Child deliberately not eating enough to stay up later

[Helpmetosleepplease]

DD is 6, she hates going to bed and will do everything to get out of it. I’ve learnt to ignore her and put her to bed, she does eventually sleep.

She’s now realised if she doesn’t eat enough at 5pm she’s too hungry to sleep. I’ve tried ignoring it but she wakes up 2, 3, 4 times in the night screaming she’s hungry which means I get even less sleep.

So she’s now having a substantial snack at 7pm (bed time is 7.30pm – snack has to be toast or a crumpet and a piece of fruit and sometimes she’s still hungry and wants a bowl of cereal (dry)) but she’s then too hyped up to sleep so ends up playing (with no toys just her own voice) until 9 or 10pm at night.

I can’t sleep until she goes to sleep (anxiety related) so that’s meaning I’m not getting enough sleep.

Earlier bedtime doesn’t help, not giving the snack means she wakes up, giving a smaller snack means she still hasn’t eaten enough so wakes up in the night, just milk doesn’t help because she doesn’t really like it so will take a few sips and then say she doesn’t want anymore, she also doesn’t like water or squash – she’d live off fruit juice if allowed but the dentist has said it’s really bad for her.

I suspect she has ASD although no-one agrees so I’m struggling to get anyone to get a diagnosis for her. She is diagnosed with Hypermobility and has an eye problem as well.

Any suggestions? I can’t go on like this. I need to sleep.

put her meal out, what she doesnt eat at 5 pm, then when she goes to bed and wakes hungry, she only gets offered the rest of the meal she didnt eat.

Don't do this.

Any dietician will tell you that this is bad advice and will only result in creating issues around food.

Her body is crying out for fluids not food it's no wonder she is waking up the food isn't the issue its the drinking

@GoGoGretaDoll

Thanks for taking the time to type that out.

I think that most adults really overestimate how much food is in a school lunch - it's great that she's eating it all up, but it probably isn't as much food as you think it is. Or to put the same thing another way, it's maybe not quite as much food as this particular child needs.

There's lots of carbs in her diet (which is good!) but not a lot of fat or protein, which is what fills you up. So could you look at something like cheese cubes or even cream cheese/humus to dip with her breadsticks in the afternoon, rather than more fruit.

Could a fruit juice be turned into a smoothie with whole milk to get more calories in there?

There's a thing called laddering that you can do with food where basically you take one accepted food and 'ladder' up from there. So my DS likes fish fingers in breadcrumbs with ketchup, which meant he started accepting homemade salmon with breadcrumbs and ketchup, which then led to him accepting just plain salmon. So it's about thinking of a favourite food and working out from there to hopefully land on foods that will fill her up more.

I think I would maybe try snack at 2, snack at 4, tea at 6 and maybe make that more plentiful?

The key thing with food though is to not make it into a battle which I know is easier said than done. It actually doesn't matter if she's doing it deliberately or not - you have to be totally easy breezy chill about it. I think in this case that also means letting go of some of your bedtime anxiety too. If she's up till 9, she's up till 9. It's not ideal, but it's better than making bedtime and dinner time a battle.

Also teach her to make her own toast! That way she's in control. Just another way of de-escalating.

She won't touch any kind of milk, she spits it out, we've tried smoothies, milkshakes etc and she spits them out.

She doesn't like cheese or hummus. Hummus is too much like a liquid and she won't even put cheese in her mouth, she pushes the plate away in disgust. It's so hard with her because if there's a food on her plate she doesn't like or eat she won't eat the rest of the meal even she likes it.

She's not a big lover of meat either, I can occasionally get her to eat chicken but she doesn't like sausages or any kind of beef, she wouldnt even try the turkey yesterday even though I told her it was chicken, she refused.

I'd do a more substantial evening g meal - so snack when she gets in from school and main meal at about 6 to 6.30

I wouldn't assume a school lunch to be her main meal of the day. For one thing you don't know how much kf it she actually eats. Plus she's growing so needing a decent meal in the evening is notusual

I say cheese she'll eat cheese sauce but not cheese cubes and even cheese sauce is hit and miss sometimes she won't eat that and it has to be a plain white sauce.

Is she getting enough veggies/protein?

4.30-5pm is quite early for dinner. I feed my 4yo between 6-7 for an 8pm bedtime.

Also, no personal experience yet but aren't school lunch portions meant to be quite small? I wouldn't rely on nursery lunch for my DC's main meal of the day - their 6pm dinner is usually something like chilli with rice and veggies, cheesy pasta bake, fish and potatoes, fish and chips or roast dinner.

@Theunamedcat

Her body is crying out for fluids not food it's no wonder she is waking up the food isn't the issue its the drinking

I think so too @Theunamedcat but she won't try any kind of fluid apart from fruit juice

That is a lot of bananas and a lot of fruit in general. The diet is really lacking in vegetables, fats and protein. In your example day the only protein is the eggs and a tiny bit from the milk/cheese in the macaroni.

