2009-07-27

On Homemade Porridge

One of my favourite time-to-spare breakfasts to make at home is porridge. I usually start with organic oat flakes, and add the following during or after cooking: chopped soaked dried apricots or raisins, oat milk powder, almond powder, freshly ground sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds, an grated apple or pear, etc. I usually spend 30~40 minutes preparing for this recipe (very long compared with other breakfasts ideas). The porridge contains a lot of healthy nutrients (good fats, iron and calcium, among others) and is very delicious.

You must be thinking that my DS has always been loving this great food made by his at-home dad.

To the contrary, he almost always screamed whenever I was making it. He cried when he heard the sound of the mill (when finely grinding the seeds). And he even became hysterical when he found that he could not enter the kitchen and saw what his dad was doing because the safety gate (which is being installed in the kitchen's entrance) was closed.

The worst thing was, when this intense child screamed, his equally intense father, who usually hadn't slept well the night before and who had just thought himself wholeheartedly spending half-an-hour in a very hot windowless kitchen making healthy good food for his beloved son, also found himself burning into the red zone and screaming at the kid. Then a vicious circle reinforced itself which scared both of us.

Well, you may have noticed that I used the past tense for the last two paragraphs. Yes, I still make porridge as breakfasts, once or twice a week, but DS has stopped behaving like the above way for several months. I think I have learned some important lessons to keep us both cool.

Now I seldom operate the mill. In case I must use it, I will bring DS to the kitchen, put my hands over his shoulders, and watch together with him how the mill is processing. In this way, he can observe the functions of the mill, not just hearing some very annoying strange sound without knowing where it came from. If he is still a bit frightened, I will switch off the mill this time and not grind any dry ingredients, or do this only when he is being distracted (by a toy for example), or when the white noise of the range hood is loud enough to mask the sound of the mill.

But the most "revolutionary" move I've done may have been to open the safety gate, to allow DS to come to the kitchen (only when I am also there too), and to let him touch virtually everything there (except of course the stove, the hot oil/ boiling water, the sharp tools, the breakables and the cleaning chemicals). Although the time of cooking is inevitably lengthened (and I have to keep my left eye on DS when my right eye is monitoring the cooking process), this superficial inconvenience is completely negligible considering the happy smile in his face when he is watching, smelling, tasting, touching and learning the properties of things in the kitchen (every one of them is interesting him)- the uncooked ingredients, the liquids, the utensils, etc.

Shortly he will also help his father prepare food.

DS stills eat only a little homemade porridge - perhaps more if he is very hungry. I don't mind that any more - I have become more aware of my own bodily cues, my gut feeling and my inner irrational messages (about what a child SHOULD BEHAVE), and of the need to keep breathing and manging my own intensity in a constructive way. I am still learning to improve myself (and to let go), and I hope that one day DS will learn how to live positively with his strong emotions too.

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