To think that a busy life is no excuse for not giving your child breakfast?

[exBrightonBell]

Just watched the BBC news about a school which will be giving all its pupils a free breakfast. Amongst the reasons for children not being given breakfast at home was having a busy life. They interviewed a mum who said that their mornings were too late and busy to reliably give the children breakfast, and that she didn't have time to have an argument about it. She seemed to think that this was completely reasonable. AIBU to think that this isn't a reasonable excuse? Poverty and neglect are both reasons why children don't get breakfast at home, but parents being too busy? Really?

"In many families, parents are leaving children to fend for themselves in the morning. This is because some parents simply don't have the time or inclination to prepare breakfast, let alone supervise their children or encourage them to eat it," says the report into teachers' experiences of children who arrive at school unfed.

Last summer researchers found positive results from free meal schemes in three local authorities.

The study looking at projects in Durham, Newham and Wolverhampton found that free meals for all helped to close the gap in test results between rich and poor pupils.

It's the first thing that happens here in the mornings - breakfast. They even make their own, they're self sufficient enough to make a bowl of cereal.

I used to have to get four kids up, one a baby, feed them all. It wasn't even that hard?!

In the holidays lunch might be skipped because they tend to graze all day but it's automatic that they eat when they get up. I can't begin to fathom it not happening. Odd.

YANBU at all, no excuse.if your too busy to feed your kids properly why have kids. My dd 5 who has ASD can be a breakfast refuser so I have to try and cram toast in her mouth

I try giving her anything she wants in the morning, even chocolate cake as long as she has something in her tummy. Dd I as skinny as a rake

bedmonster, 5 and 7 is too young, but DS was 11, and I was 14 when my parents decided to let us start looking after ourselves. they had to leave for work before we left for school. We were responsible for getting up on time, getting our own breakfasts and making it to school on time. Admittedly I was 14, so obviously in charge. I never used to bother with breakfast, but it was a case of more fool me, because I was perfectly capable of getting it myself.

I honestly don't see anything wrong with this and I think it was completely normal when I was growing up.

Incidentally, I have known a lot of children who refuse to eat breakfast. You can't force them after a certain age. However, you should make breakfast for younger children and provide facilities for older ones. There was a breakfast club for working parents at DS's old school, but you had to pay for it.

'Too busy' is a lousy excuse... But lots of people are not ready to eat first thing in the morning. I'm not, and my DS2 isn't either. Both of us prefer to be awake for at least 2 hours - preferably more - before we eat. On a school/work day, we wake at 7am, and leave at 8-8.15, so we have time for breakfast but often not the inclination. I have something at work - around 9-9.30, and I wish my son could do the same. Instead, he eats something light he really doesn't want yet...

And even worse, he then has to wait until 1:45 for lunch, because his school has rearranged the day to make lunch later. It would be great, IMO, if they introduced a breakfast club at school, because as things stand, lots of kids are going 16-18 hours without food. :(

Who hasn't chucked their kid a cereal bar or piece of toast in the back of the car on the way to school

Yes but that IS breakfast.

I will be honest and admit that I used to have a real problem with finding time to do breakfast - my DC's would get up at 6.45am with my ex. I would get in from my nightshift at 7.15am, at which point the DC's had to leave for school - my ex left for work at the same time.

So they often had one parent leaving the door with them, handing them to the other parent who had just finished a nightshift, then the first parent went to work while they got on the school bus.

Cereal bars were used a LOT, to the extent that their usual breakfast was a couple of cereal bars, a bottle of fruit juice and a banana on the bus to school!

Now I don't work, that doesn't happen. It was purely a product of our work start and end times overlapping.

I guess to me, that didn't seem like a 'proper' breakfast.

I know some very 'chaotic' families, with 4/6/10 DC's - and they ALL have breakfast every day. Of some sort.

Where ARE all these people who aren't giving their DC's breakfast?! I have lived in some dodgy areas, known very chaotic people (was chaotic myself for years!), yet I can't think of ANY of them who didn't have bread, milk and cereal in the kitchen, and either tell their DC's to go have breakfast, or make it for the younger ones.

