I'm really glad you've found a way to garner independence out of your situation. I'm look to do the same, but things are a little different for me.
37/M, 5'10, 125 lbs. soaking wet. The only time I've ever been able to gain weight was by making a huge effort to eat until I was sick every time I sat at the table, and always kept a snack around while I wasn't. At one point I got up to about 170 lbs. when I was working in a fish cannery in Alaska in my early 20's, and later settled in at 145 lbs. for quite a few years.
Today I've struck hard times and I have nowhere to go but to live with my mother for now. Problem is, I'm very unhealthy, malnourished, and have a hard time eating when I do get food in front of me.
Aside from all that, I am proud of being able to cook a great meal. I know what it's like to eat shitty food, and I became a great cook because I don't like to be nauseated while I'm eating. I like to taste good food, and healthy food at that.
Living with my mother has caused me to lose around 20 lbs. in the last six months.
My mom feeds outdoor cats all over the kitchen counters so place is a veritable zoonotic zoo of parasites and nocturnal vermin. Last summer the smell got so bad in there that I went looking for the actual source and found a rat nest behind her refrigerator, throughout the baseboards beneath the counters, under the dishwasher, and terminating into a hole in the wall beneath an adjacent bathroom's bath tub.
It took me a solid week to clean it up, and she hissed, cursed, cried, choked on her own spit, and fought me the whole way. I made her feel bad enough in the end to get a promise not to feed the cats on the counters any more so we could use the kitchen like a normal family, have the good meals I love to cook, holiday company, etc. Things went fine for about 2 weeks, and then she started doing it again. There were roaches all over her kitchen literally over night. I'll never be able to bring my son over here, and I have a long way to go before I can get a place of my own for a lot of reasons related to my disabilities and other logistical problems.
Today my mother and I got into an argument about the cat pan she keeps in front of the AC intake for the house (disgusting, I know). I picked it up and threw it in the garbage can outside as the neighbors watched her scream and yell to call 911 on me. While she was busy digging that cat pan out of the garbage can I went inside and sterilized a place on the counter top as best I could so I could quickly prepare something to eat. I have not been able to do that in weeks because the place is such a nightmare to think about let alone prepare food in.
So good for you. It is very vindicating when other's come forward about abusive family members and explain their situation because it gives readers the courage to start moving forward with their own lives. What you wrote here makes me feel like I am not alone. My mother doesn't care about my health, and it's obvious to everyone but her.
Thank you for speaking up and giving me the energy to get some of this out into the open.