to refuse....

[thenightwalker]

To let my child eat fast food!

My daugter has a party this week and the mother has decided to get all the kids there amcdonalds happy meal.

All the other mums have agreed.

My daugter is just about to turn 2 and i think this is just unacceptable food fo a child that ytoung.

I wont let her be having it.

I dont feel like im being unreasonable.

Would you let yours? Even if it is just a one off?

YABU. Don't see the prob if it's only very occasionally.

You say 22 months is too young. Thats up to you to make that decision, you are her mother. Personally I think you are over reacting to a one off that may well, if you kick up a big enough stink about it, prevent your dd from being invited to parties in the future.

"Dont invite X, the food choice is sausage or nuggets with chips and you know what her mum's like. Do you remember Y's party and the fuss she made over the Maccies?!"

So how old will be old enough? Can you hand on heart say that you wont feel the same in 2 or 4 or 10 years?

I am afraid that I have to agree that you are setting her up for a life time of trouble with food if you are so controlling over it. I have first hand experience of a child who is so paranoid about food because of what her mother told her is bad for her, nasty etc. She was once grounded for eating some chips at a friends house (mine). She cant eat out because she is phobic about food prepared by anyone else. I have seen her have a full blown panic attack when someone gave her a piece of birthday cake. She is having therapy to deal with it but it need never have been like this.

I dont think you need to worry too much. it is only one meal. I occassionally take mine to McD's becuase my mum was super hyper sensitive to what we ate / drank as children. I never had chocolate until I was 5 and I dont think I drank squash until I was about 8. I remeber other children drinking Ribena and eating Monster Munch and I remeber feeling a bit sad when I was told I couldnt have any.... I do think I have one or two issues regarding food (I use it as a TREAT, which I honestly believe is down to my mum being uptight). BTW the little boy who drank Ribena and ate Monster Munch is a rugby playing Barrister now so it obv didnt do him any harm! As such I will not deny my children things, and I belieev all things in modertaion. so yes they eat McD's about 6 times a year but they also eat home made casserole and jacket pots and homous etc.... BTW for any evangelicals on here who are freaking out about party food - do you KNOW how much sugar and syrup are in things like Flapjacks which I think about 4 pages ago someone said was a "nice treat". All i can say is that you have obv never made them at home becuase it is literally tons of sugar and syrup. I think she will be fine and I dont think you need to expend so much energy panicing about things like that. Not judging you just telling you what it was like for me as a child and I do remeber feeling left out on lots of occassions.

Sorry, should say that she is an adult now, we were friends from childhood. She never went to parties as her mother wouldnt let her due to the food issues her mother had.

Haven't read all of the thread but you can ask that the fries are not salted. It means that the McDonalds staff have to take out your fries before they salt a new batch but, as they cook a new one every 3 minutes or something, it's not a big deal really. ...Although they do give you the 'look'.

I do sympathise with your concerns - I also assume this is your first child?? Maybe it's me and those I know but people tend to get less precious with subsequent children. However, I used to ask for the unsalted fries on the occasions my wee ones had McDs. (I don't any more!!!!)

Also agree with other posters that party food is very unhealthy and in my experience, the carrot sticks and hummus are on the table only for the mummies' sake...meanwhile the kids are firing into the hot dogs, pizza and fruit shoots.

I agree with the others who say you seem utterly paranoid from looking at your other threads- especially the 'should I keep my DD in to avoid her catching the 'flu'
Seriously you sound utterly paranoid to the point of being unwell, if I were you I really would have a chat with a health care professional as it gets worse as they get older and go to school trust me. You will be in a corner rocking back and forth if you dont get a handle on it.

'I have a 17 mo dd and she has had chicken nuggets from mcdonalds on 3 occasions, is that really bad???'

YES, Memoo. This is very serious. It is a sure route to morbid obesity and every disease known to mankind.

Gah, didn't know know that?!

:o

LOL at this thread looking forward to reading properly later.

I do think you are being unreasonable, you are going to be called the mother from hell. Your child is going to be excluded because of her mother, neat eh?

There is nothing wrong with chicken nuggets.

She seems to ignore the sensible posts too - someone has already said that she can have nuggets/fruit and milk/orange juice.

Op is more happy to concentrate on chips and salt content. Like a lot of people have said, as a one off it won't clog her arteries.

As someone said above, you can ask for chips with no added salt. It's not something I would obsess over.

This has to be a joke? A rehash of the previous big thread?

Actually in addition, it would be really rude to take your own food to a party (allergies etc excluded), so for that alone YABU.

There is nothing wrong with not wanting to give your child a McD's at that age but it's incredibly rude to go to the party if you are going to cause a fuss.

Have you told the other mother you will be bringing your own food?

posting on blackeberry from macdonalds devon

does anyone else want double chips?

ds is on his second big mac as there's an offer on here : a big mac and fries for only 2.29

there is a queue.

