Everyone is entitled to their dietary preferences. But it becomes a problem when other people must go too much out of their way to accommodate these preferences and feel that their effort is taken for granted.
Just like this woman, whose vegan niece constantly demands that her aunt cook her vegan food, even though the aunt’s whole household is full of dairy lovers.
More info: Reddit
How to accept a vegan into your family, which cannot live without animal-based products?
Image credits: Kampus Production (not the actual photo)
The woman lets her niece live in her home but draws a line at becoming her vegan chef against her will
Image credits: Manuel Silva (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Justanaunt2
Aunt loses it and tells niece to cook her own food, niece gets extremely upset and tells her mother that she's expected to fend for herself
A woman, the OP, as well as her husband and children live in a different city from the rest of her family. And so, the woman was asked to shelter her niece for a while, who has started college in that city. She agreed.
There weren't many problems with the niece, whom the OP in the post called Kate. Except for one - food. More specifically, her being vegan. The OP’s family is obsessed with dairy. And so, usually, their meals in one way or another include it or any other non-vegan food. That meant that Kate needed separate dishes anytime they wanted to cook anything non-vegan.
Since vegan products are much more expensive, the OP asked Kate’s mother (the sister of the OP) to give her money so Kate could buy them. But Kate’s mother refused to do so. Kate started buying all the products from her pocket money. But the cooking was still done by the aunt.
And she didn't like that she had to make two versions of every meal: vegan and non-vegan. So, she snapped and told Kate she could cook for herself.
Then, when the aunt had a barbeque dinner with friends, the niece ate salad. The salad was meant to have chicken added to it. So, without chicken, it was very basic. And the niece got upset over the fact that she had nothing else to eat but the basic salad. The OP repeated that she could cook for herself, which made her niece even more upset.
Kate called her mom and complained about how the aunt didn’t give her any good meals. And that she’s expected to fend for herself. The mother called the OP to yell about how her daughter is not loved enough and is intentionally excluded. This prompted the woman to write on Reddit to ask who was in the wrong here.
Image credits: Toni Koraza (not the actual photo)
And while we don’t know why the girl from the story turned vegan, we do know the most common reasons why people turn vegan.
First, plant-based diets have a lot of health benefits. For example, doctors recommend starting such diets for people who struggle with heart disease, high blood pressure, or diabetes. Also, some protein from animal-based products, like red meat, have questionable effects on health. So some people tend to avoid it by basing their diet on plants. Others don’t believe humans need animal sources of food to survive at all.
Then, others just worry about animal welfare or even are disgusted by the idea of eating living things. Or they worry about the environment and what effect a non-vegan diet has on it. While some just have a preference for not eating meat or dairy products.
While, as we said, the reason for the girl's diet is not clear, what is clear is that netizens think of her as a jerk. Most people online decided that the girl was quite spoiled. After all, her aunt is not her private chef. Plus, she’s an adult and can cook for herself. Some even wondered what she would do if she had to live in the dorm.
What would you do if you were in the OP's place?
"What would she do in the dorm?": folks online fully support the aunt's reaction to her niece's behavior
Image credits: Nadine Primeau (not the actual photo)
