To feel annoyed with friend who feeds her dc nothing but crap

[itwasmuchbetter]

I know it's none of my business but I am getting more and more concerned about dc of my friend who basically live on crap. She doesn't work so time isn't an issue, they have plenty of money to buy decent food but their diet is just awful. Examples of evening meals are Pot Noodles, Plain pasta with mayonnaise, cheap white bread/ tortilla with tomato ketchup. That is after packed lunch of chocolate brioche, chocolate bar, crisps. They frequently get constipation. This has been going on for years so I don't know why it is annoying me so much recently. Oh and they are constantly supplied with Haribos at every opportunity.

being fussy isnt really an excuse though ds2 is severley autistic his diet isnt great but i try given, a chance he would eat plain pasta or rice for every meal but i put veg in cottage pie, spaghetti bolagnese etc ,that he will eat , he wont eat much fruit but drinks fruit juices and loves oranges so gets that he does suffer with constipation which is probably due to a combination of things but i do try .

X2 - maybe you should try looking at some supplements that he might eat? :)

I thought 'crap' was going to mean Turkey Twizzlers and chips, or microwave lasagne every single night or something. Bread and ketchup for dinner would have been the sort of thing you read about in those articles about people who blend up Big Macs and put it in baby bottles - that's extreme crapness.

If she's a friend then are you close enough to have any idea why she's feeding them in this manner? I mean, she's basically not feeding them at all, she's just hurling a couple of cupboard items at them. Is this something you see her serving up and don't say anything, or is she talking to you about it with pride or despair something?

Evening meals of pot noodles just sounds like she can't be bothered to me. I understand that some kids are fussy but everything the OP has mentioned they sounds like no effort required meals rather than catering for picky eaters.

Funny also how all three are picky and only like the same things

Just because they appear outwardly to be financially comfortable, doesn't mean that they are not drowning in debt.

But anyone (barring illness, disability etc obviously) can cook if they want to. There's plenty of information out there on how to learn, also about what consitutes a healthy diet.

I refuse to believe that there are people who genuinely don't realise that the type of diet described in the OP is unhealthy, especially as there are problems in constipation.

It's just that if you choose not to eat healthy food, you don't have to, and processed food is often more palatable. After all, most of us would live on pizza and cake, or whatever our favourite junk is, if we thought we could get away with it, weight and health-wise.

I don't understand how people can take their precious baby home from hospital.... and then end up feeding them this crap. Don't they care?

And don't schools cover healthy eating? I remember doing in infants, juniors and secondary - 80's-00's. How can people not know? Are they stupid?

I'll probably get flamed for this but it makes me so upset and angry that people who neglect their children to this extent actually have children, whilst others have fertility issues or even children removed (I'm thinking Fran Lyons type scenarios) but would never be so stupid as to feed their children like this!

Those who have mentioned sensory issues on this thread - a different scenario, but you all seem to have got your DC to eat something healthy, one type of fruit or whatever. And not haribo.

Does she eat Pot Noodles and pasta with mayo - gag - herself? Or is she whipping herself up real food while the kids gnaw on the scraps?

I was friends with a girl from an odd family, growing up. The kids smelled bad and their teeth went unbrushed. When I visited the house, their small, shared room was messy (fairly expected, we were kids) but their beds had no sheets - bare mattress, bare pillows, bare duvet. And dirty. Thing is, the parents were utterly normal. Normal cleanliness, normal clothes, normal house and normal bedroom.

Eventually they didn't seem quite so normal (the dad picked me and the girl up from a class we attended, then drove us around the city pointing out landmarks for two hour while my parents were frantic) and I cut off contact, though I still went to school with the girl. Not much improved.

I guess I'm wondering if there's similarities here. Outwardly normal people, even capable of making friends, yet at home they toss bread at their kids and neglect even the most basic things.

Are they clean? Hair washed, teeth brushed? Clean, fitting clothes? Do they read? Be read to? I'd find it so odd if someone can find time to do all those normal, expected things and then forget to feed them.

maybe 001 he is not as bad as some children with autism with his diet i just try and work with what he will eat .

My sister's kids have a similarly crap diet. In her case she has always been fussy herself and her eldest has Aspergers and sensory issues. Her youngest two are not offered healthy alternatives and tend to copy their older sibling's behaviour.

