Not your garden-variety dysfunction

“Weeds,” Showtime, 10 p.m. Mondays

The premise

NANCY BOTWIN (Mary-Louise Parker) is struggling to bring up her two sons and maintain the same lifestyle in the wake of her husband’s sudden death. She secretly becomes a local pot dealer. Meanwhile, her family’s life deteriorates. While Nancy is on a romantic tryst, her older son, 16-year-old Silas (Hunter Parrish), has his girlfriend stay over, and 10-year-old brother Shane (Alexander Gould) observes them having sex. Nancy’s pot supplier Heylia (Tonye Patano), mother to a large brood of her own, suggests that family dinners are the “superglue” that holds families together, and that studies have shown children do better in the long term, with higher test scores and less depression, when families eat together regularly.

The medical questions

WHAT is the effect of parental secrecy and absence on children? How traumatic, for a 10-year-old, is viewing a sibling having sex? Is it true that family meals are a positive factor in terms of psychological outcome?

The reality

“IT’S terrible to wake up in the middle of the night and not know where your mom is,” says Irene Goldenberg, family therapist and professor emeritus of psychiatry at UCLA. In her opinion, a bigger problem than the fact that Nancy isn’t home much is that she is lying to her kids about her actions and whereabouts.

Goldenberg also believes that it is traumatic for a preteen to observe an older sibling having sex -- worse than if he’d walked in on his parents, because on some level he expects his parents to be doing that, whereas the actions of his brother are against the rules. In addition, Shane is learning that “there may not be a responsibility that goes with sex. He is more likely to take risks and experiment as a result.”

There is truth to the statement that family dinners matter, says Dr. Harold S. Koplewicz, director of the New York University Child Study Center.

For example, Harvard University researchers have reported that family dinners are a crucial factor in fostering healthy child development, and a study from the University of Illinois found that children ages 7 to 11 who did well on achievement tests had spent a large amount of time at family meals. Focus groups conducted by a network of nutrition professionals in Washington state have reported improved communications and better relationships among families who dine together.

Koplewicz believes that parents and kids are far too busy with their own separate lives these days.

“We as a society have forgotten that there’s tremendous importance of regular, relaxed meals to make sure we can connect with our kids. Kids need a protected time where they have access to a caring adult.”

And, indeed, surveys show that teens want to spend more time with their parents, who are still the most influential factors in their lives.

Unfortunately, the kind of role model you can be is much diminished if you are living a lie and are almost never available, as is Nancy Botwin of “Weeds.”

Dr. Marc Siegel is an internist and an associate professor of medicine at New York University’s School of Medicine. He is also the author of “False Alarm: The Truth About the Epidemic of Fear.” In The Unreal World, he explains the medical facts behind the media fiction.