Mother-in-law | What lay beyond the idea that 'seafood must be eaten on the same day'

After my child ate dried fish, the area around their mouth turned red.
They are one year old and drool a lot, and there have been several times when their mouth turned red from vegetables.

So at first, I just thought, 'Is it irritation again?'
But a little while later, my husband said to me, 'You have to eat seafood on the same day, don't you?'
That one sentence made my chest feel uneasy.
It wasn't sashimi.
It was properly cooked.

The smell and taste were fine.

I stored it in the refrigerator and judged its condition based on my own assessment.

Even so, he kept repeating, 'No, seafood must be eaten on the same day.'

I looked it up just in case, found a page with general storage guidelines, and sent him a screenshot.
But he didn't believe me.
That was when I thought, 'Oh, here we go again.'

Even though we were supposed to be talking about what is correct, it was always my judgment that was being doubted.
It wasn't about the food.

The hardest part was the feeling that 'my judgment is not trusted.'
Moreover, even though my husband is the one who brings up the rule that 'it must be eaten on the same day,' he doesn't actually finish it.
In the end, it either falls on me to force myself to consume it, or it gets left over and I eat it the next day during the day when my husband is at work.

As that piled up, I was also tired of myself for thinking, 'This is my mother-in-law's values again.'
In the midst of that, I suddenly realized something.
Maybe this isn't a problem of 'stubbornness' after all.

My husband's mother grew up in a region without an ocean.

She is from a generation in inland China that primarily ate river fish.
When I looked into it, I found that in old China, there were many problems with water pollution and parasites, and refrigeration equipment was not as advanced as it is now.

So, the mindset of 'cook it thoroughly no matter what' and 'eat it quickly if it seems even slightly suspicious' might have been the 'correct answer' for protecting one's life.
When I thought about it that way, it suddenly made sense.

Ah, it was just that our worlds were different.
My mother-in-law's sense was correct in that environment.
But there is no need to apply that directly to the current food environment in Japan, Japanese refrigerators, and the Japanese distribution system.
Understanding and agreeing are two different things.

Knowing the background made me feel a little better, but that doesn't mean I intend to let go of my own judgment.
I live in Japan.
I will judge based on Japanese standards, by looking at the storage condition, and by observing my child.

This time, too, the area around their mouth and eyes only turned a little red, and it faded in about an hour.
Seeing that, I wanted to properly trust myself for being able to judge, 'Oh, they're fine.'
When you are in an international marriage, these 'discrepancies in what is correct' come up in daily life many times.
When you clash over what is correct, one of you gets hurt.

But when you know the background, you can distance yourself just a little.
Even so, you don't have to pretend that the painful feelings didn't exist.
I will protect my child based on my own standards.

And that is fine.