What it means to "cook a meal, eat a meal."

I want to eat properly. When various mental things get tangled up, I'm the type of person who goes about their day without eating.
In truth, when you feel like everything is just too much, both mentally and physically, that is exactly when you should be cooking and eating.

Due to circumstances in my home, even when the family is all together, we almost always eat separately. You know, family restaurants are a good example, aren't they? You can order whatever you like. It's like that; even when we sit at the same table, we almost never eat the "same thing."
If I cook a meal to suit my mother, who is concerned about salt intake, it ends up being bland. Conversely, if I cook what I want to eat, I feel bad for my mother, who is concerned about it, and I end up feeling concerned myself and unable to eat it.
Oh, this might not just be my family. There might be more people than I realize who eat their meals feeling a bit lonely, even though they have family around.

People who can gather ingredients for everyone and whip up a meal are truly amazing. It must be tough for families with children. Dads, moms, grandparents, and everyone else engaged in "cooking meals." I have immense respect for you.

Even though I've liked "eating" since I was a child, I had a careless personality of "anything is fine as long as I can eat."
Is it what you call a situation where you have to endure even if you want to eat? Maybe it was because I was suppressing myself, thinking things like "I might get scolded if I do it" or "I'm afraid of failing." Or perhaps it was because I couldn't afford to make mistakes due to family circumstances.

I might think, 'This might be delicious if I do this.' Even if I thought it in my head, it never came out. I didn't even have a childhood where I cooked things like fried eggs or grilled fish—processes that only involve applying heat to the item itself. I spent so little time in the kitchen.

If I had had more room in my heart and body, I wouldn't have thought about things like this, so maybe I wouldn't have had to worry.
The adult circumstances I didn't know about happened before I ever stood in the kitchen, and maybe that was one of the causes.
After I started working, I was chased by my job and forgot to pay attention to my meals... Maybe I was just too exhausted, or I thought it was fine because I could function without eating, or I worked with the mindset of "I'll eat everything later, so it's fine for now." I once collapsed at work from what seemed like anemia at the same time as heatstroke. I shoved ice cream into my stomach at work, but it didn't solve anything, and in the end, I had an IV drip at my family doctor's office. Naturally, the doctor scolded me.

"Listen here, Urura-san, it's not okay to not eat."

The doctor might have been the first person to get angry at me, saying, "It's not okay to not eat."
I finally realized the importance of "eating" and tried making yakisoba, but I burned it spectacularly and ruined about half of it. Because of things like that, I felt like I couldn't stand in the kitchen even more.
You might say, 'Wow, you were avoiding it over such a small thing!' but at the time, I didn't understand at all why I "couldn't do it well." I thought, 'I added oil just like I was told,' or 'Did I have to add water?' With my mouth turned down, I sullenly ate the yakisoba that had been reduced by half.
I'll never stand there again. I complained while washing the plates, chopsticks, and frying pan.

I was told that I'd get the hang of it if I kept doing it, but I never did. I didn't even understand the basics, like how to keep things from burning or how long to cook them. It felt like I was doing logic, which just confused me more.
Even so, I eventually became able to make yakisoba. But then I drifted away from cooking again.
After I changed jobs, I tried making stir-fried vegetables (it's just yakisoba without the noodles), and maybe that's when I started thinking that cooking might be fun. It took a long time, but it seems like it was an important step for me.

I wrote that cooking might be fun, but I don't have any knowledge or skills related to cooking. I'm the type of person who can't handle things with ease, so while I can marinate things in sauce or make cuts before grilling, if someone tells me something about the process while I'm in the middle of it, my hands get clumsy.

My mother is carefree. She didn't really give me advice that could be called advice. She left me to my own devices, thinking that since I'm an adult, I should be able to cook without her help. On the other hand, there is the fact that it was easier for me because she left me alone.
Until I got used to it, it was all large-plate dishes. Things like stir-fried vegetables or twice-cooked pork that everyone could help themselves to. At that time, I found it troublesome to divide things into small portions, so I had the feeling of, 'I'll just make it for now.'

As expected, if it's only large plates, the nutritional balance is heavily skewed, so I've been using a small frying pan lately. Even so, the hurdle remains high. It's only been about two years since I realized I couldn't move as quickly as I thought I could, so I felt that even more.

"Then, why don't you try making it with that?"

My mother just said that and left me to it. Other than that, no comments or remarks.

Since it was only for the amount I would eat, I decided to cook without worrying about the quantity. Lightly when I didn't want to eat, and a decent amount when I did.

"Urura-san, it's not okay to not eat."

Eat. It's a necessary thing you can't avoid to live.

Cut the ingredients, arrange them, add water, put on the lid, wait 3 to 4 minutes.
Delicious-looking, vivid colors. They're beautiful, but they hurt my eyes a little. It was just when my heart and body were worn out, so those colors were strangely beautiful, even more so.
Cut, arrange, add water, and put on the lid. It's a simple process, so I don't get lost, and I don't have to rush.
I can do this. Oh, this was all it took.

The hurdle for "cooking a meal" dropped all at once, and I felt like it became much easier. But the feeling of it being a hassle still remains, and I often just get by with a "side dish that is also a main dish (?)" made in a frying pan.
They say that if you just bring it near your mouth, you'll instinctively move and it will properly enter your stomach.

Honestly, I might have never thought that eating was fun. When I was a child, it was "anything is fine as long as I can eat," and I wasn't the type to be picky.
Now I have the right to choose what I want to eat. I can also choose the amount. Because the doctor's words from back then are still stuck in me, even if I don't want to eat, I buy food for the time being, and I head to the kitchen for the time being.

I knew it took physical strength to cook, but it also takes physical strength to eat, doesn't it? Why is it that even though it's just a monotonous task of moving chopsticks or a spoon to carry food to my mouth, I can't do it when my heart and body are exhausted?
If it's just "eating," it doesn't matter if it's something bought at a store, but why is it that I don't feel like I've recovered enough if I do that?