To be irritated with parents forcing children to sit and eat at soft play

[SrAssumpta]

I spent the morning in a play centre with a few other mums and our 3-4 year olds, met at half 9 and stayed about two hours.
The children weren't even playing five minutes when the other parents were calling them back over "Simon, would you like a yogurt? Come down and have some grapes", "Lucy have some crisps", "Oh darling I've gotten you a slush puppy come down and have it before it melts"
I just don't get it? We met up to let them play, why couldn't they eat at home, it's an expensive play centre why can't they make the most of it? Then a huge platter of nuggets and chips was ordered and they were made sit and eat all the greasy food on their plate and coaxed with "Go on just two more nuggets then you can go back and play"

I find it so irritating, we could have just met up for breakfast or lunch but why take children somewhere they're supposed to have fun and force them to sit down and eat?

callme I really think your entire attitude need altering, stop making yourself and your child a victim my goodness encourage them to be more than their disability!

broken child

I agree with SrAssumpta.

Whatever.

Live my life, then respond to the judgemental holier than though individuals that assume they "know".

My child is less than medically perfect - she won't live until adulthood - add that to being on the receiving end of judgements from people who don't deserve to know her entire medical history and you might see it differently.

Or... As I have been told here, perhaps it is all bollocks.

dd (4) gets really grumpy when she is hungry, She has no medical conditions. She doesn't always recognise when she's hungry, and neither do we until she starts whining or having a tantrum. We offer her small snacks frequently to keep her energy levels up, so she doesnt get hungry and grumpy. She is a normal healthy weight. Drinking is also important, as active kids can get dehydrated very quickly, running around at soft play.

I would offer dd a drink and a small snack (e.g handful of popcorn, biscuit, cereal bar) when we arrived at soft play, before she went on the equipment (possibly at home or in the car depending on distance to soft play. After about an hour, if she has not come over herself, I would call her over and insist she had a drink, and offer a snack.

After 2 hours, I would give her a drink again, and if she didnt have the snack last time I would insist.

Honestly callme nobody is claiming to be holier than though, sure in an earlier message I wrote how I chopped up DD a mango subconsciously so I could buy myself more time on the phone ffs, it's a discussion and although it's been stated so many times that we are NOT talking about children with medical issues, you have made the decision to be offended and more angry with each post. We are NOT talking about that tiny percentage with unseen issues, we are talking about a growing trend that some believe is having a negative impact on our attitude to food as a society.

I don't think this is quite as universal as people seem to assume.

At all parties my DC go to, they are expected to riot happily for an hour or two with nothing more than a drink (generally of water) if it is hot and/or they are running around a lot. The only child whose mother hovers (very subtly) is diabetic, and her DM is extremely adept at spotting her about to crash, extracting her, testing and sorting her out, and posting her back in before the others really notice. The rest of us happily ignore our DC until they come and demand food/water. At school it is somewhere inbetween - they do have fairly frequent (small) snacks and drinks.

OTOH, there are occasions when I insist on my DC eating. Neither are morning people, but both get very very grumpy when hungry and/or thirsty even though they often don't recognise that is what is happening. This morning (they are on holiday) I did intervene and give them wraps at 11am before they killed each other, even though neither had asked for breakfast.

Kids whine and have tantrums though, it's what they do.

It's what they've always done, so I don't understand why parents are suddenly placating them with food between meals now.

Surely this is just teaching them to become emotional eaters?

There are lots of adult Mumsnetters who say they struggle with their weight, due to emotional eating.

If kids aren't asking for food, I can't get my head around offering it to them/insisting they snack between meals. Surely there are other ways of dealing with the whining/tantrums that don't risk possible eating disorders in later years?

I agree with worra there is no need imo to keep topping kids up with little boxes of grapes and crisps rice cakes or what ever kids get grumpy giving them a biscuit because they whinge only makes the whinge for more food.

parents who automatically assume a grumpy kid is a hungry kid and stuff garbage into their mouths are perpetuating the problem.

That's the thing.

Far too many parents are falling into the habit of shoving food in the faces of small children in order to manage their boredom/behaviour or because they think it equates to love. That lazy, thoughtless parenting is getting more and more common and parents of children with a genuine need to eat often get caught up in the judging.

However, I happen to think that this trend towards feeding children every two minutes a crappy thing to do to them and there's no doubt in my mind that it is linked to childhood obesity levels so maybe it's good that it is being challenged even just on an internet forum. Any conversation that helps people rethink this parenting strategy is a good idea.

I'm sorry that means that you feel caught up in it, CallMe. Having two children with AS means my parenting has often been unfairly judged too but I do still think it's a good thing that we question changes in culture that could negatively affect the health of so many children.

That was really balanced Goldmandra its hard I guess when posters are talking in general that somebody might take it really personally

giving kids food instead of letting them express their emotions = a lifetime of really difficult to shake off emotional eating and weight issues.

Stop giving your children snacks when they are emotional - listen to them instead!

actually when I say express their emotions, I mean more learn to identify, process and feel their emotions and know they are OK and are in a safe place to be themselves

That's just what I did LovelyFriend. The emotion he was repeatedly trying to express by throwing himself on the floor screaming was hunger. With ds1 (who would break down into silent sobbing rather than scream) it was always tiredness, which is why I spent so much time trying to rock ds2 to sleep when actually what he needed was a banana and a drink of milk.

Not surprisingly, on the bmi thread, none of the current or previously overweight posters have cited the cause as 'I just woke up one day and decided it would be great to force myself to eat more than I need' or 'I always wanted to be obese because it's healthy and boosts self esteem' or 'yeah it was because i was previously slim but I'm a bit thick and thought eating pies all day was the way to go'. Nor has anyone stated that once someone disillusioned them of the above and suggested they lose weight it was really simple and effort less because all they needed to do was eat more healthily. Not a single one, everyone is saying how it's hard to break old habits, goes back to childhood, it's all in the mind etc. which says a lot really, when chances are that at toddler age it's unlikely they were all big either.

If mine come and ask I say if you keep eating snacks you will get fat. It is your choice. Eldest always changes her mind. I don't see any problems in saying it as it is the truth.

NOT having snacks as a child contributed heavily to me being obese as an adult, so hey ho... all about balance

(dirt poor - school dinner and beans on toast = food for a day - instant whip on Sundays, always hungry)

Yes, exactly, somewhereibelong 'snacks' aren't the problem, people not really having any idea of moderation is.

Growing children should have snacks if they need them between meals, no one needs to be stopped in their tracks and have someone else insist they eat. Which I think was the OP's point. Let them eat when they need to, don't keep a continuous stream of food going when they don't want or need it.

Exactly somewhere it's the eating habits from a young age that cause the problems. For you, poverty, but also the case when parents go ott treating anything but organic kale and steamed lettuce as the enemy so the child never gets chance to learn how to enjoy less healthy food in moderation.

Yeah its not the snacks themselves its the slush puppy or the grapes or whatever that the parent insists their kids have. Thats what the point of the op was

parents go ott treating anything but organic kale and steamed lettuce as the enemy

Like the parent on another thread getting grief for giving her child Innocent smoothie cartons as a way of getting fruit into her daughter who had sensory issues and that was really all she would take in the way of fruit and veg. Queue everyone well lots of people pointing out the amount of sugar in them and that she should make her own with spinach etc. and another saying that as they had the same amount of calories as a happy meal she would be better of with that.

Thankfully there is a middle ground :)