Family Ties: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly

[Ancaster]

1 hour ago, Browncoat said:

Nope.  My mother made one meal, and that's what we ate.  Although, I will say when she made spaghetti, I only ate the noodles.  But no special food was made.

I remember in our family each kid had one thing they didn't like, in which case they picked it out, otherwise we ate what was given us on the plate handed to us (mushrooms in one case, fried eggs another).  My parents were born in the 1930s to already frugal parents, which probably had a lot to do with how meals went*.

* Anyone else out there with Yorkshire-folk for ancestors?  😄

Edited Sunday at 11:19 PM by Ancaster

[Bastet]

My mom didn't make different meals, I ate what she cooked or, once old enough, made myself something else.  But she didn't force me to eat things I hated, I'd just eat the other stuff.  And if she made a main dish I hated, she made one of my favorite sides with it and vice versa.  That was easy for her to do, though, because there wasn't a ton of stuff I hated or even disliked -- if in any given month's worth of meals there are only a few times where the kid skips part of it and isn't eating the world's most balanced meal by skipping that part, it's no big deal.

[Browncoat]

13 minutes ago, Ancaster said:

I remember in our family each kid had one thing they didn't like, in which case they picked it out, otherwise we ate what was given us on the plate handed to us (mushrooms in one case, fried eggs another).  My parents were born in the 1930s to already frugal parents, which probably had a lot to do with how meals went*.

* Anyone else out there with Yorkshire-folk for ancestors?  😄

Frugal Scots-Irish ancestors, and my parents grew up during the Depression.  They also ate whatever was on their plates.

If any of us had had food allergies or other medical issues, it would have been different, of course, but still, Mom would have cooked one meal for everyone.  When one of my siblings became vegetarian, she adjusted her recipes (which were all in her head, nothing written down) to eliminate meat products, but still made essentially the same food.  For example, instead of cooking eggs in the leftover bacon grease, she'd use butter or vegetable oil and a different pan. 

 

[Dimity]

I think growing up in a big family discourages being too fussy.  If anything we ate fast so we'd be the one who got the last pork chop.  This is not a child rearing technique that I would recommend however!

I always used to see shows or read a book where some poor kid was expected to sit at the table until they finished their meal even if it took all night.  I remember one book where the offensive meal was saved and served up every day until the poor kid finally choked it down.

Anyone who actually had a parent who did this to them you have my sincerest sympathy.

[PRgal]

1 hour ago, Dimity said:

I think growing up in a big family discourages being too fussy.  If anything we ate fast so we'd be the one who got the last pork chop.  This is not a child rearing technique that I would recommend however!

I always used to see shows or read a book where some poor kid was expected to sit at the table until they finished their meal even if it took all night.  I remember one book where the offensive meal was saved and served up every day until the poor kid finally choked it down.

Anyone who actually had a parent who did this to them you have my sincerest sympathy.

Current philosophy is that forcing kids to complete a meal "even if it takes all night" will encourage disordered eating so it's not something we do.  My son has trouble expressing how he feels about things and is always eager to please.  I'm a bit worried about that (that it could lead to him getting into trouble/hanging out with the "wrong" crowd).

@SoMuchTV Cousin-nephew is easy, but when it comes to me being the cousin-aunt, my title will depend on the side of the family to the parent.  I'm one type of cousin-aunt to the cousin-nephew I saw yesterday, but another type to one of my female cousin's daughters.  And me being YOUNGER to said female cousin means I'm something different ANOTHER female cousin's kids because THIS cousin is younger than me.  It's TOTALLY COMPLICATED.

[Gramto6]

5 hours ago, Dimity said:

I always used to see shows or read a book where some poor kid was expected to sit at the table until they finished their meal even if it took all night.  I remember one book where the offensive meal was saved and served up every day until the poor kid finally choked it down.

Anyone who actually had a parent who did this to them you have my sincerest sympathy.

I had a mother like that.  We had to eat everything or sit there until the plate was emptied. I pretty much ate everything, but as a kid, I could not stand liver and it was a staple in our meal schedule. I guess it was a cheap meat source.  My little brother and I finally came up with a plan that was pretty gross but perfect for us! We would wait until we were left alone in the kitchen and then toss the offensive food under the refrigerator! To this day I wonder if the refrigerator was ever replaced and what the floor was like under it!  

