What’s food and what isn’t

Vinu was picking at his food in disdain. Why had his mother served him so much rice? And that too with fish curry! His mom knew he hated fish. He couldn’t eat the whole thing, even though he had come back famished from his game of neighborhood cricket. His mother, however, was feeling bad-tempered as usual. “Finish your lunch soon, Vinu!” she shouted from the kitchen. “Jayanti will be here any minute!”

Pica is an eating disorder that involves eating items that are not generally thought of as food and that do not contain significant nutritional value. It is seen in both children and adults. The medical term comes from Latin for magpie (Pica pica), a bird that compulsively gathers objects to satisfy its curiosity. Those affected develop an appetite for items such as ice (pagophagia); hair (trichophagia); paper (xylophagia); drywall or paint; metal (metallophagia); stones (lithophagia) or soil (geophagia); glass (hyalophagia); or feces (coprophagia); and chalk.

For these actions to be considered Pica, they must persist for more than one month, at an age where eating such objects is considered developmentally inappropriate.Although it is a compulsive behavior, most adults with Pica do not have a psychological disorder. Pica is usually a manifestation of an underlying medical condition, most often iron deficiency anemia, and in the case of children, malnutrition. It is also observed in pregnant women, and those with developmental disabilities.

Once a pica is identified, information on the patient’s diet and stress factors must be obtained. When treatment for iron deficiency is begun, the pica resolves rapidly, often within days. In fact, the patient develops an aversion to or disgust with the object craved previously. However, if left untreated, it can be dangerous. For example, children eating painted plaster containing lead may suffer brain damage from lead poisoning.

Pica is observed in animals as well, including rats, cats, chickens, birds and cattle. When cats are introduced into new homes, they may undergo stress and may eat wool, cotton, rubber, plastic and even cardboard. Cattle eat bones when they have a phosphorus deficiency. Chickens peck at wood or wire on fences or the feathers of other birds when they are feed-deprived. Amazon macaws lick clay from riverbeds in the Amazon, for 2-3 hours a day, to detoxify the seeds they eat.

Vinu could hear her loudly grumbling away about the amount of work she had to finish. Vinu often wondered what all the fuss was about; they were quite well-off, and his mother was a homemaker; plus she had servants to do everything for her. At the moment, she was busy supervising as the cook made Gajar ka Halwa for Jayanti Aunty, his mother’s sister.

He spotted his pet cat, Twinky, dawdle into the dining room. He quietly emptied the remaining rice and fish curry on his plate onto a dirty scrap of paper, and put it down for the cat. “Here, Kitty kitty”, he called. “Come and have this.” As soon as he caught Twinky’s attention, he sidled out of the side door into the garden, where he set down the food. Twinky sniffed at it this way and that, and proceeded to eat it.

That was when Vinu noticed their house-help, Sarvamma washing vessels in the washing-area. “Sarvamma, don’t tell Mummy, okay?” he told her, in a half-worried, half –pleading voice. But he needn’t have worried, for Sarvamma was always cheerful, adjusting and covered up for little Vinu’s mischief from time to time, having looked after him from the time he was a baby. “Don’t worry Vinu Baba, I will take care of it. I won’t tell your mother.

” Vinu smiled and went and sat beside her, and chatted cheerfully with her about school, his friends, his mother, and the neighbours, confident that his mother was too busy to spot him sitting with the maid. If she did, he would get a good spanking for sure. Sarvamma patiently listened and laughed at Vinu’s talk, and added a few witticisms of her own, all the while doing her work too.

Sarvamma’s son, Gopu, a child of four, came tottering up to them, crying. Vinu had always wanted to play with Gopu, but his mother had strictly warned him against it. He would have picked up Gopu in his arms even then, but he was scared of his mother’s reaction. However, Sarvamma got up and picked up Gopu, and placed him in her lap, consoling him, while she continued her work.

“Why is he crying?” asked Vinu curiously. “He is hungry, Vinu Baba”, Sarvamma replied. “I can’t feed him until I finish my work.”

“Why must you wait till then? Shouldn’t you feed him first?” asked Vinu in dismay. “Hush, Vinu Baba, if your mother hears you, she will scold me”, said Sarvamma. “I cannot take such liberties. I am only a maid, and I must finish my work first. It’s my duty and your mother’s right.”

