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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To send DS to bed without dinner

149 replies

messybessie · 31/07/2011 18:43

I've said it now but feel awful.

Sunday dinner in garden. Grandad and BIL also in attendance. DS is 5. Refused to sit properly, kept shouting and screeching, refused to use knife and fork, breaking up potatoes with his hands.

I took him from table and told him to sit in kitchen until he could behave.

He eventually came back to table but still wouldn't sit properly and finally through potato and fork across table.

Dinner went in bin. He is now sobbing because he'd hungry.

OP posts:
youarekidding · 31/07/2011 21:59

But having re read the OP, she removed DS from the table, reiterated he needed to eat nicely and DS upped the anti. Sometimes they do this to see what they can get off you, lots of children test the boundaries.

I think the difference of opinions go's on what people boundaries are.

I think a balance of all views perhaps would be, nothing if supper is usually provided or removal from table for rest of meal/ removal of meal and then a healthy snack provided afterwards.

I have, I think DS was 5 at the time, removed evening meal and not provided more. DS was up in the night and early in the morning and we both had a bad nights sleep. I would now offer supper as wouldn't want to do that again, but then again he's never behaved that way again at the table so maybe it does work.

I agree he won't starve. DS ate nothing not even milk for 5 days once (ill).

pictish · 31/07/2011 22:01

Also agree that withholding food is a form of abuse. Course it is.

But not here, and not what we are discussing.

youarekidding · 31/07/2011 22:03

Agree witholding food is abuse.

He had the food, he threw it on the floor.

Surely in the OP's case making him pick the food up off the garden floor and eat it would have been abuse? Instead she decided as he didn't want it to remove it. He had had a warning which he chose to ignore.

nicciaa · 31/07/2011 22:22

if anyone would care to read back. OP didn't with hold food. She removed him from the table, after his tantrum. She then posted later that it was bathtime and she was going to give him something to eat before bed time.

Original poster
messybessie · 31/07/2011 22:55

Well, things went from bad to worse and I'm writing it off as a bad day.

He had his (small dinner) which he ate nicely and cleaned his plate. I gave him dinner rather than a snack as DS would rather eat plain toast or bagel than an actual meal so he would think he was in heaven.

He suffers from over tiredness but I think I make excuses for him because of it and think he is old enough to control his behaviour when he wants to.

He wanted pudding and supper after dinner which I told him he couldn't have.

Grandad tried to read him a story but he would not sit still and listen so he was taken upstairs to bed. DH tried to read him a story in his room but he wouldn't sit and listen so he was told no stories.

He had no stories but did shout for 90 minutes that he couldn't possibly sleep without one.

I told him very carefully that he had choices that he had made and this was the consequence.

It is a power struggle with him and I think he needs clearer boundaries.

Not sure whether this was step forward or backward tonight but it was certainly different Wink

And he's not hungry!

OP posts:
LadyThumb · 31/07/2011 22:57

So, after all advice etc. you actually gave him his dinner??!! Well, that was a waste of time - all he's learned is that no matter what he does he still gets his dinner, and Mum has backed dowqn again.

MrsHicks · 31/07/2011 22:57

I don't think taking him away from the dinner table was unreasonable at all, but at 5 I think he is too young to go to bed without having eaten anything and it is also too young for him to have realised what going to bed without any food means. Hunger only makes my son's behaviour worse. So I think taking away that dinner was not unreasonable, but would have been unreasonable to not give him to something to eat later. We are the parents after all and know, better than they do, that they should eat reasonably regularly. And no, he possibly wasn't hungry to be throwing food around, but that doesn't mean he wouldn't have been later.

MegBusset · 31/07/2011 22:59

I think you handled it fine tbh, he is (quite normally) pushing boundaries and you have (quite rightly) firmly enforced them. Stick to your guns and hopefully this phase will pass, no doubt to be replaced by a new one...!

Original poster
messybessie · 31/07/2011 22:59

Actually lady thumb, when I gave him the dinner most of the advice was saying it was child abuse not to.

Tricky this patenting lark Wink

OP posts:
Original poster
messybessie · 31/07/2011 23:00

Parenting even Blush

OP posts:
joric · 01/08/2011 08:59

I can't believe people are accusing OP of withdrawing food!!???!!

The OP gave her son dinner.

DS threw it and messed with it.

DS cried later because he was hungry.

