To want to completely change what my DC eat even when DH thinks I’m making a fuss?

When your children are in bed/can’t hear the conversation, you need to have a serious conversation with your DH about this. Tooth decay in such young children is awful as you know and their permanent teeth won’t last long either.

Even if your DH insists on buying crap, you needn’t. I’d go as far as throwing out any sweets/biscuits/crisps/fizzy drinks he brings into the house. Even if it takes you a while to sort breakfast and dinners - cutting out the snacks immediately will have a huge benefit. If your DH tries to sabotage you on this, I would strongly think of asking him to leave.

The other thing I would say is avoid making the table a battleground. Be neutral about what your children choose to eat or not eat, neither positive nor negative. I am very much opposed to the school of "you must eat this in order to eat that." It's one thing to encourage them to try everything, but I wouldn't negotiate or create a hierarchy of foods.

I work in social work and of course it's not neglect. Is it ideal as a diet, no but most of us aren't perfect parents. I think people need to be careful of using terms like "neglect". Neglect would not be feeding your kids, not taking them to the dentist, not washing them, emotional abuse, not meeting their basic needs. Yes their diet isn't the best but you sound like an overwhelmed mum with an unsupportive husband who recognises there is a problem and wants to change. Neglectful parents wouldn't care.

I think like most things there is always a middle ground. People on here seem fanatical about eggs being the solution to everything. But a lot of people including my kids and husband don't like them and I certainly in a rush in a morning have time with all the extra cooking and dishes have time to be cooking up scrambled eggs or porridge.

Cereal could be swapped for something like weetabix. You could add peanut butter to the toast or have Greek yoghurt and fruit with the cereal for something more substantial. Even white bread has fortified vitamins in it. Yes wholemeal is better but it's not the horror show people on here make it out to be Like others have said, small changes are the way to go.

When ours were little, Dh was working like 50 hour weeks getting our business started (albeit in the evenings from home doing admin) and I had a PT job with a a long London commute.

With two of you at home, there should be no excuse for not cooking healthy meals. Dh took the dc as soon as he walked in the door at 5 and I started on dinner. Your Dh is home all day. He can take over from 4pm every afternoon with the kids til bathtime and you do the cooking and any small household jobs like the washing or a few dishes.

Make nice simple food that provides lots of options: roast chicken, roast potatoes or oven baked chips (they are the same, just different shapes), peas, fruit for pudding. Make sure there is at least one thing everyone will eat. If they only eat mountains of peas, then they have mountains of peas for dinner. If they only eat potatoes, then they have lots of potatoes. No toast, no cereal before bed. Fruit after only if they eat a decent amount of dinner. Mine are now 8 & 13. Neither of them is allowed pudding if they both don’t eat. That’s still the rule even though one is a teen now. Trust me they eat dinner.

And persist. Rome wasn’t built in a day. This won’t just get easier in a month or two, but just keep going. If anything on pretty much no reliable income, with you on mat pay and your Dh unemployed, you need to be saving money not buying takeaways and convenience foods. So this is a great way to do it.

I wanted to add to the support on the thread that you're right to change things. I haven't read all of the replies, so apologies if I'm repeating things, but some suggestions-
a plate of cut up veg (carrots, cucumber etc) available as you are cooking dinner, if they want to snack before- they seem to magically disappear even if your kids say they don't like veg.
A mixture of familiar and new things on the plate, even if it seems like a strange combination,

Find some healthy treats the kids like, and treat them to them regularly

Another mum I know is also a SAHM (to be fair you have a newborn so that changes things) but her mornings are stressful, chaotic and she’s always nearly late. She can’t understand how my children are dressed with having had breakfast and out of the door for 7:45am but we’ve had to work on morning routines because they are really important to us as I don’t want to be late for work. Good routines now will pay off in the future.

It’s great you want to change but other posters are pointing out you need to see your role in this. Yes the dad sounds like he does very little but you’ve also allowed this to happen for at least the last 2 years, and now had another baby. It won’t be easy and your husband might not like getting his own way but two children with tooth decay at their age is the shock you need to change.

Some people on MN will never be satisfied until your children are eating a diet of raw spinach and tap water. 😅 I think it's great that you are open to making serious changes. But honestly, I also think that breakfast is the easiest meal to change. You can even make scrambled eggs in the microwave if you're short on time. With wholemeal toast, that makes a fine breakfast. Once your children know that chocolate cereal isn't an option anymore, they should (hopefully) be happy with the alternatives you provide. But I would avoid cajoling or making a big production out of the changes you're making. Just upbeat, relaxed, "Here's your breakfast, darling."

