FAMILY MEAL TABLE CENTRAL TO GROWTH OF THE FAMILY IN NIGERIA

NAME: EMEKA NWOSUJI

CALL NAME: EMEKA

COUNTRY: NIGERIA

ORGANISATION: VOICE OF THE FAMILY ENUGU

TOPIC: FAMILY MEAL TABLE CENTRAL TO GROWTH OF THE FAMILY IN NIGERIA

INTRODUCTION

According to Ben Silliman, Challenge is a fact of life. Making adjustments in each life stage, coping with unexpected setbacks, or handling the daily stresses of life can turn a crisis into an opportunity for growth.

Despite changes in their structure, families remain the most basic unit of society. There is a critical need to use the collective strengths of individuals, communities, organizations, and governments to respond to the stresses faced by today’s families. Today’s families need support to build the resiliency necessary to meet life’s challenges head-on. There is encouraging evidence that research and resulting programs can contribute to the strength and resiliency of all families.

Resiliency is the ability to bounce back from stress and crisis. It is displayed in individuals as optimism, resourcefulness, and determination. Individuals, families, and communities demonstrate resiliency when they build caring support systems and solve problems creatively. Because individuals, families, and communities show resiliency in unique ways, there are no universal rules for success. Resiliency is not simply the ability to cope with everyday stress. Because stress is inevitable, those who work hardest to escape it may be most vulnerable to its effects.

This paper is a response to studies conducted among 150 families within Enugu Metropolis, Eastern Nigeria. It evaluates the usefulness of family mealtime together in the face of globalisation, economic meltdown and pressure of work. It tries to seek how to make families resilient in the face of trauma and global influence. It also seeks to have a semblance of an African family where the children are brought up under the guidance and influence of their parents. In the traditional African family, mealtime dovetails to story time. Studies have shown that eating together keeps the doors of communication open and the family united.

Resilient behavior is especially critical for the most vulnerable children and families. Today’s societal challenges require education and service programs that help counteract the impact of poverty, illness, substance abuse, and violence. Prevention and early intervention efforts help build coping skills that can reduce the need for expensive, crisis-level services.

Family resilience enables success, cohesion and support in times of trouble and crisis and can be developed and fostered at any time in the family life cycle. In general, family resilience can be described as characteristics, dimensions, and properties of families which help them to rebound from disruption and/or change and to adapt in the face of crisis situations.

Spending time together is vital for a family and promotes continuity and a stable family life. Time spent together can range from having family meals, doing chores together, running errands, and having fun.

Sharing family time together has been shown to reduce the chances that children will get involved in substance abuse, smoking and early sexual activity that can put their mental and physical health at risk, particularly in adolescence. Unfortunately, family time appears to be dwindling due to increased parental demands, responsibilities and time strain (a phenomenon that includes the lack of spontaneity to respond to children’s needs, fatigue, and inability to disconnect feelings from work).

Effective ways to reduce time strain and increase family time include: family housekeeping activities, utilizing commute time to have meaningful communication, discussing future plans, or participating in fun learning activities.

The late Catholic Bishop of Enugu Diocese, Bishop Michael Ugwuja Eneja of blessed memory stated that family mealtime is a time of reconnection and recollection. Eating together is one of the best ways for families to stay connected to each other. Meals together allow for open family communication and the chance to share what has been going on with each other in a social, family centered environment. According to him communication is the key to healthy family relationship and the best time to do this is at the meal table. During his lifetime, he always ate with his priests and the entire household. He would prefer to go hungry rather than eat without his priests. That contributed to the healthy relationship between him and all who came in contact with him. Mealtime is a perfect time to show the family they are your priority. Positive relationships within the family are the most important factor that leads to resilience and meal time together is of essence.

Happiness is about inspiring the other family member to be all that he or she can be. The idea of a family having meals together at the same time and table represents an ambiance of joy, communication, grace, and thanksgiving. It is a time when members of a family can sit down together and enjoy conversation, laughter, concentration, good health, listening, great digestion, calmness, and conviviality.

Sitting across the table is where and when you can find out more about what your spouse’s day is like, children’s likes, dislikes, and daily life. Having this information can help you direct your children toward positive activities and behavior, show more understanding to your spouse and reducing the likelihood that the children will get involved with alcohol, tobacco, and/or illegal drugs.

