Many things that become very important to us are not the things that they've said or set down as a rule, but what THEY did and how THEY ate, and what you saw as available within the house for eating. After all, in my house, my mom had certain rules as well, but they are VERY few, and not enough to say that they were the only guiding principles we've absorbed:
1. Dessert is not necessary. (For most of my life, we didn't have any dessert within the house--only after Scott, who wanted it almost all the time, did we have it on a regular basis. I'm not still not accustomed to eating dessert because of this.) 2. Eat until you're full/don't worry about finishing the plate of food. (My mom NEVER encouraged "finish your plate" mentality. In fact, she discouraged it fairly often, especially in a restaurant. She also was a big fan of "your eyes are bigger than your stomach" (which confused the hell out of my child literal brain XD), which were were meant to understand that we may think we want four pieces of chicken, but we're only capable of eating one, and so on.) 3. Soda is not allowed at any meal. We were only allowed water at dinner, and orange juice/tea/coffee at breakfast. Lunch was usually more water, or tea/coffee. We also didn't start stocking soda regularly until Scott, who HAS to have his Diet Coke.
Yet, even though there are only three rules, I can tell you that we never absorbed the idea that potatoes are good for us, because my mom almost never had them in the house, let alone served them. My mom didn't believe in over cooking vegetables, and didn't like to serve a grain as a primary fixture of a meal (such as pasta, or rice, or bread). We very, very rarely went out to eat, and while salt and pepper were made available at the table, we never saw our mom add salt to her food, so we didn't learn to add salt to our food (and especially not in large quantities). As I said before, we didn't learn to snack because my mom didn't buy snacks. We weren't wealthy enough to buy a lot of things when I was much younger, so a lot of the things most kids thought of as normal fare, like Lunchables and Capri Suns, were not present in my childhood. I didn't see ads about these things, but I DID see my peers--I was envious up until the point when I ate my first Lunchable, and realized that it was totally crap food. XD
You have to also think more about the way that food was presented, and how it was served, and what it was. Such as--were you taught that food should be all on one plate, or separate plates, or bowls? Was everyone allowed to serve themselves, or was food served mostly by one person (like mom or dad) and going for "seconds" was discouraged/encouraged? What was usually the primary focus of a meal--pasta, rice, vegetables, fruit, meat? (For instance, in Brian's household, his parents like fruit with dinner, so the "vegetable" place of a standard American meal is often either all fruit, or half fruit, half veggie.) Was canned, or premade, or food-from-a-package part of a regular meal, or was the focus on fresh, made from "scratch," or made that day meals as the norm? Even more importantly than the general rules of the household, these are the governing principles that shape what you eat, how you eat it, and how you feel about eating it. And most of them have been shaped by decades of advertising about The American Meal (especially things like the controversy about eggs, margrine vs butter, whole grain/wheat/white bread, etc).
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Date: 2011-02-07 07:01 pm (UTC)1. Dessert is not necessary. (For most of my life, we didn't have any dessert within the house--only after Scott, who wanted it almost all the time, did we have it on a regular basis. I'm not still not accustomed to eating dessert because of this.)
2. Eat until you're full/don't worry about finishing the plate of food. (My mom NEVER encouraged "finish your plate" mentality. In fact, she discouraged it fairly often, especially in a restaurant. She also was a big fan of "your eyes are bigger than your stomach" (which confused the hell out of my child literal brain XD), which were were meant to understand that we may think we want four pieces of chicken, but we're only capable of eating one, and so on.)
3. Soda is not allowed at any meal. We were only allowed water at dinner, and orange juice/tea/coffee at breakfast. Lunch was usually more water, or tea/coffee. We also didn't start stocking soda regularly until Scott, who HAS to have his Diet Coke.
Yet, even though there are only three rules, I can tell you that we never absorbed the idea that potatoes are good for us, because my mom almost never had them in the house, let alone served them. My mom didn't believe in over cooking vegetables, and didn't like to serve a grain as a primary fixture of a meal (such as pasta, or rice, or bread). We very, very rarely went out to eat, and while salt and pepper were made available at the table, we never saw our mom add salt to her food, so we didn't learn to add salt to our food (and especially not in large quantities). As I said before, we didn't learn to snack because my mom didn't buy snacks. We weren't wealthy enough to buy a lot of things when I was much younger, so a lot of the things most kids thought of as normal fare, like Lunchables and Capri Suns, were not present in my childhood. I didn't see ads about these things, but I DID see my peers--I was envious up until the point when I ate my first Lunchable, and realized that it was totally crap food. XD
You have to also think more about the way that food was presented, and how it was served, and what it was. Such as--were you taught that food should be all on one plate, or separate plates, or bowls? Was everyone allowed to serve themselves, or was food served mostly by one person (like mom or dad) and going for "seconds" was discouraged/encouraged? What was usually the primary focus of a meal--pasta, rice, vegetables, fruit, meat? (For instance, in Brian's household, his parents like fruit with dinner, so the "vegetable" place of a standard American meal is often either all fruit, or half fruit, half veggie.) Was canned, or premade, or food-from-a-package part of a regular meal, or was the focus on fresh, made from "scratch," or made that day meals as the norm? Even more importantly than the general rules of the household, these are the governing principles that shape what you eat, how you eat it, and how you feel about eating it. And most of them have been shaped by decades of advertising about The American Meal (especially things like the controversy about eggs, margrine vs butter, whole grain/wheat/white bread, etc).