to give ill DS who wont eat a McDonalds?

[streakyfalsetan]

thats it really, ear infection, bad cough, high temp. Not eaten properly for nearly a week. Out of desperation I bought him a Happy Meal (usually has them as a treat maybe once a month) in the week and he ate about half of it.

Not really eaten properly since then, am so desperate for him to eat something Im edging towards getting him another McDs today for his dinner. One part of me thinks if he is that hungry he should eat whatever I make him but I keep thinking that when Im ill there are only certain things I fancy so why should a 3 year old be any different?

I wouldnt even eat two in a week but AIBU to do it just this once just so he has eaten something?

It's not the notion of giving them a carby meal to sustain them through the illness. I'm not suggesting they only have vegetables and fruit.

But it's the quality of Macdonals, KFC, BK, Wimpy that makes me throw it all back up. It's that it's their carbs, their volumes of salt and gluten and all the other crap in it that's worrying. The oil and the fats used and quality of the protein - organic does not mean quality!

Tell you what - I'll come back in five years and let y'all know how I get on. I'm not above saying I was completely wrong, and all your experience foretold the crashing reality

I think there are 2 golden rules in parenting.

1. Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.
2. You try to do your best. And when you know better, you do better...

Dust LOVING empire of the evil clown!!have you copyrighted this? Please may I use it? Still laughing...

Bettybat, most parenting books are written by people WHO DO NOT HAVE KIdS, and get paid SHIT LOADS telling us what to do how to do it, and some even tell you when to do it....mentioning no names!!

Fair play bettybat the fact you're taking this in such good spirit bodes well for any 'adaptations' you might have to make when the baby arrives.

I would say that I'm pretty sure when we've been ill for a while and not eating we actually do 'need' reasonable amounts of salt, carbs, sugars etc and the 'quick hit' approach is probably no bad thing. FWIW, I existed for pretty much the first 5 months of pregnancy on rice with soy sauce, fizzy cola bottles and the occasional can of coke - fundamentally I was being so sick I just needed salt, starch and sugar to keep me going. I'm the same when ill even now - after surgery last year I didn't eat for about 3 days and when I did it was jelly sweets, cans of coke and salty pretzels.

It was Lucozade and Heinz tomato soup as staple diet when I was ill as a child.

Oh yes, Lucozade in the big bottles with the cellophane wrapper. Had to be Campbell's soup for me though.

Yabu. Give him soup. And insists he eats it. End of.

Rhino I appreciate what you're saying I really do, but no one is ever going to convince me that "depriving" my child of a Macdonalds is a bad thing.

But you're right - it's what they cook their food in that is one of the problems. The quality of that high amount of fat. The lack of that stuff in my diet makes me sick. There's a reason for that - and just because X percent of the population has become used to it doesn't make it OK to consume. It just means you've conditioned your bodies to accept it.

I don't think anyone could ever argue that fastfood isn't crap? There's a massive difference between a high quality fat, and a poor quality, salt ridden, addictive fat. Macdonalds trots out the line about their organic meat but again, organic does not immediately equal quality.

So no, I couldn't care less if I am "depriving" my child of that kind of crap. I'm doing them a favour by not conditioning their bodies to accept such poor quality food.

I'm with higgle.
Flat coke is supposed to be good...coke is on my banned for dd list tho, not for me, it's my little helper...

Sorry could not resist as everyone is being so reasonable on this thread. I don't eat McDonald's. I dont eat red meat. Ever.

When I was pg with ds2 I had severe hg and at one point held nothing down for 5 days. Literally nothing. I had a cheeseburger and milkshake. Now that stayed down probably still there.

As your instincts and most people here say, Yanbu. Poor thing it's horrible being unwell, for child and parents who have to watch it.

Well, clearly McDs doesn't make most people sick or it wouldn't have succeeded in becoming the Empire of the Evil Clown, would it? Can't beat a bit of junk food now and then.

betty you'll be a good mum. [bugrin]

YANBU.

He is only 3 - yes they can survive without food for about 5 days at this age, provided they are drinking, but surely any calories or fat you can get into him is better than none at all. No difference IMO than you making him chicken nuggets and chips at home - just the whole happymeal thing may make it enticing and therefore encourage him to eat it.

My DS had the same ENT infection at about the same age and didn't eat for 5 days. When he did start eating it was cheesestrings, chocolate, yoghurts etc. It didn't affect him he started eating a healthy balanced diet again when his appitite was back.

Hope the poor little mite feels better soon.

helpyourself oh, thank you, I hope so :)

Really though, as a genuine question - is there no one else that rejects fastfood as a lifestyle choice? No one?

Not carby, high fat stuff - but specifically fastfood?

"but no one is ever going to convince me that "depriving" my child of a Macdonalds is a bad thing."

If you deprive someone of something - make something completey contraband - you only make it more appealing. A little bit of something every now and then is arguably far better long-term than outright banning something.

I know what you're saying re the way your parents raised you - I used to use this argument all the bloody time pre-kids, too - honestly, I have failed miserably compared with my parents in terms of so many things. [bugrin]

There are so many reasons for why this is; some tenuous, some totally valid. Just don't beat yourself up too much when if you fail to live up to the standards they set, or you've mentally set for yourself. :)

Yes Betty, as I said. We don't eat take away or deep fried stuff as a lifestyle choice.
I'm just not locked rigidly into it as that reduces my options in an emergency.

No not really betty as the differences on a nutritional level arent that great from other food - ie ready meals which we don t eat - the people who eat them and snip about fast food are just being snobbish.

I do have friends that reject all fast food but they are vegan anyway.

Do you mean multinationals producing fast food? As our local caffs fryup wont be any better than McDs nutritionally.

I do have friends who do that then yes but they live apart from the mainstream and their whole lifestyle is different.

Dust ahh yes sorry, I should have said aside from... :)

And I know this is where my inexperience becomes glaringly obvious but...surely my parents would have had similar emergencies....surely there must have been times as I was ill as child, not wanting food, my parents need me to eat something, I want something "comforting" and my body needs something salty and carby....

I'm clearly going to have to ask them what they did - maybe I'll be completely shocked and it'll rock my world

Give it to him. My 2 dd's have just got over being poorly, one with ear infection and one with tonsillitis (sorry can't spell it) in the same week! They both went off food, not too much prob with dd who had ear infection as she's only 1 and luckily she was happy to drink lots of milk. But I allowed my 4 year old to have what she wanted when she fancied it (within reason) it won't hurt him and anything is better than nothing. Hope he's better soon

Go for it OP.

Sometimes it just takes something/anything to kick start the appetite when you're off your food.

My 12yr old didn't eat for 3 days after a stomach bug and I've never been so pleased to see anyone eat a packet of Quavers!

It worked though and he went slowly back to eating properly the next day.

I don't have McDs very often, but it annoys me how much misplaced snobbery surrounds their food.

Really, think of what they serve in Starbucks, Pret, pizza express etc. Is that food really lower in salt, sugar and fat?

You can check their menus online. Starbucks sell drinks containing more cals than a big mac.

Not saying fast food is great for every day, but it isn't the devils food.

Betty, what do you class as fast food?
Just specifically what is sold in fast food shops?

I understand you to a point. I don't like McDs burgers and prefer properly cooked food. Or a real burger with real bread and crisp salad.

I am raising DS the way my parents did, in terms of food, more or less.
A variety including fast food.
Some treats here and there.

DS loves most healthy food and some he doesn't. He loves most fast (bad) food and some he doesn't.