Most 7-8yo's can use a toaster and butter bread, most 5-6yo's can do a bowl of cereal.

I really haven't met ONE parent, through ten years of school runs, five houses, four primary schools, that doesn't either make breakfast for their DC's or have breakfast stuff available for older DC's and tell them to go and get it.

And some of the areas I've lived in meet the EU descriptors for Deprived areas, one was one of the most deprived areas of the UK.

I'm baffled tbh, that there really are people out there that won't even attempt to give their DC's breakfast.

DD has always hated eating until she has been up for two hours, so used to eat very little for breakfast. Now she will eat in the morning, but only ever either a Philadelphia sandwich or a honey sandwich with a drink of fruit juice. She takes a piece of fruit and a breakfast bar (she's into those cardboard belvita things) for morning break.

I get that some DC's might not eat well in the morning, it's taken me ten years for it not to be an argument with DD, but to not make them breakfast OR provide food so that they can make it themselves OR chucking them a couple of cereal bars and some fruit on the way to school seems hard to get my head around when I haven't ever known ANYONE not to IYSWIM.

And as for people saying use Lidl - our whole town has no Lidl, and both Aldi's are an HOUR away (EACH way) by bus. If my DC's didn't go to school near Tesco, I would struggle because it's physically impossible to carry a week's worth of food for 5 people home on the bus.

It costs me £10.50 to get me and all of my DC's to and from the supermarket by bus. And they all have to come in the holidays, to help carry. During term time, I shop daily.

If I run out of milk and bread in the school holidays, we end up with some weird and wonderful breakfasts until my ex brings emergency supplies!

I'm probably going to get flamed for this but I have on the odd occasion sent my son to nursery without breakfast as he's point blank refused to have any. Am talking major tantrums when asked what he wants (he's 2.11). It's not an everyday occurrence & I know he'll get a snack fairly soon after he arrives so it's not like he'll go hungry.

I would never be 'too busy' to give him breakfast though.

I think the thread is just challenging the notion that it's somehow ok for parents to be 'too busy' to give their children breakfast.

I think food-refusal in the morning is fairly common, and that a sensible answer to that is what parents on here seem to do, which is to arrange a snack for early on.

It's laziness. I am a single parent of 6. I also work three days a week. I cook my kids breakfast( omelettes,pancakes, sausages bacon, toast, crumpets etc) every single morning and have done for year and years.

My children both have autism and we get up at 6 in order to go through the whole routine and get them to school (5 miles away, a few minutes by car) by 9am. I think that in most cases, certainly those where being 'busy' is blamed, this would be sorted by, as has been said, getting up earlier and/or being more organised. Since there are 24 hours in a day, it is not possible to use the excuse of not having time to make sure your child has a slice of bloody toast!

However. I don't eat breakfast. If I do, it's not till at least 10. (and I of course do get up at 6) I feel physically sick in the morning. I cannot force food down my throat. It sticks, I feel ill. I need to wake up, have a drink and wait for the sickness to pass (I'm not pregnant!). Trying to eat before my body is ready is a horrible experience.

Now I don't imagine I am unique in all the world! I also don't think this is something unique to adults. So I bet there are children out there who feel this way. And eating later is a good idea.

My children's school's cafe is open at morning break and the kids can buy a bacon butty or some toast. I think this is a good idea and solves that problem.

Then you have the children who want to battle it out with you and for them, the best thing is they see that that only means they're hungry! They suffer . Because getting into food wars is stressful and the best thing there is to say fine, you want no breakfast? OK. No big deal.

Then if they're doing it for the battle there's no reason to.

It's just bad parenting to let your kids start school on an empty stomach, and also if you let them start school tired because they don't go to bed early enough.

Both theses things mean that learning is disrupted for the whole class. I am all for free breakfasts being provided at school as an option for all kids as I think the classroom experience will improve for all as a result.