'And im not going to make my child into some kind of social outcast with an eating disorder for not letting her have a macdonalds while shes still so young.'

Nah, you're going to make her an outcast and an eating-disordered basket case because you're a control freak, helicopter mum/nutter.

I always feel sorry for kids like this, but I still don't like their mum so my kids don't hang out with hers. And no one else's does, either.

Memoo, let's drop the kids off at Mickey D's - the older ones will look after the little ones, and slip off to a bar. :o

Is this normal MN ? or one of them [suspicious] grin

anyway YABU

Blunt honesty here having looked at your previous posts.

You clearly have issues. It's easier as you have toddlers now but you sound like you have the kid who I wouldn't invite anywhere because I couldn't handle dealing with the mother.

Cross-posted with expatinscotland. I'm clearly not the only mum looking out for her own sanity.

I am 42 years old next week.

I grew up on a diet of fizzy pop, crisps, chocolate, fish and chips, cakes, biscuits..

and ooh horror of horrors.. when I was 4, I didnt really like sweets... but I loved tomatoes, with a bit of salt on the... and I wouldnt eat boiled eggs unless they had salt on them either.. and still dont.

I had cereal with sugar and full fat milk... and drank tea and coffee from the age of 3 as well..

Macdonalds didnt exist in the UK back then, and I didnt have a KFC till I was 18... because we didnt have a branch of that near us.. but we did go to the chippy at least once a month, and we probably had pies from the bakery once a week at least.

I still have all my own teeth, and they show no signs of falling out any time soon.

My cholesterol is low, my blood pressure is perfect, I am healthy, normal weight, and still eat greasy salty junk food when I feel like it.

Now dont get me wrong, that isnt all I ate.. I also had fish, casseroles, salads, boiled spuds, loads of veg...

It is called a balanced diet. A little bit of naughty stuff, lots of healthy stuff, and you tend to grow up not being fussy, not having eating disorders, and being perfectly healthy usually.

It's your child and if you don't want her to eat shite then you are not being unreasonable at all in my opinion. I also think 2 years old is too young for this sort of party.

McDonald's is the devil's eating place.

YABU. It's just one day. She's not going to become and morbidly obese junk food addict from one meal.

Everything in moderation - yes, the fries had salt and aren't good for kids, but what kind of dull life is she going to have if you never let her have anything a little bit bad for her.

Is ice-cream off the menu too?

Chocolate?

Crisps?

In which case, you may as well ban her from all kids parties from here on out...

YABU. If you don't want your child to eat a McMeal then don't send her to the party at all. Please don't send her with her own food because you will look rude and silly.

Don't underestimate how long a reputation for being unnecessarily difficult might last either. Only my dcs had a friend whose mother was very similar in attitude to that of bogeyface's friend. Child not, incidentally, having allergies or other reasons for for being kept away from the fairly standard, and mostly home-cooked party food we all offered.

In this case, mother would stand behind her dd's chair and pounce on the child if her hand wavered anywhere near "unsuitable" food - this being pretty much anything that wasn't a home-made hummus dip and sliced carrot. Child's hand would then be placed back in her lap while mother browsed round the table trying to find an alternative that met her standards. It was at one of these parties that she uttered the classic sentence "Don't be silly darling, those iced biscuits are icky. Anyway, you don't want to spoil your appetite because we've got lovely, lovel Brussel tops and tofu for tea".

Now it may well have been that her version of Brussel tops and tofu was delicious although I remain unconvinced. What remains undisputed is that nearly 30 years later, our dcs and all their friends present at the time still take the piss out of the woman for making such an exhibition of herself and her daughter. Who, incidentally, if she came round unaccompanied, was known to beg for sweets and biscuits and who grew up to have serious ishoos with food.

To answer the original questions -
Would you let yours?

Yes, would and have done. They are 3&4, have had the odd nugget/fries/water combo since around 18 months mostly at parties. Not always from McD's but I can't imagine oven baked nuggets & chips are much healthier!

Last night (having just been discharged from ED) I wasn't up to cooking so we had Chinese takeout.

They are fed a mixed, varied, balanced diet and I do include a little junk in that. I think it helps them grow up less food obsessed, less body conscious and less picky. Oh and a diet without any fat is going to be lacking in a few essential fat soluble vitamins.

It's a one off, let her eat nuggets with the rest of them.

Or take your own food and stand there on your moral high ground wondering why none of the other mums are talking to you.

Well, I wouldn't feed a 22 month old a Happy meal regularly but as a one-off I don't think it's so bad (and I have a child on a restrictive calorie controlled diet so am pretty fanatical about healthy choices where food is concerned.

A portion of 4 McDonalds chicken nuggets has the same amount of salt as 2 slices of bread, so I don't think you ought to get too hung up on the nutritional content of a few nuggets once in a blue moon.

I'd rather give my young children a Happy Meal containing some chicken nuggets, fruit bag and a bottle of milk than give them rice cakes or a box of raisins.