The other day, what I had for lunch with my family are a few slabs of grilled pork chop. You see, though I am more inclined to eat vegetables than meat, my family would prefer to have it the other way around. Thus, I was forced to stare at the pork chop sitting on my plate and eat it.
But eating everything is something that I did not do. There was this very big slab of whole oily fat in there, even larger than the meaty part itself. I removed it just to eat the meat, upon which my aunt asked why I cut it off. I laughed.
At this point in her lifetime, I still find it difficult to understand why my aunt would still like to have her share of fat. She's already in her vulnerable 50's, a time when diseases already start to come out and threaten her very life. Though she would always say that she is anemic and that she will not be affected by eating more fat, I'm still troubled by her way of eating. She isn't that young anymore.
But of course I just cannot discipline her into throwing away the oily fat. It still is her right to eat whatever she wishes to eat after all. Though I would love to get all the fat away from her, I know very well that it might just end up in another argument, just like all the days in the past. In the future, I guess, when I have more "powers" in the household and really get away the fat from her. Maybe for now, I can do with a little scolding. I hope the payment that she has to make for my reluctance to discipline her isn't that grave.
Balancing the health of your family members and your relationship is probably one of the more difficult things that one has to face in the family. When relationships become extra-sensitive and prone to storms, insisting on a healthy diet becomes a problem. Will you ever solve it?
