I know why Americans are fat

[regentrude]

Agreed!! Literally, every parent I know is stressed out and over committed. The pressure to join everything is huge!! People talk about how Grandma cooked but Grandma didn't spend literally 4 hours in the car after picking kids up from school.

 

But these are choices people make. Nobody has to join all these activities. It is a question of priorities and it is possible to opt out.

[HomeAgain]

Sometimes it's not just a matter of cooking, but of cooking for people to eat.

 

Dh and I are spending the year apart.  I have the kids here, he is living in an apartment.  All of a sudden our meals went from gourmet, fantastically planned things to rather harried.  And on nights it's just the youngest and I here it's hardly worth cooking at all, since we each eat about as much as one person put together.  Add in evening activities, and I'm not going to lie, there is frozen pizza in my freezer along with a box of hamburger patties.  It is just easier some nights for each person to turn on the grill as they need food, or if we have half an hour, throw in a pizza and call it good.  It's just not fun to cook, and I'm only getting to the farmer's market once a week right now for fresh fruits/veggies, so they're gone by Wednesday at the latest.  That leaves half a week to figure out alternatives.  LOL  Last night I finally made it to the store at 9pm, grabbed the milk I'd forgotten we'd needed, hurried up and grabbed the avocados, and because I knew I'd be short on time again tonight, already made pico de gallo.  My children got home at 9:30, and were in bed by 10pm.  Not ideal (and on a more daily basis, just as damaging to a child's health as a poor diet).

 

On the upside, dh and I are both learning how to cook smaller meals.  He ate fast food/frozen food steadily for 2 months before portioning out meat for the freezer.  I'll buy a big tray of chicken to cut up and at least once a week I'll take out a bag and pan-grill it, add some frozen veggies and a quick couscous and have dinner on the table in 15 minutes.

[Guest]

But these are choices people make. Nobody has to join all these activities. It is a question of priorities and it is possible to opt out.

Yes and no. My DH can't opt out of long work hours. DS can't opt out of drivers ed. Could I give up my volunteer work? I guess but the connections I've made have greatly benefited my family.

[Bluegoat]

I think this is well said.

 

All this work to figure out how to make food and eat in less time is really missing the point of the problem. 

 

Yes, yes yes.

 

There are people who simply have no choice, typically those whose busyness comes from simply trying to make ends meet, have to deal with illnesses or other similar challenges.

 

But for those of us who are really choosing the busyness - trying to make food fast, even if it is healthy, is buying into essentially the same food attitude as going through the drive-thu.

 

I remember as a middle-school kid, hearing from my French teacher how the lunch time at her relatives' state school in France differed from our own.  We had packed lunches, ate in the classroom at our desks, we had 15 min to do so and get outside.  Her nieces and nephews has a full sit down meal, with tablecloths and real cutlery and real food, and they took the whole of the lunch hour (or hour and a half I think actually) to eat and chat. 

 

The idea of it was a bit of a revelation for me.

[Bluegoat]

But these are choices people make. Nobody has to join all these activities. It is a question of priorities and it is possible to opt out.

 

I think though it can be hard for people to realize that they can when it's the social norm in their circle.  Some might not even be able to picture what doing it would look like. 

 

And many are getting signals that say - if your child isn't in a sport and some other activity, isn't involved in some passion, there will be long term consequences.

 

It can also be so easy to get sucked in.  My friends son is so keen to play hockey - he loves to watch it and he likes to skate, and it would likely be really fun for him.  But the time commitment required to be on even just a regular team is huge, and not just huge but includes things like 6am ice times.

 

His mom, who has a pretty strong sense of this being a bad thing, has him in a pick-up ball hockey league which isn't what he wants but is fun and manageable for the family.  But it's not hard for me to imagine a parent enrolls her kid in hockey as a little one and then can't see her way to pulling him out when it gets crazy.  Add a few other kids in swimming or ballet where the same things happen,  and you have an impossible schedule.

[Jane in NC]

This thread brings to mind a conversation that I had a decade or so ago.  At the time, my social circle included a number of families with kids about the same age--families that we would see at the soccer field, at the ice rink, at 4-H meetings.  It was the family practice doctor who noted that everyone was making sure that their kids had the right physical and extra-curricular activities but look what the kids were putting in their bodies.  The PE teacher was the first to confess that her gang was eating McDonald's take out in the van two or three times a week.

 

Actually I thought of that conversation a week or so ago when a horticulturalist was hanging out at the house.  He had done some judging for 4-H and was shocked at the junk that was served at the event.  He said "One of the H's in 4-H is 'health'.  Why is that not emphasized?"

 

Balance is the key.  It just seems that good food, the conviviality of dining, and proper sleep are not always in the equation.

 

The constant snacking is the thing that gets on my nerves.  I work with kids on a volunteer basis.  I have no problem with the after school snack but I don't think that kids need to carry candy or soda to events. 

[skimomma]

I appreciate reading some of these posts.  I homeschool an only child, work very part-time, and serve on one volunteer board.  That is it.  I was beating myself up the other day that I don't feel like I am making a "contribution" or at the very least living up to my full earning/career potential.  But somehow I am busy all day every day.  I garden, can, meal plan, keep the house picked up and clean, etc..... and spend a large part of every day cooking three meals.  I need to remind myself that it is OK to stay out of the rat race.  As a teen, my dd is exploring and enjoying all kinds of new activities and social experiences.  My dh is working two full time jobs.  Because I am not "contributing," I am available to help get everyone where they need to be, make sure everyone is getting healthy meals (even if I have to pack them up in thermoses), and make a comfortable landing spot for the end of the daily race.  I am content.  It is a luxury, I know.  And I might not always have it.  But reading some of these posts is helping me to remember that I do not have to do "it all."  

[Soror]

I appreciate reading some of these posts.  I homeschool an only child, work very part-time, and serve on one volunteer board.  That is it.  I was beating myself up the other day that I don't feel like I am making a "contribution" or at the very least living up to my full earning/career potential.  But somehow I am busy all day every day.  I garden, can, meal plan, keep the house picked up and clean, etc..... and spend a large part of every day cooking three meals.  I need to remind myself that it is OK to stay out of the rat race.  As a teen, my dd is exploring and enjoying all kinds of new activities and social experiences.  My dh is working two full time jobs.  Because I am not "contributing," I am available to help get everyone where they need to be, make sure everyone is getting healthy meals (even if I have to pack them up in thermoses), and make a comfortable landing spot for the end of the daily race.  I am content.  It is a luxury, I know.  And I might not always have it.  But reading some of these posts is helping me to remember that I do not have to do "it all."  

It is hard and the pressure is intense.

 

I started a thread about that last week I think because it does feel that the pressure to do things is so great. 

 

We aren't opting out of everything, as hs'ers who live in a rural area doing activities is how my kids make friends. But I also realized that not all the activities we did were really conducive to forming friendships. Every choice we make comes at a price. I think the tide will start to shift, some highschoolers are barely getting any sleep, their to-do lists a mile long trying to beat out everyone else, we know this isn't healthy. I think we instinctively know as well that lives are not all that balanced for many Americans. The lack of time to eat decent food is just part of it, too much stress and not enough sleep are just as bad or worse.

[regentrude]

Yes and no. My DH can't opt out of long work hours. DS can't opt out of drivers ed. Could I give up my volunteer work? I guess but the connections I've made have greatly benefited my family.

 

Sure, but in your post to which I replied you mentioned spending 4 hours driving after school. For most people, that is a choice.

Of course people who have to work long hours don't get to choose.

 

I work and homeschool. We were very selective about which activities our kids signed up for when they were younger.