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?

Toys I'm with Captain on the point that it's up to no one except parents to decide a child's eating habits and if food is refused by a parent people should respect that.
I can only imagine if I were rude enough to take another kids snacks and say "no wonder your Mum says you never eat your meals" what their reaction would be to that.
And yes it does make a difference to whats consumed at meal times its pretty naive to say a tiny snack wont make a difference because it does, it takes time for alot of children to develop an appetite to eat a meal properly and it's not your call to say it doesn't matter unless it's your child. I have a friend who used to put my dc on the same routine as hers just because we were in her house, her dc is rediculously fussy at the table and whenever we visited her so would my child be for the next meal it's actually unusual for my child to leave much food at a meal time and he eats most things, even if he's never tried them before, but after mid meal snack even little snack you would think he was really fussy. I don't go to that friends house anymore because I think shes rude undermining me.

For breaking the habit I think less variety could help sort habit from hunger, if the same boring cucumber was offered and the option of anything more interesting gone there would be less insentive for the "Im hungryyyy" chorus.

I have to remind mine to drink (ds has a kidney condition) but they snack when their hungry

Has anyone on this thread actually said this, I must have missed it?

What several people (including myself) have said is that our children struggle to go 5 or 6 hours between meals so are given a snack halfway. Speaking for my ds2 this has never affected his ability to eat his meals (and no he is nowhere near overweight just very active and growing quickly).

Several posters have said that their children need 'regular' snacks, and the OP said that in the space of two hours several children were called back 4 times for snacks. I also know someone myself who is constantly encouraging her children to graze on breadsticks and crackers and bananas with the excuse that they get upset and hard to manage if they don't 'top up' regularly. She then wonders why they won't sit down and eat their lunch or supper.

DD - (now 13 - 5'8 and size 4 - in case that matters in the "obesity" statistics) always needed to snack at 10.30ish - she woke at 5.30 - that is FIVE HOURS previously. Waiting til 1.30 for lunch would mean 8 hours between meals aged 3... Not every child will have had breakfast at 8.30.

At the moment pretty much all DD will eat is cucumber.... (It's really really hot where we are, which is at least part of the reason)

What has that got to do with children being encouraged to constantly graze somewhere.
And why do you speak so dismissively of obesity statistics. Do you not realise that this is a serious and escalating problem that those working in the health sector are increasingly concerned about?

Nursery... My daughter would have appeared to be one of those grazers - she was really ready for lunch as her day started stupidly early, but I'm sure I have been judged for letting her eat mid morning in a 2 hour play session.

But that's not what the OP said. She was talking about parents giving their children several snacks over two hours, including ordering a large plate of chips and nuggets.

letting her eat

No, it's absolutely nothing to do with letting children eat.

I think the concensus is that snacks for children who are hungry and need them are totally fine - pushing snacks and encouraging it in children who already eat decent meals and aren't hungry is a problem. I you know your child needs something before a two hour play session at 9.30 as they had breakfast at stupid o'clock, then I'd be giving them a banana before we went in. and always have a drink available. Unless your plan was to have lunch there, then they should be able to wait until 11.30 without being dragged away from playing to eat.

Of course it could be that parents were trying to get them to sit down as they were overheated and sweating and just wanted them to take a break and the food was the lure...

Nobody is objecting to children that need to eat snacks, but with a few exceptions the majority of toddlers (or children) clearly don't need it if you're having to remind them they do constantly. Well cared for children in western society (short of medical cause) do not suffer health risks in later life because nobody persuaded them to eat enough as a child. But persuading your toddler to overcome their natural instinct to eat only when hungry does cause health problems in later life. I've never yet met anybody who is or has been overweight through over eating who says they thought their body needed that much food or that excess junk was healthy, they always say 'I don't know when to stop'. And human survival, other cultures/ countries and what we know about past generations proves that only a very tiny minority are born with that lack of an 'off' button, which suggests it's something learnt. The reason so many adults struggle to lose weight isn't because they are sat eating piles of pies too stupid to realise they shouldn't be, or they'd all lose weight easily. Losing weight is hard because somebody has welded their 'off' switch to 'on'.
I accept its not actually my business, which is why in real life I don't share my opinion unless asked or provoked by someone criticising our eating habits. But yes I do secretly judge when I see an overweight child in too long but skin tight clothes with an even more overweight parent waving a Mars at them.

I can't bear it! Mine are older now, but I never did this. I might keep something relatively healthy in my bag incase they were hungry, or we got caught short, but I never initiated the 'snack' obsession. Obv if mine saw a friend eat something, they would want too.

I am so with you on this op, yes small dc need snacks but this sort of forcing and constant cajolement to eat and we wonder why we are all fat?

people say its odd I see it over and over and over again.

people laying out HUGE snack assortments, every food their dc could possibly want under the sun in tubs .

only just read your post lurked, this is what I dont understand, dc know when they are hungry!

Plus there is a difference betweenproviding a healthy snack - fruit/crackers for example - as your child has woken early and buying junk from the cafe!! This is the parent pre-empting the child's needs, not the child saying they're hungry. Soft-play is thirsty work so bring water!!

its not just mars bars either though its any food.

one lady was told by her health vistor child on small side and next time i saw child she was a little tub!

i dont think the nature of the food matters, constantly trying to force feed child is the crux, be it with crap or so called good food.

Hm my parents didn't allow snacking and I do remember being so hungry before meals as a child. In that situation now I'd just have a little snack. There's nothing wrong with snacking, nor any biological reason to eat all the day's food in three sittings.

As a mum of an autistic 2 1/2 year old I know full well the ramifications of letting him "just play" for 2hours. He has no idea how to regulate himself and little snacks and drinks give him valuable time to just calm down for 5 minutes as well as the energy he needs (he burns energy like no one business) to continue to play without melting down. Oh and as for letting him go out of his comfort zone to learn life skills, it's not always that simple and can actually be very detrimental to my son. Maybe some times there are reasons and sitting on the outside passing judgement doesn't help anyone.

Ace it has been qualified on here that we aren't talking about children with medical reasons for needing snacks.

I'd be interested to know why you are so certain that the child and parent combo you maybe anonymously judging do not have any medical need? Diabetes isn't something you would know just from looking, high functioning autism isn't always outwardly noticeable either and off the back of that thyroid and glandular conditions (which can present symptoms including weight gain) are regularly confused for overeating. I'm just saying that maybe before you immediately jump to "there's no need for that" you consider that there may actually be a need.

Worth remembering, though, that you don't necessarily have a diagnosis for high functioning ASD or MH problems at a young age, even if problems exist from then, so some children seem to not fulfil the "medical reasons" disclaimer, even if they will retrospectively, IYSWIM.

DS was very hard work particularly in social situations when he was very young. I frequently felt as if everyone was judging us (they probably were!). Yet, now I know he had a reason for it (however subtle), as he has been identified with ASC traits and anxiety problems (was assessed by Ed Psych and now awaiting on CAMHS referral). ASC is increasingly common, and so are MH problems, so I would give people the benefit of the doubt..

I doubt that every single child in the OP's group had some kind of medical issue.
There is a growing problem regarding children and obesity, and much of it is down to children constantly eating between meals. That is an actual fact.

As I said, it has already been qualified that posters sometimes understand that there are medical reasons, so you seem determined to take offence where none was intended.