My MIL (mother-in-law) used to comment about EVERYTHING I ate and once called me a "healthy eater" in her condescending southern belle drawl with the implication that I wasn't being a "proper southern woman" by adequately feeding myself. Her incessant questioning of my food choices and passive-aggressive quips at my portion sizes were rude, infuriating, and bizarre considering the shape I was in. But I would slap on a pained smile as I secretly wanted to backhand her ass over teakettle. Of course, my (now ex) husband thought the whole thing was hilarious.

Eating with my MIL and FIL (father-in-law) was a nightmare. This woman ate like a fussy toddler. She'd spend 30 minutes poking at and around her food, ate nothing but chicken fingers when we went out to restaurants, cooked vegetables until they were a limp, flavorless shadow of their former selves, and cooked meat until it was unpalatable shoe leather. Mayonnaise wasn't a condiment in this family; it was a food group, and simple black pepper was "too spicy" for them. She'd take two bites of her bland, beige, colorless, flavorless meal, wrinkle her nose and claim she was stuffed. If I made dinner, she'd pick out all the "weird" ingredients with this indignant look on her face like I was trying to poison her. She never tried anything new, often insulting the ingredients without even knowing what they were or what they tasted like.

Her idiot husband, my FIL, was the polar opposite and ate like a glutton. It was vile watching him gorge himself with his dentures in his front shirt pocket, hoovering everything in sight like he would never see food again. We once went to a Ruth's Chris Steakhouse for my graduation party after I completed dental hygiene school, where he proceeded to embarrass the shit out of me by loudly insisting upon having A-1 Steaksauce for his massive fillet mignon. They didn't have any, obviously, because A-1 is used to cover bad cuts of meat, not prime steak that costs $150 a plate. He ate so much that my mother and I were honestly concerned he would have a heart attack.

The first (and last) time I made Thanksgiving dinner for my entire family (around twenty people), I went all out. I bought a massive local farm-raised free-range turkey that cost a small fortune. I stuffed the bird with aromatic vegetables and fresh herbs I had grown myself, then lovingly packed fistfuls of seasoned butter under the skin like I was the reincarnation of Julia Child. I peeled at least two dozen potatoes and mashed them with salt, butter, and cream until they were perfectly smooth. I made cranberry sauce from scratch, simmering the sour little fuckers with sugar, orange zest, and a tiny dash of horseradish until it had the perfect balance of sweet and tart. I used the turkey neck and gizzards to make nearly a gallon of gravy as my husband scrutinized my every move since he was usually the gravy man in our house (he was a hateful bastard, but the man knew how to make gravy). At my father and brother's request, I made traditional green bean casserole and had a growler of local beer ready in the fridge. Finally, I steamed broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower with butter as an easy, fresh vegetable sidedish that required no thought or prep. I had several selections of wine, all carefully picked to pair with dinner and dessert--three pies: pumpkin, apple, and pecan--made by yours truly the night before. I labored in the kitchen for 48 straight hours and spent over a thousand dollars to put this meal together because, dammit, I was the new wifey, and I was going to prove how badass I was to my parents and my in-laws. I was exhausted, but everything was absolutely fabulous, and I couldn't help but be proud of everything I'd made with my own two hands.

All that work, everything made from scratch with precision and care, and you know what my in-laws raved about? THE FUCKING STEAMED VEGETABLES. The one thing I had put zero effort into. The one thing I used the microwave for because I ran out of burners on the stove. The one thing I made as an afterthought and didn't give a shit about. They complimented NOTHING ELSE. I wanted to reach over and take out both sets of their dentures and toss them into the backyard for my dogs to shit on. My MIL liked that boring vegetable medley so much that she made it at every family dinner afterward and insulted me further by over-steaming the poor things until they were pale, stringy snot that I refused to eat.

I'm tall (5'8"), naturally thin (size 2), with a genetically high metabolism like my father. But back when I was married, I was also doing HIIT workouts (high-intensity interval training) two hours a day after work six days a week and was built like a brick shithouse. I was lean, defined, and cut with 13% body fat and an ass you could bounce a quarter. My husband was 6'4" and 230lbs of hateful man meat that liked to knock me around, so I trained like my life depended on it (which became a reality at several times during our marriage). No one knew this at the time, but that's why this woman's comments and concern for my figure were so baffling to me. I ate healthy, but the portions were not small. I had rippling biceps and shapely quads to fuel, and they would not be denied. There was absolutely no reason why this woman should be concerned with my weight. Still, she openly disapproved of my "unladylike" demeanor because I ate my food without worrying it to death, had opinions I openly shared, and wouldn't let my (now ex) husband (her son) boss me around and be "the man of the house." Yeah, fuck that and your misogynistic dixie darlin attitude, there toots. I'll eat whatever I damn well please and boss your son around like the bitch he is. Lady, respectfully, fuck you very much.

I hate to admit one of my proudest married moments was when I made lasagne (my mother's recipe), and that twiggy twatwaffle ate the entire portion I served to her and told me how good it was. She then asked if I really needed a second helping and ruined the moment, but I still felt like I won. I'm so glad I never have to see that awful family ever again.