 

[shapeshifter]

 

[PRgal]

15 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

 

This was one of my favourite books growing up.  I’ve read it to my son and asked him if he thought Frances was silly.  He said yes and said he ate lots of different things (yep, just not that much protein.  Still hesitant to give him kid protein drinks since they’re usually loaded with sugar). 

[Mountainair]

9 hours ago, Gramto6 said:

I had a mother like that.  We had to eat everything or sit there until the plate was emptied. I pretty much ate everything, but as a kid, I could not stand liver and it was a staple in our meal schedule. I guess it was a cheap meat source.  My little brother and I finally came up with a plan that was pretty gross but perfect for us! We would wait until we were left alone in the kitchen and then toss the offensive food under the refrigerator! To this day I wonder if the refrigerator was ever replaced and what the floor was like under it!  

 

My grandmother is that way. She’s a terrible cook and while I am 40 now I have terrible memories of sitting at her table and being forced to eat slop. If my parents were there they would not make me but I often spent summers at her house without my parents. I eventually started feeding it to her dogs when she wasn’t looking. Her rule for adults was if there were leftovers they go in the dog bowl not the trash. 
A few years ago I visited her with my parents and my kids- my youngest was 3 at the time and we walk in her house and my 3 year old immediately says, “what’s that smell” and proceeded to throw up all over my dad who was holding her. Grandma was making a breakfast casserole and it smelled rancid. My mom went through her trash and found the sausage package she was using and it had expired three years prior. 
My grandma will be 90 in March but she is no longer allowed to cook when family visits and we all gather at a different family members house instead of hers. 

[Absolom]

Wow, three years expired sausage!  I thought my mother was bad when her mind began going, but we never approached that.  Mom had a habit of wanting to buy a jar of peanut butter every trip she made to the store with her caregiver.  They did use the oldest one first so when cleaning out her house, the food pantry got half a shelf of peanut butter.

[EtheltoTillie]

22 hours ago, PRgal said:

It doesn’t work that way anymore for a lot of families, eating that one meal.  And that’s why moms (since it’s mostly mom who cooks) are so stressed out.  
 

We had our extended family reunion with my side last night.  By “extended,” I mean my uncle and aunt (dad’s younger brother) and cousins.  One cousin and his wife have an 18 month old.  He’s sooo adorable!  Brings back memories for us!!  In Cantonese, the little boy would be called a cousin-nephew due to the generational difference.  Chinese family titles are super complicated!  

PRgal, I recommend you watch the new movie DiDi, about Taiwanese immigrants (to US).  I think it will resonate with you a great deal.  I just watched it this morning.  In the US, it's streaming on Peacock.  It was a Sundance selection.  The director's last movie, a short documentary, was Oscar nominated.   Anyway, unlike many indie coming-of-age movies, it does not feel cliched. 

Edited Monday at 08:46 PM by EtheltoTillie

[PRgal]

6 minutes ago, EtheltoTillie said:

PRgal, I recommend you watch the new movie DiDi, about Taiwanese immigrants (to US).  I think it will resonate with you a great deal.  I just watched it this morning.  In the US, it's streaming on Peacock.  It was a Sundance selection.  The director's last movie, a short documentary, was Oscar nominated.   Anyway, unlike many indie coming-of-age movies, it does not feel cliched. 

We don't get Peacock in Canada, but it's available on Prime (I checked).  I'll check it out once I finish Wicked.

[Mountainair]

3 hours ago, Absolom said:

Wow, three years expired sausage!  I thought my mother was bad when her mind began going, but we never approached that.  Mom had a habit of wanting to buy a jar of peanut butter every trip she made to the store with her caregiver.  They did use the oldest one first so when cleaning out her house, the food pantry got half a shelf of peanut butter.

She had six kids and lives by herself and just never got out of the habit of buying food for a huge family. She has two fridges and two freezers the she keeps stocked with reduced priced foods but it’s only her living at home. 

[EtheltoTillie]

21 hours ago, Ancaster said:

I remember in our family each kid had one thing they didn't like, in which case they picked it out, otherwise we ate what was given us on the plate handed to us (mushrooms in one case, fried eggs another).  My parents were born in the 1930s to already frugal parents, which probably had a lot to do with how meals went*.

