Staying at the dinner table until everyone has finished

[ForkingKnivesAndSpoons]

For normal everyday family dinners at your house, does everyone just leave the table once they've finished? And I'm not talking about expecting others to wait for extra slow eaters, I mean when the "slow" person (me) takes a total of 10-15 mins to eat their dinner?

YABU - Yes it's normal for the slowest eater to be left sitting alone at the table
YANBU - It's rude to up and leave them there alone

Don't invite me to dinner if you don't wanna be social.
I also don't like people watching me eat or commenting on what I have or haven't eaten/ left.
Please talk amongst yourselves while I'm still eating!

We stay, much to the (understandable) frustrations of my 7yo.

If my 5yo sees her sister go off to play she won't eat any more as she gets massive fomo. She's underweight and it's important that she eats.

I think it's really rude to just get up and leave when you're finished but dh does it fairly often. Technically we have an 'ask to get down' rule and I generally only say yes if someone is obviously miles behind. Dh is constantly hurrying the kids too because he doesn't want to wait for them but he is an incredibly fast eater! I know I'm on the slow side of normal but when, out of 5 of us, he's 15 minutes ahead I think he should realise he's the anomaly and slow the fuck down instead of hurrying us all up.

Just let them go when they want. They spend too much time at school and hardly anytime at home as it is.

I can't enjoy my dinner if I feel I'm being hurried.
End up just leaving it.

I was always very strict about table manners when we ate at the table. I think it's a useful life lesson to learn-once learned never forgotten. And there are times when it's important to know.

My daughter is the slowest eater in the house (she takes a good 20 minutes after the last person before her has finished eating), her twin brother is the fastest. It would be nice if we all stayed at the dinner table until everyone has finished, as I think it's respectful and nice family time, but I don't think it's terribly realistic right now.

My son always asks very politely if he can leave and tells the person who has cooked the meal how much he enjoyed it, so I really don't mind him leaving the table since he's so nice about it.

DH and I will stay at the table until our daughter has finished because we don't want her to eat alone. I will sometimes do some clearing and get dessert ready if she's taking an exceptionally long time, but we have an open plan kitchen/diner, so still am there to chat to them both. Son then joins us again for dessert.

What has going to school hot to do with leaving the table before anyone ese has finished?

My MIL is horrendous for this. Then the rest of them wander off and leave me sitting alone. I hate it. I'm not slow eater, but we have the youngest kids and always seem to get served last so I'm having to sort out toddler DS2 while everyone else is stuffing. It really bugs me

Everyone stays at the table until we’ve all finished. Unless they have a reason to go and ask to do so.

I don’t really mind DS getting up and fidgeting because he has ADHD and it’s hard for him to just sit still. But he ask to ask if he wants to go away completely.

What drives me absolutely bonkers is what exh did (and no doubt still does!) - getting up and going looking for puddings before everyone has finished!

When we were together at one stage, if I had cooked I used to not put knives and forks on the table until the last thing that hit the table (ie when I was ready to sit down) to stop him hoovering up everything on the table before I’d even got to start eating, and be up looking for pudding!

No, me neither.

Hurrying children to finish their dinner is awful. Teaching them horrible habits for life too.

Basically is the slow eater in high regard in the situation. If they are, I stay. Well, that makes the link, between respecting your fellow diners and leaving them before they’ve finished eating, very explicit!

Ugh ,an ex if mine used to fucking take stuff from the trays as it was coming out of the oven!!

I'd expect anyone age 5+ to manage enough table manners to remain at the table until everyone has finished and ask to get down from the table.

Mine are also expected to clear the table.

As kids we had to ask to leave the table. Can we get down please.

Thank you for that, I appreciate the reinforcement that I’m not doing anything wrong. My child isn’t 2 yet but I really felt the judgement in that moment and in honesty it did get my back up so I was quite sharp in my reply, which backs up what you’ve said. My reply was that I was forced to sit at a table and forced to eat the food given to me as a child and it evidently backfired. I will not do that to my child, but he’ll certainly learn manners as he ages.

My daughter takes approximately three days to eat a sandwich so we just crack on 😂

Nothing better than taking an hour to eat a huge sandwich/ baguette 😎

I'm the slow eater and when my dds & dh have finished eating I say to them they can go if they want to. My eldest dd will always stay with me until I have finished eating, even though I am quite happy eating alone. I feel less pressure from it.

My kids take ages to eat and happy for them to get down when finished. We have enough battles and issues around food (autism and sensory related) that I am not adding another thing. Equally sometimes DP and then watch an episode of something together over dinner about their shared interest and I am not that interested so I get up and either clean up or go read my book. I love the idea of dinner being a quality time together but in practice it doesn't work for us so I focus on quality time and connection at other times.

I’m often the last to finish eating and would rather people didn’t wait for me! Will have been chatting throughout the meal so doesn’t feel antisocial to tell people they don’t need to wait for me.