Sister and eldest are extremely overweight and youngest two are grey, scrawny, undernourished little things. I am in a constant state of biting my tongue when I see her and hate having to prime my children beforehand, that they will not be having half a dozen doughnuts each for their tea, like their cousins.

do those with fussy eaters really just present them with haribo?

course you don't.

and what are the chances of all the kids not only being fussy. but they all eat the same foods which all also happen to be foods that take seconds to prep.

hell even chicken nuggets and chips take 15-20 mins actual cooking time.

it's crap cos she's lazy and buttering a piece of bread or boiling a kettle.is about all she can be arsed to do.

Why bite your tongue, Tinkly? Something is deeply, unsettlingly wrong with someone who serves up half a dozen donuts to their child for 'dinner'. I appreciate they won't want to hear it, but maybe it will snap them out of whatever mental trance they're in where basic human nourishment has been forgotten.

And honestly of she had concerns shed be under a gp. not making sings up to deal.witg constipation. if it was causing that many problems.shed be tearing hair out.

I remember a case like that Saukko, where the parents were jailed. I've found a report by the powers of google - the children were upstairs filthy and starved, while the parents were downstairs, in cleanliness, with food and alcohol .

It would be easy to have healthier meals with very little prep time if she chose - microwave jacket spud with baked beans type things and fresh fruit take hardly any mote effort than cooking plan pasta. Even things on toast would be better. Does she know anything about nutrition? Or are the children all very fussy?

I have often seen people with kids pushing a trolley full of crap at the supermarket. So many people do eat like this even though we are bombarded with information about healthy eating. There are no excuses only choices.

giles yes the mother in this case is probably being lazy.

but that doesn't mean all parents of fussy eaters are lazy, which is what alice is implying.

As MTWTFSS has suggested, why not have the family round for lunch or tea and cook them something healthy? Get them talking about the kinds of food they enjoy and what is and isn't good for them?

If that didn't work, I think I would risk losing the friend and just tell her outright that it's downright neglectful to feed her kids unhealthy crap.

Do the school not say anything about the crappy packed lunches? DS's school send texts round if kids have inappropriate/banned foods in their lunch boxes.

I don't think it's really anything to do with being fussy. I'm the fussiest eater out there it doesn't mean I like all junk food and hate anything healthy. Kids can be weird. There is nothing wrong with mentioning it tactfully. As pp have said start inviting them to your house and prepare healthyish things.

She may appreciate some help you never know.

I find it odd that all three children would be fussy in exactly the same way.

Yes I agree there can be extreme issues with fusiness. But as pps have said most paremts with incredibly fussy children seem to be managing to get something good into them.
and beans on toast, cheese on toast, pizza, pasta with jar sauce are our 'crap' meals when we can't be bothered, unlike lots of people on here whose can't be bothered meal seems to involve meat, grain and three veg in a slow cooker. But these aren't meals, they are carbs and condiments. They go beyond the " nuggets, chis and beans" type of meal.

Pot Noodles are strongly flavoured and full of unidentifiable green bits - surely a fussy child's nemesis!

I think inviting g them round is a bit mean really.

they are used to tenor diet now. witg the best of intentions, a table full of lovely home made food they will only get to have that one occasion (that's if years of this stuff hasn't already made them.fearful or wary of other food) is nothing g short of torture really :(

and if after years of pot noodles and pasta, a spaghetti bolognaise full of fresh ingredients could well give them.an upset tummy which I expect will "confirm" she was right all along.

if that makes any sense

Nuggets, chips and beans are health foods in comparison, with all that protein and fibre.

You could suggest they have school dinners - that way they would get a reasonable meal cooked by someone else.

Same, Saukko. I was expecting chicken nuggets and chips 7 nights a week, not bread and ketchup.

My parents were neglectful. They didn't do the food shopping very often, the only things we'd reliably have in the house was bread, a jar of mint sauce (my mother used to mix it with her food) and potatoes. So we made ourselves mint sauce sandwiches a lot of the time. It was obviously very grim, we were not being looked after.

You say she's a competent parent in all other areas? Well, feeding your children is a big part of being a parent, and she is failing. As her friend, you have the opportunity to see if there's any way you can help her. The kids aren't healthy if they have chronic constipation, that moves it away from the realm of 'mind your own business' imo.