Six ways a family dinner can be ruined, and how to avoid that
Shared meals can help nourish relationships in the home, if you follow these six rules
We've all read, or at least heard about, the correlation between family dinners and improved physical and emotional health of our children, better grades and social skills, and avoidance or delay of risky behaviour.
But if your daughter flees the table in tears during an argument, or your son shuts down when he feels he's being criticised, or if you want to scream because your children (or spouse) reject a meal you prepared, the benefits of the shared meal can seem unattainable.
As a family dinner advocate and meal planning expert, I've made it my mission to help families eat dinner together more often by helping them remove the stress and obstacles around making it happen.
But what I've also observed is that it's not just about the food: there are interactions that can detract from the potential upsides of eating together.
When our oldest was a high school senior, we were eager to learn more about where he was thinking of applying to college and how his essays were coming along. Since we were all running in different directions during the day, my husband and I saw dinnertime as the perfect opportunity to inquire about his college applications. But Solomon is an independent guy and he wanted to manage the process his own way. Raising the issue at dinner proved to be a quick and reliable way to cut dinner short or stunt conversation.
The dining table is the obvious way to teach children table manners. But this can easily turn into non-stop nagging
Once we took that topic off the table, Solomon relaxed. Looking back over 18 years of family meals, I've examined what has separated the dinners where we felt really connected from the ones that made us all want to bolt from the table.