Families who eat together are more resilient and are able to view challenges and crises with confidence and to view challenges as opportunities to grow, heal and strengthen their relationships. During mealtime, the parents should get into the habit of talking with the children. Build closer relationship with them when they are young, this will make it easier for any of them to come to you when they have problems and will help you become more sensitive to their mood changes.

Family table talk plays a vital part in rearing children. During mealtime, the time when the whole family is likely to be together, children learn moral values, absorb family culture, and develop as individuals.

The importance of regular family activities to share ideas and find out "what's happening" is a great way for a parent to be involved, discuss rules, monitor activities and friends, and be a good role model. The benefits of eating together will last long after your meal ends, especially if you make family mealtimes a regular activity.

Let us take the family meal off the endangered species list and move it back to the VIP list.

UNDERSTANDING FAMILY MEAL TABLE

For those of us who are Christians our Lord Jesus Christ introduced the concept of family meal table with his apostles and left us with a very strong admonition to do it in his memory. Ever since then it has been a source of unity, love, companionship and communication in the families that practice it.

One of the things the Lord has introduced is the concept of the family meal table. A regular (nightly, if possible) event where Dad directs the discussions, loving the Lord his God with all his heart, soul and strength, keeping His commands in his heart and impressing them on his wife and children and guests as they sit in their house, around a meal, full of fellowship and love for one another.

BENEFITS OF EATING TOGETHER

Family Connectedness

Family connectedness (e.g., feelings of warmth, love, and caring from parents) has been consistently related to healthy youth development and a reduced risk for emotional distress, substance abuse, violence involvement, and early sexual involvement. The act of sharing a meal together on a regular basis is a major means to develop and keep strong parent-child bonds. It eliminates unnecessary frictions and crisis thereby making the family more resilient.

Communication

Regular conversation in a natural setting helps family members learn the give-and-take of effective communication. Some of the communication benefits associated with family meals are:

• A regular time to meet each day and talk with each other about thoughts and feelings

• An opportunity to learn how to ask and respond to questions

• A chance to share stories and ideas from each family member’s experiences

• A time to practice manners, listening and taking turns in conversation

In the study conducted, the respondents believed that the primary benefit to eating together was strengthening the family by providing opportunities for communication and building relationships. Other studies report similar perceptions on the part of parents. Not only do parents want to feel attached to their kids, kids want this too.

Oprah Winfrey conducted a "Family Dinner Experiment" in 1993. Five families volunteered to accept the challenge to eat dinner together every night for a month, staying at the table for a half-hour each time. As part of the experiment, all family members kept journals to record their feelings about the experience. At first, sharing meals was a chore for many families and the minutes at the table dragged on. But, by the end of the month, the families were happy and planned to continue dining together most evenings if not every night. When the families appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show at the end of the experiment, the greatest surprise to the parents was how much their children treasured the dependable time with their parents at the table.

Better school performance.

Family meals appear to give children an edge in the classroom. In a 1994 Louis Harris and Associates survey of 2000 high school seniors, students took a test to measure their academic ability and answered a list of personal questions. Students who regularly ate dinner with their families 4 or more times a week scored better than those who ate family dinners 3 or fewer times a week. These results crossed racial lines and were a greater indicator than whether the child was in a one- or two-parent family.

In some or our analytical tests it was found that children ages 7 to 11 who did well on school achievement tests spent a large amount of time eating meals and snacks with their families. Their achievement was not affected by their mother's employment status, full-time, part-time or not employed. Preschoolers had better language skills when the family ate together. Although the researchers believed that there was nothing magical about mealtime, it nevertheless served as the best opportunity for children to have longer conversations with parents and to hear words they rarely would hear other times of the day. The researchers believed that extended conversations provided young children with a chance to think, and that enhanced their linguistic development.

Ability to copy better attitudes from parents

When you cook and serve meals at home, you have more control over the quality and quantity of your family’s food choices. Kids tend to mimic their parents’ attitudes about foods.

Children would not perceive healthy eating as important if it is not something that they see you doing. Eat and serve sensible portion sizes. Be open to trying new foods and new ways of cooking foods.

Family meals should be dynamic – an exchange of ideas, conversation and feelings. Turn off the television, the video games and the computer. Mealtime is a wonderful opportunity to strengthen family ties and pass on family cultural traditions. Encourage your kids to help prepare meals, set the table and help with dishes

Better adjustment.

In a study that followed 65 children over 8 years, the research looked at which activities most fostered healthy child development: play, story time, events with family members and other factors. Family dinners won out.