* Anyone else out there with Yorkshire-folk for ancestors?  😄

Nah, but we have US Depression-era parents.  But nothing's logical.  My mother hated lamb for some reason, but she would always make broiled baby lamb chops that were completely dried out and well done.  But she didn't eat them!   She made something else for herself, and for the life of me I cannot remember what it was.  I think I was so focused on getting through my portion.  My father claimed to like them, and I would chew them and chew them over and over until I had an inedible wad.  Finally she stopped making them at all. 

Later in life I learned that people served baby lamb chops rare . . . 

Edited Monday at 09:14 PM by EtheltoTillie

[shapeshifter]

34 minutes ago, EtheltoTillie said:

Later in life I learned that people served baby lamb chops rare . . . 

Edited Monday at 09:41 PM by shapeshifter

[Ohiopirate02]

48 minutes ago, EtheltoTillie said:

Nah, but we have US Depression-era parents.  But nothing's logical.  My mother hated lamb for some reason, but she would always make broiled baby lamb chops that were completely dried out and well done.  But she didn't eat them!   She made something else for herself, and for the life of me I cannot remember what it was.  I think I was so focused on getting through my portion.  My father claimed to like them, and I would chew them and chew them over and over until I had an inedible wad.  Finally she stopped making them at all. 

Later in life I learned that people served baby lamb chops rare . . . 

I am laughing over on my end remembering my dad talk about my great grandmother's chuck roasts. Apparently they resembled hockey pucks. By the time I came along, we only visited her and stayed with my other great-grandmother who knew how to cook. My mom tells the story about the first time she took my dad to Pennsylvania to meet her grandmothers. The one who could cook asked my dad if he wanted any pierogi, he said yes, and she went into the kitchen to make him some. My mom looked at my dad and told him that was never going to happen at home. Though grandma had the pierogi in the freezer already made, and mom sure does love to keep a couple dozen of them in the freezer today.

[EtheltoTillie]

29 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

Apologies to Shapeshifter's grand-Lambchops

[shapeshifter]

My family has a lot of 1st cousins who have never met because of parents’ estrangement and/or due to moving long distances from each other. I only saw my paternal grandparents a few times because of a feud between my mom and her mother-in-law. 
But one of my clear childhood memories is sitting at my Grandmother’s table and being served boiled chicken with the skin on it and asking my mother if I had to eat the skin. There was silence. The memory stops there.
There had been a lot of hard times when my grandmother did not have enough food to feed her kids.

[Mountainair]

I have 11 cousins. I’m the second oldest at 40 and my youngest cousin is a senior in high school. My kids have all grown up with my cousins thinking they are their first cousins as well. When I got married I had three of my cousins serve as flower girl, ring bearer and jr. bridesmaid and all of them had my kids in their own weddings. 
Not to say there isn’t family drama but mostly us cousins have stuck around for each other. 

[shapeshifter]

When my first cousins have met as adults, it's always been pleasant, with an unspoken wish that we could have been closer but are now geographically not, so…. 

My youngest daughter (the one with the kids — my "lambchops"🐑🐑) is very well-integrated with her husband's many cousins and their spouses etc. 
My 2 little grandkids have 11 first cousins they see regularly.
Most of them are step-1st cousins, or is it not necessary to make that distinction? Her husband grew up with his step-siblings.

[PRgal]

2 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

My family has a lot of 1st cousins who have never met because of parents’ estrangement and/or due to moving long distances from each other. I only saw my paternal grandparents a few times because of a feud between my mom and her mother-in-law. 
But one of my clear childhood memories is sitting at my Grandmother’s table and being served boiled chicken with the skin on it and asking my mother if I had to eat the skin. There was silence. The memory stops there.
There had been a lot of hard times when my grandmother did not have enough food to feed her kids.

I think there's some estrangement between my mom and one of her aunts' family.  This is the only great aunt (or as my mom would say, grand aunt) I saw frequently growing up since she accompanied her younger son and his family's immigration (this cousin uncle had two kids, a boy and a girl, both older than me.  I remember wanting a GameBoy because the boy cousin had one.  But nope, my mom said it would ruin my eyes) in the early 90s.  But after my grandmother passed, I basically did not see them at all.   I think the boy cousin's kids are in middle or high school now.  And the girl cousin has kids in university.  But I may have lost track.  This great aunt was the last of four kids from the main wife, I believe.  My grandmother had four other younger siblings that survived into adulthood.  Different mother though.