If your kids aren't used to having fruit and veg regularly, it may take time for them to warm to the idea. But just keep offering and let them see you enjoying a banana or a salad or whatever.

Your DH is an idiot, you are doing the right things. I don’t want to kick you when you are down but a 2 and 5 year old with tooth decay is absolutely awful and you are right to treat this as the wake up call it is. Rather than “it’s only baby teeth and doesn’t matter” it’s “hopefully we’ve got the chance to put this right”

Your husband sounds particularly useless to be honest, why was he sacked?

A total overhaul might be too much to tackle in one go.

You buy fruit, but its wasted? I find preparing it really helps. Faced with a whole boring pear isnt as appetising as a cut up (or cutted up ) one.

Proper Greek yoghurt with sliced strawberries is an excellent breakfast that takes as much effort as toast.

Maybe start with the fruit. And breakfast.

From small changes good habits are made!

Good luck, I think you've got this though!

“Children are supposed to have treats”
your husband is wrong here. A treat is a treat because it isn’t a daily thing. It’s a weekly thing for example.
your children are getting ultra processed and nutritionally empty foods with every meal and sometimes as the entire meal.
you are absolutely right that things need to change now. Early years is when a lifetime of good habits can be formed. Dental hygiene, eating whole foods as part of daily life.
you husband sounds so unsupportive. If he’s not working outside the home why is everything in the home left to you ?
if he’s getting junk food for himself as you say - he has to hide it now because as you’ve discovered then children then want it.
He should man up and parent his children with you, which means leading by example and supporting you. Cooking and eating healthy family meals together. Does he leave all the other workload and mental load to you too ?

I agree with a PP that your son is hungry because he isn't getting enough real nutrition in chocolate cereal and white toast. Porridge, scrambled eggs, etc. will fill him up and be much healthier.

In general, I don't like the idea of parents and children eating dinner separately. I think family meals are so important. However, if your husband insists on consistently choosing unhealthy options, it would make sense to feed the children first. He can have his beige buffet or takeaway burger later. Likewise keep his biscuits and crisps in high cupboards that the children can't reach and ask him not to eat these things in front of the kids.

Take a look at French school dinners for some ideas of healthy, straightforward options. It might seem strange to recommend school dinners, but in France they really have cracked it. The meal starts with a salad or veg dish of some sort, then a main course with protein and veg, a cheese course (it is France, after all 😀), and a dessert which may be fruit or yogurt or a something baked.

He’s hungry op because there is not enough nutritional value in toast or biscuit cereals. Nothing in those will keep him feeling hungry two minutes later. Eggs are the easiest. Eggs on toast so there is some familiarity.

people seem to go one of two ways if they are neglected as children as your husband was. The good ones want better for their own children, the others repeat.

re the tribunal. If his attitude to work is anything similar to his attitude to his own children - lazy, selfish and neglectful - then he might not get anywhere.

everyone knows junk food is bad. Everyone. So to feed it to your children as their only diet is neglect.

Your DH sounds absolutely ridiculous.
Does he not think if this carries on then the kids adult teeth will be exactly the same as their baby teeth? Fillings etc?

If hes not on board with you then I would find him very hard to be around. Being overweight as a child will probably mean a life time of eating/weight issues.

Your DH is completely negligent about your DC's health as evidenced by his attitude to their teeth. Your eldest DS will be getting adult teeth soon and, if he continues the same habits, will have the same decay and cavities. You can't force him to improve his diet but you can keep his bad choices out of sight (and reach) of your boys.

Maybe change little by little rather than all at once.

Easy things that are healthier and which usually appealed to my and visiting kids (with minimal thought and labour for me) included:

• (low sugar and salt) baked beans on toast (maybe try half and half or mildly seeded bread instead of just white) or baked beans on a baked potato. Baked potatoes are usually tastier after being cooked in the oven rather than just microwaved but they can take a while. An alternative is to peel a good size sweet potato (the orange ones - full of goodness and quite sweet which may appeal to the kids) pierce it all over and then give it 5- 10 mins on high in the microwave. You can mash it with butter for the tiny one. Sweet potatoes are also popular cut raw into chips and baked in the oven with a good dash of olive oil.

• Tuna fish mashed with a little mayo or guacamole or something maybe combined with sweetcorn, chopped cherry tomatoes, or spring onion or cucumber is good on toast or potato as above. Or tuna on top of partially toasted bread topped with cheddar and a squeeze of tomato purée or ketchup then finished in the grill or one minute in microwave to melt cheese.

