What's the most depressing meal you've ever eaten?

McDonald's fries and a cheeseburger.

I was a headstrong young kid with loud opinions that I didn't really know much about. So when I was 11, I decided to boycott McDonalds and smugly refused to eat anything from there. I'd rather go hungry on a road trip than compromise my ~morals~, etc.

When I was 19, my father suffered a life-changing stroke. He was the sole earner in our family. I stepped up to help my mother, who basically fell apart.

One day, we were doing our grocery shopping at the mall near the hospital. We were exhausted from being at his bedside around the clock. At this point, we knew he was likely to live, but would likely be profoundly disabled, and that our lives were never going to be the same.

McDonalds was there. We could afford it, barely. It'd be a treat. My mother loved those dollar cheeseburgers.

I swallowed my childish pride and ate that McDonalds value meal, instead of causing a scene over some dumb thing I was never really sure why I believed in the first place. That's the day I remember growing up.

/r/AskReddit Thread