gathering and everyone can enjoy being props for her IG instead of trying to have family time while she's doing her IG thing and mocking your efforts.
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  • Hyena No4842 She could bring anything she wants and eat it but draw the line at the nasty post!
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  • NTJ Dixieland_Insanity Calling the meal you planned and prepared trash is not ok. She should count herself lucky to be allowed to attend after making an ugly dig like that. That's what crosses the line for me. Tell her and your aunt to enjoy her kale and quinoa or whatever at their place while the rest of the family enjoys a traditional meal at yours.
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  • NeeliSilverleaf She's an adult. Don't invite her. If your aunt wants to coddle her bratty behavior, she can host her.
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  • HippieGrandma1962 She called your food trash and insulted you on her Instagram. Not to mention turning a family dinner into a photo shoot. She can find somewhere else to eat Thanksgiving dinner. So can her mother if she objects.
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  • Ok-Lunch3448 Calling ur food garbage automatically gets her rejected. She can eat at home.
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  • MeButNotMeToo If she brings food, it's a gift to the host, and the can do with it as they wish. She brings it in, straight into the locked chest freezer in the garage.
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  • Scruffersdad I had a guest once who called my gravy disgusting and said she'd never eat it because it looked gross. As I said, she was a guest once. I have frequently been served food I would otherwise never eat, but I keep my mouth shut, smile, and say thank you! I'm a guest, unless I'm allergic to it, I'll try it. Except Brussels Sprouts, they're just not edible. But I will take some and hide them under something else. I'm not rude!
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  • ShimmerKoi No cameras or phones at the table. This is a moment to be present with family.
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