What is This?

(Lessons we can learn from our children)

I am gratified at the reactions my previous post garnered on the Quiet Place. So much goodwill, so much resonance from so many people. Many also wanted to know details of the program that I did to lose the weight. Happy to share more on that, if my readers would like to know, leave a note in the comments.

Today I want to talk about this chocolate bar.

For those of us trying to lose weight, chocolate can be a roadblock. We love to binge eat it, right? So what do you think my purpose was in putting up this scrumptious image? Who has nibbled away at the edges?

My 3-year old. We were at an airport and suddenly a tantrum began for chocolate. I could tell he was hungry, it had been a while since breakfast and I had miscalculated the gap before lunch. I took the path of least resistance and bought him the chocolate bar.

Have you hung out with toddlers lately? Their little brains are still developing, brains that don’t fully mature until the early twenties at least. And those brains are not wired to handle the big emotions they feel. Which is why the smallest thing can set them off into full meltdown mode.

Hungry + Angry = Hangry

Before I found the Quiet Place, toddler tantrums would trigger big emotions in me as well, and it would be a race to the bottom. Now I have learnt that the bigger his tantrum, the quieter I must be. And use the power of rapport to bring him into the zone of influence of my Quiet Place.

This time, a full on meltdown was brought on by the fact that I broke off a piece of chocolate for him to eat. Why Amma! Why did you murd it? No Amma, you must not murd it. Noooo! (Isn’t his Kanglish adorable? Is what I was thinking. Murd being an Englishified version of muri, Kannada for break. He wanted to clutch and nibble the whole bar, and was having an apoplectic fit that I had broken off ‘one row of houses.’)

I realised that he was too far gone down the tantrum spiral to be able to listen to reason. Also, when children are hungry, they really cannot listen to anything at all, let alone reason. (Isn’t it the same with adults? We let ourselves get way too hungry and then demolish everything in sight. Far better to keep healthy snacks accessible so that we don’t slip into toddler tantrum mode. What’s the word for it? Hangry. Hungry + Angry. And to make sure there isn’t an unreasonably long gap between meals.)

Hunger and Fullness

Come to think of it, the common sense rules that apply to child nutrition are pretty much the same as far as adults are concerned.

Kids are way ahead of us in some respects, though.

That is the point of the image that accompanies this post. Despite his demand for a giant bar of chocolate, my son knew exactly when he was done; a few pieces. Enough, Amma, he said. And after that he wasn’t interested in that bar anymore. He didn’t mention it again except to say he wanted to share it with his friends back home.

Will we do that? Can we forget about that chocolate bar after we are done with the initial satiety? No, of course not. We know its in the fridge and sneak back for a midnight nibble.

What about sharing? This reminds me of a certain brand of mints that come in a flat round box. The box lid has two trapdoor -like openings with two labels. The tiny one says 'to share' and the enormous one says 'for me' or something like that. Nice commentary, right? Whereas if we actually made it a point to share and give away goodies, they just wouldn't be around in the fridge to tempt us in the first place.

Kids know exactly how to heed their body’s signals of fullness and stop precisely at that point of hunger satiety.

It is a skill that we have forgotten. Because of conditioning such as ‘You must finish all the food on your plate!’ Sometimes followed by ‘No dessert if you don’t!’

These mantras, while founded in goodwill and concern for the growth of the child, as well as good values about non-waste, unfortunately also served to destroy our innate ability to judge when we are full.

And if we can’t tell when we are full, how will we stop eating? Doesn’t it sound so simple, when put like that? The simplest things are the hardest to comprehend sometimes, simply because they are so simple. We are conditioned to believe that complexity is clever, and simple isn’t smart. Question this for yourself.

How to start tuning into fullness signals like a toddler does? Have you noticed how children live completely in the moment? We need to rediscover that skill to slow down the eating process.

Listen to your body. Like a toddler does. And how do you do that? With me, now - access That Quiet Place inside.

How? Take a few deep breaths before a meal. Slow the mind down. Let the pounding of thoughts cease. Keep that phone/tablet/screen/gadget away, switch off the TV. Serve yourself a small portion to start with (so those childhood mantras about non-waste don't start their auto-play when you feel like you're full). Look at your food, really see it. What does it look like, what does it feel like, smell like? Relish it completely. A little bit, a few mouthfuls. Engage all the senses.

And let it go.

This part is important, folks, the letting go. When I started trying this out I enjoyed the process so much that I wanted to eat more! Watch out for that attachment :)

That is how you also let the excess weight go. As crazy as it sounds, all that extra poundage is sitting on our bones because we are not able to let it go. We hold on to it with these bad patterns that we have set up. Let go of those patterns, and the weight has nowhere to hide, no option but to melt away into the darkness whence it came.

Children haven't had the time in the world yet to form those patterns. Dissolve your own patterns and be mindful about what patterns your child is picking up from you. I would even say, stop expecting your children to take their cues from you all the time, and you take your cues from them instead. There's a tremendous amount we can unlearn about ourselves in the process. We can rediscover how to look at the world through eyes full of wonder and joy.

As parents, we all have anxieties about our children. Will they turn out okay? How are they doing in school? Will they get into IIT? (!) Whom is she texting? Why is her room door locked? It goes on, endlessly, the pounding of those thoughts. For me, my main anxiety is that my childhood obesity pattern will repeat with my son. It is why I have paid close attention to his food habits from the time he was a baby. Nothing is taboo, I don’t want him to develop fixations because he was denied something. Instead, I try to restrain myself from micromanaging, prohibiting, lecturing, saying, doing. Instead, I allow. What do I allow? I allow him the space to be in tune with his body’s signals of hunger and fullness. How do I do that? By allowing him to stop eating when he says he is full. There is no pressure to finish the last bite on the plate. No pressure at all.

My only prayer is that he continues to nurture that sense as he grows up, as peer pressure to consume junk food shows up. We will cross those bridges when we come to them.

Meanwhile, be like a child. Life is more fun that way.