family dinners

[Sheherezade]

For all the other families out there with preschool and above aged kids, how do you handle family dinners? I have tried off and on for years to get us to sit down at the table for dinner just twice a week and it always makes me angry and my husband guilty. He just can't get home before the kids meltdown entirely. I have done dinner without him and waited to have dinner with him myself after the kids are asleep, but this family around the table scene only happens once in a blue moon.....Last night, after an attempt that ended with me telling him over the phone dinner was getting cold, the table was set and the kids were waiting for him (and being truly pissed off as this was the one night of the week he said he could make it home before 7), he rushed home to a hurried grumpy dinner with an angry wife and over tired over hungry kids. I once again vowed to never try and have a family dinner again.....

Now that the end of his training is looming, I started thinking about what he considers a "good" day. He leaves at 6-6:30 and gets home around 7 in the evening. Even with that "good" schedule, he'd see our kids for about an hour a day when they weren't asleep. The kids go to bed around 8. I try to feed them by 6. Am I doing something wrong? I can't figure out how to get a family dinner out of this schedule!!!! As it is the kids get up by 6 each day with him (and me) and talk to him in the shower. I could try to get them to sleep later and do dinner at 7, but he still probably wouldn't make it half the time and they'd be in bed around 9(DH and I go to sleep by 10!!). Then I'd really be pissed if I changed the schedule of everyone in the family (at great effort) for nada. Should I just give up? I wonder what other med families do. He's surgical so honestly, he doesn't know often that a case will go "bad" and take longer than he thought. I DO understand why he misses dinner for years on end; I just want to know if that's the norm or if their is something else we could try. Any fabulous solutions?
Angie

[Rapunzel]

I don't have any fabulous solutions. Sorry, Angie.

I can tell you what I do, though. My kids eat dinner at about 7pm every night. We generally have a large snack at about 3 or 4 pm and that seems to get them to 7:00. My husband makes it home by dinner about half of the time. Dinner goes on with or without him present. So, we do have a "family dinner" about half of the time (especially on weekends when he doesn't have call) and the other half of the time it's family dinner w/out Dad. I've gotten used to it and it's generally more efficient and less messy when Dad's not around (because when he is we are spending so much time trying to talk to each other that I don't pay much attention to what the kids are doing when they're supposed to be eating).

When my husband was doing his intern year with Q3 I would take the kids up to the hospital about once a week and we would have dinner in the resident's lounge or the cafeteria with their dad. We generally had dinner with the entire family about two other times during the week so going up to the hospital for dinner really rounded things out for us.

Sorry for your dilemma! It sounds like you are doing a good job, though!

Jennifer

That sounds tough, Angie. It can be hard to find a time to have dinner together, maintain bedtimes, and have it be a good experience without too much grumpiness!
Maybe you could feed your kids earlier and let them eat a little snack or dessert while you and your husband eat dinner? That way you would all be eating together (not the same food, though) and they wouldn't be starving. Maybe have them in their pjs and closer to ready for bed?

[houseelf]

Angie,

Yes, yes, yes. We have struggled and struggled with this issue. Right now it is not as bad because DH is in the lab. But, we have had to become very creative with this because I also work outside the home 3-4 days a week and am always in a rush to get dinner on the table. Although the easy way out would be to just throw our hands up in the air, I keep forcing the issue because it is a) healthier b) better for the family c) gets my son to eat when he otherwise wouldn't.

So...here are a few things we try. As underwhelming as this goal sounds, I demand at least two sitdown dinners a week, and sometimes this means both weekend days. We try to have a sitdown pancake breakfast on Sunday. (Hey, breakfasts count too, right?) Dinners eaten out must be eaten at the restaurant table if at all possible instead of in the car. When DH is not around, I prop my kid up at the breakfast bar in the kitchen so that we can talk while I cook/clean/run around like a chicken with my head cutoff. I will say that in someways it has gotten easier because now my son can help me with basic food prep and setting the table. Before I had to nurse, cook, get the food ready and on the table, feed him a separate dinner. Let's just say family dinners were RARE indeed. But I have made this such a HUGE issue that my boys have been trained to take it seriously and make it a priority.

But I feel your pain. It is hard when they have such erratic schedules and it all falls on you.

Kelly

[mommax3]

We hardly ever had dinner together during residency.....I didn't even try. The kids and I sat down, but DH was the phantom guest at the table, only making occasional appearances. Since then, we probably manage 5 or 6 (including weekends) sit down meals together per week.....but his schedule right now is controlled by the fact that he is in the military (socialized medicine at its finest......NOT 8O ) and his surgical load is very light because most of the patients here are young and fall more into the obstetric category (which brings its own scheduling challenges) than the gynecologic.

I vote for either the earlier big snack/later dinnertime or the regular dinner/later snack (or dessert) ideas. I think as long as you maintain the expectation of dinner as a family, it will eventually get easier, and it isn't a total failure if it is just you and the kids.....you are still sitting down with them and conversing about their day, etc. and if Dad misses it because of work the kids still have the norm of a family dinner. They will eventually get older and go to bed later and it will be easier to achieve......until then, shoot for it but don't be too ####### yourselves if you don't always make it.

I know what we have now will go in the toilet as soon as DH starts private practice, so you all may have to bump this post back up for me in about a year and a half!

Sally

[SueC]

My kids are preschool and younger, but we tend to do dinner when it is ready regardless of whether dh is home. We do always eat at the dining room table, but that is mainly becuase mine really are too young to eat anywhere else without making a huge mess. We're kind of used to eating without dh, though it is nice when he is there and we can all eat together. I'm thinking of making a "set in stone" dinner-time of 6:30 to give my husband a time to shoot for at least.

[Sheherezade]

Thanks everyone for the fabulous ideas. It is nice to know other people have this problem too. I don't have any medical families in our social circle, and I think my kids think we are wierd for never having Dad home at dinner. Anywhoo--nice to know it isn't just us. I am thinking about attempting the late snack and 7 pm dinner.....but I'm not getting my hopes up. This is one household organization problem I've always failed at solving. I really don't like the idea of them going to bed later. I have this feeling that the 8 PM solid bedtime is the only reason I've survived this single parent med spouse thing for the last 8 years!!!! I do think it will get better as the kids get older. I keep forgetting they do that <<<SOB>>> I suppose it has its good points as well.....

Angie

[peggyfromwastate]

One thing to watch out for for "when they get older" is that they will have activities that conflict with dinner time too. I like Rapunzel's idea, and we did this as a child growing up. My dad didn't make dinner much (he was an ER doc) but we had a set scheduled dinner around which all other activities were scheduled. Now, with Mac in med school, we have dinner as a family every night and it's really easy, b/c he doesn't have to be anywhere else. I think later I'll try to do what Rapunzel does (7 pm dinner time) and hope for the best... As soon as Kate hits middle school, hopefully she'll be in sports (I hope I hope I hope) and that will mean games, etc., and schedules will adjust, but I think we'll have a "dinner time" anyway for those who are in the house...

Good luck and I really hope you find something that works! It's such a nice tradition to have...