Well-adjusted adolescents and frequent family meals are linked, according to psychologists Bowden and Zeisz. In a 1997 survey of 527 teens ages 12 to 18, the teens who were best adjusted ate a meal with an adult in their family an average of 5.4 days a week, compared to 3.3 days for teens who didn't show good adjustment. The well-adjusted teens were less likely to do drugs or be depressed and were more motivated at school and had better relationships. The less well-adjusted teens were more likely to be involved with drugs, be depressed, exhibit difficulty getting along with others and have trouble in school. Adjustment was correlated more to shared meals than to any other factor including gender, age or family type. Bowden said that mealtimes were a sort of "marker" for other positive family attributes and seemed to play an important role in helping teens cope well with the stresses of adolescence.

Dr. Steve Wolin, co-author of the "Resilient Self." a practicing psychiatrist and a professor at the Family Research Center, George Washington University, claims that even if the family has serious problems, such as alcoholism, eating dinner together is still important for family structure. He asserts that children of alcoholics who had family dinners together were less likely to become alcoholics themselves. Despite potential problems, the stability and communication at the table remain important for kids. He advised establishing rules for dinnertime to avoid conflict, such as not discussing school or interpersonal problems and saving conflicts for another time and place.

Better nutrition.

Mothers in the Nutrition Education Network of Washington's focus groups said, "When we eat together, we eat better".

Cullen and Baranowski found that students in grades 4 to 6 who ate dinners with their families consumed more vegetables, more fruit and juice, and less soda. When children ate with their families, they used more low fat practices (such as trimming fat from meat and using low fat foods at meals).

Numerous studies have overwhelmingly pointed to the fact that families who eat together have better overall nutrition. In turn, this means they also have a lower risk of many diseases and of being overweight or obese.

In a Harvard study children who ate family dinners most days consumed more fruits and vegetables and less fried foods, saturated fats and trans fats and soda than children who ate dinner with family members never or a only a couple of days a week. Children who ate dinners with family members most days had substantially higher intakes of dietary fiber, calcium, iron, foliate, and vitamins B-6, B-12, C and E. No differences were found for whole grain foods, whole dairy products, red and processed meat or snack foods. An interesting finding was that children who ate family dinners more frequently had more healthy eating habits that were not related to eating family dinner, such as food eaten away from home. The researchers found that the effects of family dinners were similar for both younger and older children. Their results didn't change after adjusting for body mass index, physical activity, hours of television watched, two-parent home or other arrangement, household income or mother's employment (88% of the of the mothers were employed). Similar findings have been found in other studies.

Help Your Kids Develop Language Skills

When it comes to family events, family dinners were the most important one in contributing to children's language development, according to a Harvard University study. "When there is more than one adult at the table, it tends to make talk richer, topics are established by adult interest and can be extremely valuable opportunities for children to learn," said Dr. Catherine Snow, professor of education at Harvard and the lead researcher of the study.

OBSTACLES TO FAMILY MEALTIMES

Conflicting schedules. Almost every piece of research, story in the popular press and comment from parents themselves points to today's hectic lifestyle crowding out time for family dinners and this is supported by several studies of work, social/personal activities, kids' activities and community activities. The 1996 Washington state focus group study of Food Stamp families also found that varied schedules of family members interfere the most with family meals, especially with adolescents.

But with today’s busy schedules, maybe we can make some adjustments by letting breakfast be the family meal or start a new tradition of eating a small evening snack together.

No time to cook. With already busy schedules, parents feel they don't have time to cook dinner. A Fast Food Centre in Enugu Metropolis, CRUNCHIES, reported that take-out food was used by more than a quarter (29%) of families for the evening meal once a week; 20% said they used carryout twice a week and 12% said three times a week. The survey found that the meal preparer spends an average of 35 minutes fixing dinner. That survey also determined that about 30 minutes is spent at the table.

Child nutrition expert Ellyn Satter wrote that she often gets resistance when she presses for family meals. People tell her that they just don't have enough time to shop and cook. Her response is that eating well is one of life's important issues, and parents need to be willing to devote time and energy to it.

Don't know how to cook. Because of the widespread availability of convenience foods, ready-prepared foods and quick serve restaurants, cooking is no longer a needed skill.

Would rather watch television. About half of all families always have the television on in the background during dinnertime, and about a third of the families usually ate in front of the television. A Missouri survey found that some parents actually preferred eating in front of the television to eating at the table with their families.