Fats and protein help keep you feeling full for longer.

Push bedtime back to 20:00 or 20:30 gradually, give it a bit of time and I bet that wake up will become more like 6 instead of 5. Maybe make a bit of a deal of it: ‘now she’s a big girl she can stay up half an hour later’, might just help with bedtime battles. Give her a small snack at 16:30 and then big meal at more like 18:30. If she’s still hungry just before bed, you could offer her something small literally just before teeth brushing. That way, you are squeezing an extra snack in, while making her hopefully more hungry for her tea and addressing your wake up time.

Can you very gradually dilute the juice with water?

Looking at her diet, I would probably want to add more protein and fat to fill her up and give her the nutrients her body needs. Things like full fat yoghurt, cheese, peanut butter, avocados, but really at this stage anything she will happily eat. I would also serve the evening meal much later - 6pm or even 6.30.

Definitely a later supper. I would feed 6-9 year old children at 5.30-6 pm and still put them to bed about 7.30.

How is her weight? Could you leave non-sugary snacks in her bedroom so she can have herself a little midnight feast if she wakes up hungry? Not ideal but if you really need your sleep it could work...

What about foods with a high water/liquid content? Ice lollies, cucumber, melon, jelly, grapes, blueberries, milkshakes, oranges, etc. All are a way to get extra fluids into her.

Also agree with PPs. Really difficult with fussy kids but more protein and water would be better.

I'd stick to your usual routine, since you say it works most of the time, but when she says she has enough, leave it on the side and when she says she's hungry later tell her she can eat what's left! If it is deliberate she'll soon get bored of cold soup!

@Helpmetosleepplease how does she know that is hunger if she hasn't been told? I've gone to sleep absolutely starving on several occasions over the last couple of months because I haven't been able to eat. It has never woken me up in the middle of the night, let alone repeatedly.
And yes you're probably right, she is thirsty, and that can be mistaken as hunger, but if you keep letting her eat all the time and not getting her to drink, that isn't helping, and you know that. Will she have milk with something mixed in? Hot chocolate, banana smoothie? At least then she's getting protein as well as liquid.

when she says she has enough, leave it on the side and when she says she's hungry later tell her she can eat what's left! If it is deliberate she'll soon get bored of cold soup!

Again this is horrible advice, please don't do this unless you want to store up issues around food.

@TheOccupier

Definitely a later supper. I would feed 6-9 year old children at 5.30-6 pm and still put them to bed about 7.30.

How is her weight? Could you leave non-sugary snacks in her bedroom so she can have herself a little midnight feast if she wakes up hungry? Not ideal but if you really need your sleep it could work...

She's not underweight, but she's tiny in terms of size. She's smaller than most of the Reception children at school and still in age 3-4 clothes. I was told that was the hypermobility though.

[quote delilahbucket]@Helpmetosleepplease how does she know that is hunger if she hasn't been told? I've gone to sleep absolutely starving on several occasions over the last couple of months because I haven't been able to eat. It has never woken me up in the middle of the night, let alone repeatedly.
And yes you're probably right, she is thirsty, and that can be mistaken as hunger, but if you keep letting her eat all the time and not getting her to drink, that isn't helping, and you know that. Will she have milk with something mixed in? Hot chocolate, banana smoothie? At least then she's getting protein as well as liquid.[/quote]
She won't drink hot chocolate, she doesn't really like normal chocolate. And won't try smoothies or anything, if she does she spits them out.

She loves bananas so I have been letting her have as many of those as she wants.

I’d totally disagree with hyper mobility having anything to do with size. (Peers at 6 feet 3 teenager...)

OP she really does sound neurodiverse, in which case all the “they’ll eat/drink eventually”, “give them the same meal back” stuff won’t work. My child would starve before they ate something they felt anxious about or that was the wrong texture - I don’t mean for a few hours, I mean for days and days. They would drink absolutely nothing if water was not available (we are incredibly lucky that water is what they have landed on as their only liquid). Part of the sensory issues from their ASD is they don’t feel thirst the way a typical person might, their whole sense of how their body feels is out of kilter.

As part of her assessments etc have you ever asked for a referral to a dietician?

@Hospedia how is it bad advice?? My mum and every one of my friends parents did this growing up! We had the choice to eat or not but we weren't rewarded with something better if we refused our tea!

Snack at teatime, main evening meal with you later on say 6.30.
I wouldn't rely on school meals to be the main meal of the day.

Why don't you let her have more fruit juice? Water it down as much as you can get away with & go for no added sugar. I know it's not ideal but it really does sound like she's thirsty and it would overcome that issue.

It is hard Op, so don't beat yourself up & whilst it doesn't sound like her diet is great, it's not the worst either so that's good.

I agree with the others - don't make food or bedtimes a battle.

Tough it out? I can’t imagine if she eats well at breakfast and lunch she can really be “ starving “ by 7.30 pm