• You can make ‘home made pizzas’ by using toasted pitta breads or muffins as a base then giving the kids a chance to make their own faces with toppings ( make your own tomato and hidden veggie sauce in advance) and have little bowls cherry tomatoes, olives etc for ‘eyes’ , cheese for hair, carrot strips, cucumber etc chopped to use.

• Fishfingers aren’t the worst thing if you choose decent ones. Make veggie faces on plate. See if the kids will try purple space discs (beetroot), bunny sticks ( carrots) etc etc

• Ive never met a non vegetarian child who didn’t love to graze on chicken and grapes …for some reason they like the taste combination.

• I had a non negotiable of fruit after meals even if it was just a couple of dried apricots. Remember that they need a good teeth brushing after dried fruit though.

• In the absence of allergies, it’s a good thing to get them eating nuts and seeds - when old enough to minimise choking risk. My son liked mixed seeds added to his yoghurt.

Hidden veggie tomato sauces are fab. As others have said, freeze a few and you’ll have a healthy sauce with pasta or whatever there is to hand.

Good luck.

The diet they have has become their normal and from what you have said it is your partner's normal too.

You can make changes now and see real benefits in your children's wellbeing.

Where is your 5 year old on the BMI percentile scale? My daughter started school with a BMI on the 91st percentile, which is borderline overweight. At the time she was just under the 50th percentile for weight but was only 1st-2nd percentile for height. She started school with her aged 2-3 clothes hanging off her. She was under paeds and dieticians due to allergies and reflux and as she was out growing clothes based on height and we could still see her ribs they weren't overly concerned. They didn't want to restrict her already restricted diet and she frequently wouldn't eat. The fact he is outgrowing his clothes by width not length I would see a red flag that something needs to change.

It doesn't necessarily take long to see the changes, since being in school my daughter has increased activities and decreased the food she is willing to eat and has dropped down to the 9th percentile for weight whilst moving up to the 4th for height. Her BMI now sits around 35th-50th. Before starting school she was driven to nursery and more casual activities. She now walks to and from school which is 1.5 miles round trip and up a steel hill on the way back, has football and swimming lessons once a week, goes to scouts (squirrels first now beavers) once a week and did cricket in the summer term in addition to PE twice a week and forest school every other week.

She also had a cavity at 3, she hadn't had any juice or sweets or chocolate at this age due to her health but did have out of control reflux. Her medications were all put up, she had fluoride treatment on her molars every 3 months and continued to be super super careful with her diet. The cavity didn't get any bigger and she was able to have a no dril okl filing to repair the cavity once the dentist was confident there was no active decay uin that tooth.

There is quite a lot to change in the diet and also mentality - it seems like there is a fear of them being hungry and that is meaning that sweet foods are coming in after healthy options. Are they really hungry or is it that their sweet craving hasn't been satisfied?

Firstly there diet has a lot of sugar in, I would keep a food diary and calculate how much is coming from sugar - include all the ketchup etc.

My daughter has squash if she is at a birthday party or a play date, that is it. We get fresh juice cartons and she has those if we go out for a picnic or on a Friday evening if my partner and I have a beer with dinner. The sugar of the fresh juice is worse for teeth but at the same time we find it much easier to ration as we only buy 2 or 3 at a time and it looks more a like our drinks as we will have a can of beer. We also try to stick to whole foods and avoid artificial sweeteners and favouring as it is harder to determine if the foods are safe for her to have given her allergies. Some of her allergens are outside of the top 14 and don't need to be labelled on ingredients and can be hidden in under "natural flavouring/colouring"

Reduce the number of biscuits so it's a treat during the week rather than part of normal diet. I would plate them up as part of a regular after school snack - slices of apple, segments of satsuma and a couple of water biscuits some days - other days a couple of biscuits - we tend to go for rich teas, bourbons or jammy dodgers. We only have one packet at a time and they don't get replaced.

Meals, I would try to get the eldest involved in making them as much as possible. If chips are a safe food for them to eat for the time being I would keep them but start serving them with healthier options - roast chicken and veg or a mince and sauce type thing.
I would look at frozen fruit and veg to reduce costs and food wastes

Cereal - we stick to the unsweetened version for the most part. We get a large box of Cheerios at Christmas and in the summer, once it's gone it's gone. She favours porridge which she now has with raisin and chopped dates in, similarly for Weetabix.

You do need to work on getting your partner on side, if it's how he's always eaten maybe he doesn't want a mirror reflected on him but part of parenting is finding a place of comfort when you have some of your less desirable characteristics reflected back at you from your children. Could you use it as a combined health and cost point of view?

