Parenting and the Meal-Time Tamasha

Parenting and the Meal-Time Tamasha
Aditi Sarkar Dutta is a full time mother and part time writer. She holds a Master’s degree in Organisational
Social Psychology from the London School of Economics. After working for over eight years at multinational
consulting organizations, she quit her job to be able to enjoy motherhood and follow her passion for writing. She
writes a personal blog,http://mrsdutta.blogspot.in/ and her articles on parenting are published in the White Print
magazine. She lives in Gurgaon with her husband and two children.
Yesterday, when I went to the park with my kids, I saw my friend painstakingly feeding her four year old
his meal while he played in the sand. On numerous occasions I have noticed mothers to small children
feeding them while they are busy at play. A common complaint from mothers is that their child refuses
to eat and mothers or maids run after them to painfully feed them one morsel at a time. If the child
manages to finish the portion, it feels like a big triumph for the mother.
Mothers often feel thankful when their child finishes the meal without a fuss or does not demand ‘junk’
food. Sometimes I see that children of four or even older do not feed themselves and need to be fed by
an adult, especially when it comes to healthy foods. Additionally, there are many children who eat only
when watching television or are being entertained by other gadgets like a phone or tablet. Sometimes, I
feel that parents often prefer to feed children to be able to monitor what they eat, prevent them from
making a mess and also find it faster, but in the process we take away the control from our children.
Also Read: Eating, á la française
In contrast, when I visited a house in a village of Rajasthan, I was surprised to see that even two year
olds from a family of farmers were far more independent and perfectly capable of feeding themselves.
They even used the toilet without any assistance or coaxing from their mothers. The number of children
in the household was way more than the number of adults. This also made me think about my own
grandmother, who happily brought up four children while I struggle with two and see a lot of friends
choosing to have just one child.
There is a huge contrast in how kids were brought up earlier or how they are brought up in the rural
areas of our country. It is probably more of a city phenomenon that the well-educated Indian parent is
fussing over everything to do with their kids and especially with food. I myself face challenges when it
comes to feeding a balanced diet to my children. Over time, I have come to believe that it is better not
to be too bent upon having our way all the time when it comes to feeding children. Also see more info
@ http://www.parentedge.in