Neighbour keeps feeding my child - WWYD?

[AwayWeb]

Bit of a weird one and I’m probably overthinking it but would appreciate outside views.

Our 6yo daughter often plays with the neighbour’s grandson - their garden backs onto ours and they go between the two. It’s all very casual. They’re similar ages and get on well, so I don’t mind the time they spend together.

The neighbour is the boy’s grandmother (his mum drops him off there most days after school) and while she seems nice, I don’t actually know her well. We wave, chat briefly over the fence, but we’ve never had a proper conversation or anything.

What’s bothering me is that nearly every time DD comes back from playing, she’s eaten a whole meal over there. Not just a snack - an actual meal. Things like sausage rolls, fish fingers, chips, even dessert. She came back yesterday saying she had trifle. TRIFLE. She’s 6. She doesn’t even know what trifle is at home.

We’re vegan as a family and although we’ve never made a big deal out of it, I think they know. DD has mentioned it and I’ve said things like “oh she won’t eat that, we don’t do meat”. But they clearly feed her meat anyway. I don’t want to be the overbearing food mum but I feel a bit… undermined?

DH says it’s harmless and to let it go. He thinks I’m being precious and that a few fish fingers won’t kill her. Which, fair. But I just feel a bit odd about it all. I never gave permission for them to feed her, and it’s happening regularly now. It feels like they’re doing us a favour we didn’t ask for, and I can’t tell if I’m being rude by not saying thank you or being walked over by not saying stop.

Would it be completely out of order to ask them not to feed her anymore? Or at least ask what they’re giving her? I’m not trying to start neighbour wars but it’s making me a bit anxious now.

WWYD?

You let them supervise your child but complain about what they feed her?

Either look after your own child properly or accept that you can’t control what she’s being fed. Children that age are curious and if she’s at a friend’s house and they’re eating food that’s new and interesting to her then of course she’s going to want to try it!

I personally think it's rude of you to be letting your child be at someone else's house every tea time! There's no way I could feed my children and not any other child that was there.

@AwayWeb Yes agree with you @SkintSingleMumm
So much food shaming nowadays, what's wrong with a few sausage rolls!? Or trifle!

I remember one of my DS's best friends had a mum who was very health conscious, kid was never allowed ice cream only mango sorbets (which I love btw). When he came over to us he would gobble up the vanilla ice cream and other treats.

Lovely boy though he did end up doing drugs in the end. Although mum was very strict on the food, she was very lax in terms of his whereabouts. Not saying one thing leads to another, of course, but I do think people nowadays spend far too much time worrying about food. It's an illness almost. As long as largely balanced, it's not an issue eating some UPFs or not have a 'five a day' day.

And I would never NOT feed a kid who is visiting if we're having a meal. I remember once I had to sit in the living room while my best friend's family had dinner and I felt so, so lonely and rejected - still remember it to this day (this was 50 years ago!).

Btw, I don't agree with strictly vegan for that age range especially girls. Do look into the science, it's v hard to get enough B12 etc through a vegan diet and a deficiency could be really harmful.

You ‘think they know’ you are Vegan as a family. Well, they either do or not. If they do they’re deliberately going against you, if they don’t then they don’t.

DH says it’s harmless; is he a committed Vegan or not ?

Vegan or not – feeding another family’s child a full meal without checking with parents is……different.

Please don’t have the conversation with your daughter about saying ‘No’. Don’t put it on her. You go and have the conversation next door and say you are Vegan and much as you appreciate their generosity and kindness would they please send her home before her friend has his meal. How difficult is that ?

Yes, invite him to join in with your daughter for a meal sometimes. He might go back and ask for different meals; or not !

I’m sure you can do Vegan Trifle. 😉

I was going to say the exact same thing. Would worry me you don’t know them but she is there long enough to eat a full meal.

Boundaries! Tell dd playing in gardens only and she has to politely decline food. It's always a warning sign to listen to when normal social boundaries are being ignored. Just tell the grandma you've told her to politely say no to food as she is spoiling her tea and you prefer they play outside. You're the parent and you need to protect her. Any further issues you stop her going over.

My grandma (in her 80s and a great cook, if old school!) often has a home made trifle for us when we go round for tea. My 3 year old devours her portion. Am I very unusual in being ok with this?!

Trifle 🤢 🤮 🤢

This! I too am used to safe guarding and the idea that your 6 year old is spending unsupervised time in the home of people you don’t seem to really know would be much more of a concern for me than trifle! And yes before anyone asks would say the same about school play dates etc Be aware of leaving v young children unsupervised with adults you don’t really know.