OP gave son another dinner.

I'm just worried OP, that if this happens again you will just keep picking dinner off the floor and getting him another plate full :(

4madboys · 01/08/2011 10:42

amazed at those saying its abuse and neglect not to feed a child!! he WAS OFFERED food, he messed around, threw it and didnt eat it, that was his choice, he had the OPPORTUNITY to eat his dinner and didnt, in my house he would have then gone to bed hungry, end off.

all five of my kids eat well, they have all gone through phases of being fussy, kids do, but it doesnt get pandered to!

graceandbeauty · 01/08/2011 11:03

Agree totally with zorgmoid who put it far more eloquently than I could. That's what we do as well.

OP I would strongly advise you to follow through next time - if your DS sees that you make empty threats you are going to have these tantrums for a long time. Don't feel guilty for being a strong parent - your DS needs to push against the wall and see that it does not fall down. It's so important.

Original poster
messybessie · 01/08/2011 11:28

I know grace, I just find it so hard but I am trying as I see it becoming a downward spiral.

DS is very articulate and always looking for loopholes in my argument Hmm. So he will always find a let out. I actually think it's a very good skill which I have encouraged but I now feel it is coming back to bite me Grin.

So bedtime was worse last night as I said he couldn't have a story as he wouldn't sit down and listen.

Bedtimes have always been a battle and at the moment he is desperate for a sleepover at my friend's house but I have told him he needs three good bedtimes in a row. Last night would have been the third. So this morning he woke up arguing that it wasn't his fault that he didn't have a good bedtime because he hadn't had any toast and I hadn't read him a story or sang him a particular song and therefore it was impossible for him to go to sleep Hmm.

I told him very calmly that he had made choices about his behaviour at dinner time and bedtime and he knew very well what was at stake. It was his choice not to sit and listen and therefore not to have stories, it was his choice to shout for 90 minutes after being told there would be no stories, therefore it is his choice to not have 3 good bedtimes in a row and therefore not to have a sleepover.

Normally he behaves well at mealtimes so I'm going to write last night off as a one off and start again today.

I definitely need to stop letting him run rings round me.

OP posts:
pictish · 01/08/2011 12:46

Yes you do...and what will NOT help you is some of the advice on here intimating that you are somehow neglecting your child by sending him to bed with no dinner for bad beahviour at the table....you are simply taking control as a parent should amd making it clear his behaviour will not be tolerated.
There is little reasoning with 5 year olds...you just have to make a decision and stick to it - that's what they understand. Actions speak louder than words.

CurrySpice · 01/08/2011 13:04

I snorted at this a bit "i think you should be asking him why he behaved in this way and explaining that it was wrong. "

pictish · 01/08/2011 13:06

I laughed at that too.... good luck with that approach.

CurrySpice · 01/08/2011 13:07

I expect whoever posted that (CBA to look!) would follow it up with

"Now darling, please don't do that!"

if they were REALLY misbehaving! :o

chicletteeth · 01/08/2011 13:10

YABVU and you are very nasty or very stressed (can't decide which, not enough information)

He's five for pete's sake.

Would you feel it appropriate for someone to withold food from you because you didn't so something they wanted.

You are also making bigger problems for yourself by using food as a weapon

manicbmc · 01/08/2011 13:11

He's 5. He's playing to an audience. If he does it again, then give him his dinner on his own. If he doesn't eat it then it's tough.

Child abuse my arse Hmm

pictish · 01/08/2011 13:11
Confused
CurrySpice · 01/08/2011 13:12

Yes, he's 5 Chic, which is old enough to know you don't throw food around. And old enough to understand a warning

Oakmaiden · 01/08/2011 13:14

chicletteeth - if I scrunched my food up with my hands and then threw it and my cutlery off the table, then yes, I would expect my host to not offer me any more Grin

manicbmc · 01/08/2011 13:16

If he wasn't given any food. Or was told he'd only get a meal if he behaved a certain way, then yes that's abusive. But taking it away after it's been played with is being sensible.

chicletteeth · 01/08/2011 13:17

Clearly something seems up though if he was also unable to sit for a story.

I have a 6 year old and so know what meal time battles can be like, but in my view, binning food (which is just wasteful anyway) teaches them nothing.

Logic from my SD when she was young that if her food was binned by an adult because they weren't eating it, why can't she herself do the same.

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