The Value of Family Dinners

As a devotee of the regular family dinner I have read the statistics that give scientific credence to what was something I more or less stumbled upon as I built a family of my own. The statistics are encouraging; so much so, they can even give the impression that if you are not sitting down to dinner with your family on a regular basis, you are likely to find your children failing out of school and strung out on OxyContin.

The statistics are impressive. The Center for Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) asserts that “children who do not eat dinner with their families are 61 percent more likely to use alcohol, tobacco, or illegal drugs. By contrast, children who eat dinner with their families every night of the week are 20 percent less likely to drink, smoke, or use illegal drugs.” Additionally, “teens who eat frequent family dinners are less likely than other teens to have sex at young ages, get into fights, or be suspended from school, and they are at lower risk for thoughts of suicide.” CASA is so convinced of the correlation between family dinners and the battle against substance abuse that they have sponsored “Family Day; A Day to Eat Dinner with Your Children” on the fourth Monday of every September since 2001 (www.casafamilyday.org). Dianne Neumark-Sztainer, PhD, MPH, RD, an epidemiology professor at the University of Minnesota concurs – “Our research also has shown that more frequent family meals protect against tobacco, alcohol and marijuana use, low grade-point average, depression, and suicide – particularly with adolescent girls.” Similar statistics were published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, “Correlations Between Family Meals and Psychosocial Well-being Among Adolescents.” The list of scientific validation certainly goes on and on.

My devotion to dinner came about through a search for family comfort as I transitioned from single-working-girl to married-instant-stepmother/homemaker. The comfort I was searching for was not just for my stepson. I was looking for it too, and it was not immediately evident that I would find it in the kitchen. It was my own memories of dinners with my family and the personal comfort I drew from those memories that took me into the kitchen. Growing up, our regular family dinners did not make a conscious impression on me, but years later they did, and so they must have.

When writing about my dedication to regular family dinners, I worry about painting too rosy a picture. Is it unrealistic to believe that simply eating dinner together is all that is necessary to galvanize our loved ones against the societal pitfalls that terrify any parent? As a sample size of one, I can certainly say that I did not drop out or fail out of school. There is, however, that pesky matter of ninth grade when I did get kicked out of boarding school - - that was surely a blip. I’ve never been curious about or enticed by drugs or substance abuse. There is, however, that raucous matter of excessive wine consumption during my single days as a campus recruiter for a Big Five accounting firm - - another blip. I’ve always been thought of as cheerful, funny and full of life. There is, however, that sobering matter of an extended, largely secret tangle with depression - - this is absolutely not a blip. Not even heavenly gravy can completely overcome genetic wiring, but it can temper it (yes, my gravy is that good). Good grief, perhaps if my family had not enjoyed the dinners we did as I grew up, indeed I may have found myself exploring pharmaceuticals behind the high school gym.

Such honest confessions aren’t meant to discourage anyone from joining the ranks of family dinner devotee, nor are they meant to discredit the statistics. Even with my dirty laundry, now airing for all to see, I am firmly convinced of the power of the regular family dinner. I simply want to insert some realistic slivers into the dialog, lest it get too slanted toward an idealistic picture none of us can attain. Further, after awhile it gets tiresome at best and creepy at worst, painting this picture. What begins as a Norman Rockwell ideal becomes more Stepford than Mayberry. It can flip from inspiring to nauseating in seconds.

I don’t live in Stepford or Mayberry, nor do I live on Rockwell’s Main Street. I live in the real world, where we love our families and try to do all we can to make a happy and comfortable home with varying degrees of success. For me, and for so many others, part of that quest is preparing dinner regularly for our families. Sometimes it works out like a perfect 1950’s sitcom and sometimes it’s like an offensive rerun of “Roseanne”. Sitting down to dinner with your family is less about the healing and nourishing powers of the food we are serving and more about the message that shows itself in the effort and thought extended – “This family is special and you are an integral part of it, so today I fixed a family favorite, hoping it will urge kind words and instill warm feelings of comfort and love.” Botched meal or not, that message remains the same when you serve a homemade dinner to your family. Sulking teens, defiant preschoolers – let them protest – “I don’t want that! – What is that? – It doesn’t smell good! – I don’t want to try that! – Why can’t we go out to eat?” This is the cadence of real life - where raising your children well is not usually noticed or appreciated by them until they are raising their own. Where doing what is best for your children is not usually met with cheers but rather with whines. These are the realities at my family table.

And yet there are those moments, and they come more often than you might think, when the view at dusk through your window by a passerby of a warm home, a special meal and loving communion among those around the family table really does reflect what is inside. It is everyone’s respite from real life for just a moment. It imprints itself on the hearts of your loved ones without their knowledge, and they are never the same. It’s a truth I now thank my parents for, and a loving gift I give with my own imprinted heart as often as I can.