Ok, so as a mum of twins with a fairly big garden, containing a tree house, swings, a slide, paddling pool (in the summer) and a dog.
I often had more than two kids in the garden, in fact on most weekends and during the school holiday it could be anything between 4 and 15 kids, mostly boys.
I feed and watered them all, sometimes I cooked for them, sometimes it was sandwiches, cake, biscuits etc….
I never once had a mother complain or be upset about it, even when later I found out one was supposed to be vegan.
I even had a mother come tell me their child didn’t eat eggs at her house, what I was doing with the eggs that made mine taste good!.
Unless, your child has an allergy, I wouldn’t worry too much about it, even if it’s not actually seen as healthy food, your child is probably running it off, getting exercise and enjoying the company of another child.
It just happens to also be a child’s grandmother, who we all know ( those of us that have or had grandma’s) think kids always need feeding up, to make them big and strong!.

Exactly! 😂 I cant get my head around it… TRIFLE!! Will somebody please think of the children!! 😂😂

of course not! Im more confused that people don’t usually have trifles in their fridges for tea/pudding etc,

The people who say they would always feed a child who was there at mealtimes - surely if the child was 6 years old you'd check with their parents first? A 6 year old can't be relied upon to tell you of any food allergies or intolerance or medical issues they might have with food. Food isn't a benign thing, it can literally kill people if you get it wrong.

And it’s not just trifle. Sausage rolls. Sausage ROLLS. Literally the food of the devil. Next stop is literally crack cocaine.

The devils work!!

Is it me or .....why is a 6yr old in a house being looked after by another adult that you don't even know well enough to feel comfortable enough to have a conversation regarding food with ?????
You can't converse regarding food/meals but it's absolutely fine that your SIX year old is there long enough and often enough for them to be fed and the amount of times they've been fed to become an issue ......
I can't get over the fact you can't talk about meals or food preferences but are comfortable enough to just leave your SIX year old in a strangers house .....come on !!!!

Food is the last thing I would worry about in this scenario. Your tiny girl is spending a significant amount of time with people you consider strangers! Look after her!

This post shocks me for several reasons.

the OP has no right to decide her children are vegan - all the nutrients they are missing out on while they are growing...my sister is vegetarian but doesn't impose her beliefs on her 2 growing children because they are her beliefs not her children's.

Then the second issue...SAFEGUARDING! how is the OP regularly letting her 6 year old child into the house of someone she doesn't know, without knowing exactly who is in there and what her DD may be being exposed to for considerable periods of time - there is a lot more than trifle to be afraid of here and I'm astonished that she is so blasé about her child's safety. This is truly bewildering to me and is the real problem here.

Then there is the whole CF aspect of her taking advantage of someone's Nan as free childcare for seemingly hours without recirprocating. The OP is not a serious person and I feel she needs to reconsider some of here life choices.

They shouldn’t really have fed her anything without knowing yourselves or her very well, what if she’d had a life threatening allergy..

My Ds went to a 10th birthday party sleepover with a friend I did know through his football team and a mum I also knew a bit anx had chatted to a fair amount. She let them all stay up all night playing Call of Duty in his bedroom on a giant TV (it was his dad's game). I wasn't pleased but he's 17 now and no harm came of it. Anything can happen really if you let your kids play unsupervised for long periods of time in someone else's house. We had a girl on our road (quiet cul-de-sac)who would come knocking to play multiple times a day around the age of 6 (this was years ago, she's 21 now). I found it really annoying tbh after a while as she wasn't always v nice to my younger DS and I didn't know the parents at all and I couldn't believe the parents didn't seem to care which house their daughter was playing in (they didn't know us from Adam).

It's what people do. It's basic human kindness to feed guests.
I'm vegetarian- not vegan- and from when they were babies I always said it would be my children's choice to eat meat or not. They both eat meat. I never had an issue with them eating it elsewhere and although my biggest bugbear is ultra processed food, and I cook everything from scratch at home, I had no issue with kind people offering things I wouldn't entertain keeping in the house myself because it's just basic hospitality and it's well meant. Your daughter is too young to understand veganism and honestly I think she should be free to choose when she's older (not my business I know) but I also understand that this is frustrating for you.
Some people don't get vegans. Some people will go out of their way to antagonise vegans. Which is petty and childish and if you believe this is what's happening, and not just a kindly grandma giving her grandson and his little friend food then yes that's out of order. If, however it's just a nice person feeding the kids- which to be fair is what lots and lots of people automatically do because they're nice and children need food - then I'd leave it.
I once had a neighbour who was Jewish and obviously didn't want her children eating certain foods (easy with me not eating meat I guess) but she didn't want them eating sugar either. I respected that and didn't offer her children certain things when they were playing with mine. Have you actually discussed this with your neighbours?
If you really don't want them feeding your child then you'll have to stop her playing with the neighbour but is this really the best solution?

I’m wondering what DD usually has for tea? It sounds like she is enjoying fish fingers & trifle. Maybe she isn’t as keen on vegan food & just likes what other people see as a normal kids tea. The grandmother sounds very generous.

Following I put vodka in the jelly at Xmas make a non-alcoholic one to before anyone starts clutching pearls lol

I agree, its so bizarre.
Childs ok to go and play in some strangers house, shock horror at trifle.

Jelly in a trifle? Sacrilege 😲