Vinu was indignant. How could a small child like Gopu stay hungry? He hadn’t forgotten how hungry he had felt just an hour ago when he had finished his game. He had almost run home to have his meal. “Well, if you can’t get him food, I will get it for him”, said Vinu, and went to the kitchen, before Sarvamma could stop him.

“Mummy, please serve lunch on a plate and give it to me. Little Gopu is crying because he is hungry”, said Vinu to his mother.

Vinu’s mother looked at him in amazement. Then her shock turned to annoyance, and her annoyance to anger. “How dare you speak to me like that!” she shouted, startling the cook and Vinu in equal measure. “I am not her maid, that she can order food for her child!” she fumed. “After she finishes her work, she can come and get it herself. How dare she send you to get it!”

“But she didn’t send me, I came on my own”, Vinu almost cried. Sarvamma, however, hearing the commotion, arrived on the scene and begged Vinu’s mother for mercy. At last his mother cooled down, heaped some food onto a plate, and shoved it towards Sarvamma. “Here, for you and your child!” she said haughtily. “Don’t come crying to me again!”

Vinu was shocked to see the amount of food on Sarvamma’s plate. It was just half of what he had been served, and it was supposed to be for both her and her son! As soon as his mother was out of earshot, he asked Sarvamma if he could bring her more rice. “Oh no, Vinu Baba, you’ll get me into trouble”, she said, her eyes wide with fear. “We will manage. This is more than enough for us.”

Vinu hung around, watching Sarvamma feed her child. “Oh no! I didn’t check if Twinky finished eating that rice!” he remembered suddenly. “Better clean up after her, or Mummy will give me a good scolding again.”

He found that Twinky had hardly eaten the food, and had instead made a mess of the rice and curry on the ground. Twinky sat contentedly in a corner, chewing on a piece of cardboard. “I give you good food, and all you want to eat is cardboard”, he rebuked Twinky, in as harsh a voice as he could muster.

“If Mummy finds out, you won’t stay very long in your new home.” His mother hated the cat, and protested strongly against it whenever she got a chance. He quickly cleaned up as best as he could, and returned to find Gopu sitting in the garden, playing in the dirt. “Don’t play in the dirt, Gopu”, Vinu called. Gopu turned to him, smiled, and proceeded to eat a handful of mud.

Sarvamma wasn’t anywhere around. Vinu quickly knocked the dirt out of Gopu’s hands. “Bad Gopu”, he said. “You just had food, why are you eating dirt? Come with me, I will teach you how to draw.”

Gopu followed Vinu obediently inside, and took the slate and chalk that Vinu handed to him. But no sooner had Vinu turned his back on Gopu when he began sucking on the chalk! “No Gopu, you mustn’t— ”

But before Vinu could take it from him, his aunt Jayanti walked into the room, along with his mother. “Doctor Aunty!” he cried and went and hugged her. Jayanti was a doctor, and Vinu’s favourite aunt. The happy moment was interrupted by his mother’s scream. “Vinu! What is Gopu doing in your room? I told you so many times not to play with him—”
“What’s wrong if he plays, Didi?” enquired Jayanti.

“Well, just look— such a dirty child— and eating chalk—”, Vinu’s mother turned away, disgusted. “Worse than that cat we have!”

“If Gopu is eating chalk, it’s because he isn’t getting good food”, remarked Jayanti. “Is that so?”“How should I know?” grumbled her sister. “He’s the servant’s child.”

“Mummy doesn’t give them enough food, Aunty!” piped up Vinu. “Gopu is always hungry.”Jayanti glared at her sister. “When you’re so rich, can’t you spare enough for those who toil day in and day out for you?”“Eating non-edible items that provide no nutrition, like chalk and dirt, is an eating disorder called Pica, which is caused by iron deficiency and malnutrition”, she continued. “No doubt Gopu’s not getting nutritious food.”

“The cat eats cardboard”, Vinu chimed in. “Well, that’s Pica too, because it’s seen in animals as well. But your cat’s doing it because she’s stressed out about her new surroundings”, explained Jayanti. “I hope you take better care of your employees from now on, Didi.”

Sneha Verghese is a research scholar in Journalism at Osmania University, Hyderabad. Also a post-graduate in biotechnology, she loves teaching and writing stories for kids to explain scientific concepts