Dp and I work full time and we all of leave the house at 7.35am for work/school. Dd always has bacon or eggs or something hot. It takes 10 minutes to make.

I don't remember my parents ever making me breakfast - and they didn't/don't eat breakfast themselves. I think they probably must have started out by offering me stuff but got used to me never wanting it, so gave up. Not to do with being too busy. I have never been hungry first thing in the morning. Eating before 10am is not a pleasant experience for me.

On the news report, could the 'too busy' have meant she/the household was too busy in mornings to do a 'proper' sit down breakfast, but that doesnt mean she didnt do the cereal bar/toast-on-the-go thing? How many non-neglectful parents would really deny hungry children something to eat in the morning on a systematic basis then cheerfully admit to it on TV?

Merry at least you gave your dc something. Yes I agree with older children getting themselves breakfast, providing what is needed and letting them get on with it. Yes I have a breakfast refuser, she is 5 so I let school know, they rovide a snack for the chidren ater

There is a vast world between a full sit down cooked breakfast and nothing offered/available at all.

I assume this measure is aimed at the kids who would eat breakfast if they could, but are just not given the opportunity by their parents.

Agree with expatinscotland if food in your kids stomachs is not your No. 1 priority then I can't imagine what is.

Mine have 2 most mornings, a roll/fruit at around 6:30am and then breakfast at around 8am, either at daycare/before school club or at home depending on whether I am working that day or not.

Not everyone eats breakfast as soon as they get up - I don't - I get up between 4 and 5 am and couldnt face food until at least 8.30am. DH is the same, he's up at 6, won't eat until he gets to work.

The children are the same - none of them want to eat for at least an hour and a half - and regrettably, they are packed off with enough money to get a bacon roll and a hot chocolate when they get to school - because they just would not get out of bed at 5.30 in order to lay fallow for 2 hours, to eat before we leave the house at 7.40.

Ditto when I used a paid for breakfast club - I was paying for their breakfast - thats where they ate.

I thought the same thing when I saw that news item OP. one of the reasons she gave for not giving them breakfast was it was too early for them to eat when they had to get up. Surely an answer to that is to make them something to take with them? To eat in on route to wherever they are going?

I can't believe it's acceptable to not feed your children breakfast?! Sometimes my 2 yo DD doesn't want any breakfast but that's another story....!

If tey don't want breakfast straight away, a sandwich or roll on route

I am in the area where this is happening. It is a 3 month trial which parents have had no say over. Everyone I have spoke to think if is a crazy idea and not properly thought out. I haven't seen anything on the news about it but my guess is they were trying their hardest to put a positive spin on it when really there isn't one.

In Scotland - not sure whether it still stand in these time of economic hardship - KS1 has free school dinners - every pupil. That may or may not be the case now..

Sometimes it's just cheaper to do things en masse rather than faffing with the few.

Disclaimer - I'm not in the UK!
My daughter was in nursery and they supplied breakfast every morning. They had a variety of different options, cereal, eggs, toast, veggies and it was brilliant! DD is a slow breakfast eater but I knew she could eat a little bit at home and then a proper breakfast in nursery.
Now she is 5 and in a pre-k nursery (start school at 6 here) and they have a proper snack at about 10:30, she takes a roll or a little box of pasta. Again this means I don't have to worry that she eats enough at breakfast to make it all the way to lunch.

Ds is another one who often won't eat in the morning, he will have a hot chocolate, so at least a few calories, but although he is generally up at 6:30 and I give him toast then, it is often just nibbled or ignored. We have to leave the house at 8:25 for the school run, so if he hasn't eaten by then, he might be hungry by the time he gets to preschool.

I would be happy for something more than fruit to be available for him when he starts school. You could say that I am too busy in the morning to make him stop being a pirate and eat some more food, but the girls manage to eat something, and he generally just refuses food, whatever and however it is offered until 10am. Am hoping he will grow out of it, but reading some other replies here it seems he isn't alone in not being hungry in the morning.