I think it’s brilliant you’ve noticed that you’d like to change things and that you already know what you need to do.

You have good ideas as to what replacements you’d like to make. It’s so hard when you’ve got busy family life. It would be good to get DH involved….
Also maybe you could save the money from takeaways & then go out for dinner.

I think getting rid of the sugary breakfast stuff would be a quick easy win. If you could replace those with porridge weetabix eggs & fruit yoghurt. These will also set your kids up better for the day concentration/energy etc.
Also getting rid of squash & prioritise water & milk
If they do have juice or squash have it with meals only
If there is resistance to the food swaps then maybe tackle in phases breakfast drinks & snack swaps first.
Then introduce some meal changes each week.

My meal snack ideas…
Homous & raw veg can be good after school snack
Cutting up fruit worked best with mine & just putting down after dinner

Quick weekday meals
Jacket potatoes with beans/cheese/tuna & raw veg on the side
Pizza pitta - toast wholemeal pitta bread tomato puree then get kids to do toppings & pop in oven for 10 mins or so. Could also use wraps as a base. Add veg to every meal

As others say whatever you can batch cook - mince use to make cottage pie, lasagne or just bolognese sauce.
Soup - mine weren’t keen but my friend gave his son veg soup before most meals !
Pasta - tomato sauces add veg & chicken or mince /sausages
Wraps
Good quality sausages with mash & veg
omeletes if they’ll eat them (mine wouldn’t!)
cutting down on crisps & chocolate biscuits but don’t eliminate completely
homemade chips - cut into chip shape & roast with a little oil.
try sweet potato with fish fingers (best quality you can) with veg
Desserts - could be baked fruit like apples or tinned fruit with custard

Maybe you could do some homemade popcorn or bake cookies /cup cakes/muffins with the kids on a weekend/friday. Maybe DH could do this? ??

Homemade pizza dough could be a nice tradition for the weekend

If you can involve them in making meals /snacks they might enjoy that?
also I found finger foods quite good with something to dip - strawberries in chocolate veg & humous etc

You will absolutely be doing your kids a favour by making these food swaps.

I would also stick your guns about only offering fruit & yogurt or something else healthy but simple if they don’t like your main meal. Save yourself the pain later on of doing something different for each child.

Good luck & I really hope you can get your DH on board.

I wouldn't buy any sweets or biscuits or sugary cereals. You already know it, but they're so young to already have tooth decay. Don't buy any juice or pizza, if this stuff isn't in the house it's easier to resist.
Think of healthy or even just on the healthier side meals they like and serve that more regularly, at such young ages you should be able to get some hidden vegetables in. Get them involved in preparing healthy snacks and meals, chopping fruit for a colourful fruit salad, chopping veg to go in a soup or sauce, baking savoury muffins.
It's unfortunate your DH is off work because he's probably the biggest obstacle with his negativity. If he was out of the way you could easily get children of that age on board with making healthy eating fun.

Unfortunately you’ve had children with an idiot… has he always been this immature when it comes to his diet and his lack of knowledge around healthy eating and nutrition?

Well done realising there’s an issue, your children’s diet does sound like it needs a lot of improving. Start by removing squash, but you could offer water that’s been infused with strawberries/lemon. If they don’t want to eat the food you’ve provided that’s fine, it’s their choice. But don’t offer anything else, they need to feel hunger- it’s really important. Raw carrots make a great snack, if they’re having fruit then they need nuts alongside- peanut butter with apple for example?

But you’re fighting a losing battle with your husband, without him on board, you’re incredibly limited what you can do. Can he come to a dentist appointment or take the kids himself to hear it from a professional?

my god i despair at this fucking awful men.

You might not want to think it op, but your husband is going to ruin your children.

You are obviously a caring mum who wants the best for your children and have recognised their diet isnt optimal.
Wanting to improve the nutritional value and health benefits in their diet is a good thing.
Start with a few changes eg: swap the sugary cereal,biscuits and crisps for healthier options (so many options around look at NHS healthier families and their app with a food scanner)
Its a great opportunity for your DH to learn to cook atm as he has time

And don’t say you aren’t a sporty family. You and your husband might not be but doesn’t mean your children can’t be.

ive noticed on Mumsnet you hear about these men who don’t work but spend like they do!

As I say to my children, and this is what you need to say to him, we’d all love to eat pizza and chips all day but it’s not healthy and takeaways are expensive. You need to get on the same page.