Time for me

As you have kids and life becomes ever more hectic, it's so easy to forget about making time for the things you want or like. After a while, as a mom, it almost becomes second nature to deny yourself what you want and opt for what the kids want instead - trips to the park instead of to an art gallery or museum, eating at the McDs instead of a restaurant, skipping movies, opting for family time instead of time as a couple...

For me somehow, right from the beginning, it's been important to have time for A and I as a couple. We've had good help at home, and my parents living close by so we've managed to go out for movies, out for meals or parties once in a while. But time to myself has been something I've been pretty stingy about, maybe also because I work fulltime.

In the beginning it was so bad that I would put off nature breaks if the kids wanted something, not realising I was hopping uneasily from one foot to the other while getting whatever they needed. Now it's a rare occurrence for me to go out for so much as a mani-pedi, a once in 3-4 months thing. Haircuts have become an annual event. (Of course, the mani-pedi-haircut thing may also be because I'm naturally lazy about things like that - have been even before I had kids.) Reading is once the kids are in bed or while I'm getting ready or commuting. Writing tends to happen late at night or during occasional breaks at work. Worst of all is that I've fallen off the fitness wagon.

I used to work out thrice a week with a trainer when Chubbocks was small. But that was a time I felt I could permit myself since I worked only halfdays. Then, after Puddi came, I started really rationing my me-time so I began working out with the trainer at 5:30 in the morning, as that one hour was a spell during which the kids and A were fast asleep, so I wasn't 'robbing' anyone of that time. And after Bojjandi came along, I just didn't have the bandwidth or the energy, between breast-feeding, pumping, working and making time for the other two and A.

It's only when I took a break from work, starting July, that I felt I could make a commitment to one hour of working out, and enrolled in a nearby gym. It's been a great thing for me, because I'm not a do-it-yourself yoga type, I either need a tape/ DVD or the energy of other people that bounces off the wall at a gym, to push me. I also have always loved weight-training and working out on machines and the gym has more than enough for my needs so I love working out there.

More than everything, though, when I was doing some thinking about life directions as one tends to do at the end of every year, it hit me that being fit and healthy and energetic went beyond just going back to my original size - before the hypo-thyroid and baby-making caught up on me. It was to do with the sense of empowerment I felt just by taking action against something I saw as an issue. And also, it was about becoming healthier, having more energy to do things for myself and for others. That's when it hit me that one of the few changes I feel called upon to make this year onwards in my attitude towards my own health and fitness, and me-time in general.

I have to start thinking of it as an investment in the family, rather than something I'm robbing them of. Just like I try and think of working as something that builds assets for the family - more money, yes, but also a more patient me. My being fit and having more energy to hang with the kids and being more healthy is likely to keep paying off longterm dividends for the family. I'll be around longer, for one thing. And healthier more of that time. And happier, with a better self image and more positivity and a better attitude about how to cope with life's troubles, big and small.

I think a lot of women make this mistake of treating anything they do for themselves as an indulgence and therefore either of secondary importance or 'robbing' their family. Sometimes it is, let's face it. But a lot of times, it is something that's necessary for their physical and mental wellbeing, so let's stop Nirupa-Roying ourselves!

Kids' Eating Habits

Recently in the US, two cookbooks that have found a roaring market are both about the concept of sneaking vegetables into children's food by disguising them - put pureed spinach into brownies and chocolate pie, put sweet potatoes into a cheese sandwich...So the basic premise is, kids will only like foods full of starch, fat and sugar so the only way you can make it a little better is by hiding pureed vegetables in those same starchy, fatty, sugary treats and re-cooking them umpteen times until all semblance of taste, texture and nutrition is drained from the vegetables.

Frankly, I disagree, and much to my relief, so does a pioneering paediatrician who did her research way back in 1928 ( the link to the article on her in Slate - http://www.slate.com/id/2155816/). Her thesis was that supplied with a variety of healthy foods, kids are naturally programmed and smart enough to pick things that offer a complete and healthy diet. Now, obviously, if all you're going to offer them is potato chips, brownies and cookies to choose from...

I honestly believe that good food habits are something that need to be inculcated from the beginning. The basics, like limiting candy, sugar and flour. Making sure they get vegetables and fruit into their diet from the time they start eating solids. Restricting the availability of chips, colas and the like.

So far it hasn't been an issue despite any amount of peer pressure. Yes, of course my son loves chips and asks for them periodically, but we just don't stock them at home. Same with colas, chocolates and candy. Now he's allowed to drink a glass of coke, but only at parties ( typically because most birthday parties nowadays are hosted at Pizza Hut or McDonalds where juice isn't available as an option). He loves soup and salad and asks for them on a regular basis. In fact, of late he's been showing signs of interest in cooking, and came up with a soup recipe over the weekend which we had to choke down(thankfully only a small quantity - the soup consisted of glucose biscuits soaked in water with Boost on top!). So I asked him to help me in making Stone soup (recipe to be found on my food blog), and he loved both helping me and the soup that 'I made myself', as he claimed. My 17 month old daughter loves her fruit and veggies and spent a gloriously messy evening fishing all the veggies out of the soup and feeding herself yesterday. So far, her idea of sneaking food is to help herself to curds from the fridge.

There are so many different types of cuisine and so many recipes are available freely on the net that it shouldn't be that difficult to find some way to cook a vegetable that your child will like, while still retaining the taste and flavour of the vegetable. I think if we start with the premise that kids will like vegetables and fruit rather than the opposite, then we don't need to do all this 'disguising' and 'sneaking'. Maybe the concept was based on the authors' own dislike for vegetables and fruit?