Unfortunately, today's family meal table is all but missing from the home. We have sacrificed our family table for all manner of activities and way too often, our meals are situated around the blue glow of the family television. Conversation is limited to pass the salt and stony silence while the blare of TV fills the room.

Conclusion and Recommendations

Believe it or not, there are some risks to eating together as a family. In order to be successful, family dinners must be enjoyable for you, for your spouse, for your kids. If everyone is tense, irritable or unhappy, there won't be a lot of conversation, bonding or other benefits.

So, in order to ensure that family dinners are beneficial, be careful of what you speak of. "It's not the time to talk about cleaning their room or curfews," says Susan Moores, a registered dietitian. "Instead focus on open-ended questions about things your kids are interested in or things that will get them talking."

Also, stay away from the "clean your plate" mentality. Allow kids to serve themselves and just take a little bit. Forcing a child to eat everything on his plate will teach him to ignore his body's cues that he's full.

Remember that it's OK (and probably necessary) to keep things simple. Have grilled or baked chicken with a salad, or throw meat and veggies in a crock-pot in the morning for a warm meal after work. You can also try meals that your kids can help prepare, like turkey burgers or individual pizzas they top themselves. Remember also that you can still sit down for a family meal even on those nights when you do order pizza or other take-out food.

The bottom line is, do what works for you, whether that's cooking extra meals on the weekend to serve during the week, preparing meals in the morning or eating simpler meals, like sandwiches and soup, sometimes so that you are able to sit down and enjoy the meal too.

At the family meal table, never keep saying, "Right, right..." when your child or spouse is talking. Once in a while say, "I agree. That's so exciting," makes the dialogue such that the person talking to you feels valued. You'll be remembered with positive visual imageries when the family dinner is remembered by your child 50 years later, with a pleasant smile. You'll be treated by family members exactly how you treat them with words, gestures, and that smile with a glint of recognition of the good in your children and spouse in your eyes.

Most families do value shared mealtime and are frustrated with their hectic lifestyles that prevent them from cooking and eating together enjoyably. While eating together nightly may be a rigid and unrealistic goal, especially for families with teens, a target of 4 or 5 times a week would provide the benefits known so far. The data suggest that children in families that eat together 3 times a week or less are more prone to trouble in school, poorer diets, behavioral problems and more.

Simply sitting at a common table does not automatically mean that the family dinner is nutritious or that the family members communicate well, if at all. To be a positive experience, some families may benefit from meal planning advice and tips for conversation. In rare cases, perhaps skilled guidance by a therapist would be warranted if an overly controlling parent may be driving the child toward an eating disorder. Certainly there is room for research on the impact of family mealtime on a child's nutritional status, subsequent eating behavior, emotional health, sense of attachment, academic performance and so on. Virtually no studies have looked at the impact of family mealtime on parents' physical and emotional health.

We should take the time to sit down and enjoy it with our family and friends even during simple meals. Make mealtime a very pleasant experience, not a time for discipline or arguing about problems at school or work. Time spent breaking bread with friends and family will help our children form positive attitudes about food and eating and create fond family memories that will last a lifetime.

The simple practice of making a menu each week will not only help you provide some structure to the family dinner hour, but also will save you a lot of money on your food budget. A simple thing like keeping a running grocery list on the fridge will help you avoid last minute trips to the grocery store. Your family will be eating healthier and you won't be as stressed out because you know what's for dinner Tuesday night.
Menus aren't just for restaurants. They deserved a special place of honor on every family's fridge.

It is our job to instigate this type of conversation. We have to lead the family, be the role model, show character of the family and prepare in advance some question that are fitting for the great meal table. Ask questions that will encourage conversation such as:

• What was the most interesting thing that happened to you today?
• What did you do today that showed (insert character trait the family is studying) you are a good person.
• What are you reading at the moment
• What should we do for our family vacation?
• Discuss the current character trait we are studying –
  - Review the definition and opposite trait
  - Discuss application in the family and for the individual
  - Discuss the rewards that are ours when we choose character
  - Offer praise for good character seen (in the family, in books, in movies, in other people)
• What could I help you with tomorrow?
• What has God been saying to you?

We can make charts and hang them beside our dining room table. This is to help on those days when tiredness abounds and we do not know how to turn it to edifying conversation. I encourage you to print yours out on card, trim it, fold it and have it on your meal table as a reminder.

With this there will be a healthy balance between the structure and flexibility in the family meal table, meaning that the family meal may be structured but the activities during the meal flexible.

This will inadvertently make the family resilient to all the pressures and crisis we are facing in the world today.

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