To think.. there is a weird obsession with snacking?

[helpmeplease2045]

I have two DC age 6 and 3.

My 6yo has a pretty big breakfast (bowl of porridge with fruit and often second bowl of muesli or cereal for e.g.), we then provide them with a morning snack (maybe piece of fruit) for school, then two hours later they have school lunch then after school parents are handing over more snacks (ranging from fruit to biscuits, cakes, crisps, sandwiches etc), then a snack at home / at a playdate / children's party. There are snacks after activities / on the way to activities.. all this before dinner.

Sometimes I feel like it's a constant battle to stop kids from constantly eating all day! When I was younger we had bkfast, morning snack maybe on a school day and school dinners then we waited till the evening meal. I don't think little children need a constant supply of (often sugary) treats throughout the day.

AIBU to not want my small children to be eating something every two hours!?

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

Over 64% of adults are now overweight/obese too, so it's probably getting harder for everyone to spot

Have the goalposts shifted though? When I look at pictures of celebs from previous decades they were often rounder. Wasn't Marilyn a size 16 or something?

[wetcardboard]

I think we all need to feel hunger every day, as a way to manage how much we eat

This is very true I think. And our culture seems to have developed a complete fear of hunger. I saw a post where someone complained about how their diet was making them miserable, and someone wrote back "You shouldn't feel hungry on a diet, if you do it means it's a bad diet".



Even when not dieting you would expect to feel hungry sometimes. Not weak and clammy and like you're about to faint, but normal hunger where you have a bit of a rumble in your belly and maybe a pang or two. Ideally you should feel something like this before every meal. It's a sign your body actually needs to be fed.

No wonder kids are picking up dysfunctional eating habits, when adults around them have an extreme aversion to any sensation of hunger.

[MrsHathaway]

Have the goalposts shifted though? When I look at pictures of celebs from previous decades they were often rounder. Wasn't Marilyn a size 16 or something?

Nope.

They look rounder but they have tiny waists. Partly that's a waist training/corset thing, but also it's because they weren't fat round the middle like we are nowadays.

And it's the fat round the middle that kills you.

[WorraLiberty]

I disagree Chit, I think it's far more about the volume of food consumed than the quality of it.

On almost every thread asking what/how slim people eat (and there have been tons over the years), it transpires that the overwhelming majority eat less than the overweight posters.

[kimann]

i let my daughter have a cream cracker whenever she asks for one - is that really bad?! sometimes she snacks on fruits or yoghurt. Should i stop these as well - she's almost 3.

[MrsHathaway]

When you say yogurt, what do you mean?

Whole milk yogurt with nothing added, or Frube?

[EpoxyResin]

I don't think people have a "fear of hunger"; not generally anyway. I think a lot of (usually overweight) people don't know what it feels like because their eating habits are so out of whack they never get that far! But your average healthy snacker (I consider myself one) does feel hungry; they just respond to it by eating!

I don't have a fear of hunger, I have a normal and natural response to it. I appreciate it's not always practical to eat when hungry and I'm perfectly capable of surviving until the next opportunity, but why would it be a universal good to feel hungry and do nothing about it? Feeling hungry a lot doesn't necessarily equal healthy eating habits or a healthy body.

[chitofftheshovel]

We'll agree to disagree then worra.

[YetAnotherSpartacus]

And it's the fat round the middle that kills you

Oh dear ... I'm a goner then! :)

I'll have to climb up to where my old school photos are stored ...

[MrsHathaway]

Oh dear ... I'm a goner then!

LOL, you and me both

[ElinorRigby]

Perhaps there's an analogy with other bodily functions. You sometimes get messages from your bladder or your bowels. But you think, 'What am I doing right now?' 'Is this a convenient time?' That sort of thing.

So if you're in a meeting with people or in the middle of an activity, you wouldn't necessarily excuse yourself and go to the loo. You'd know that you could wait a while.

But (some) people are that way about food. 'I feel a minor twinge of not having a full stomach,' morphs rapidly into 'WHERE'S MY SNACK?'

[Funnyonion17]

Yabu as how is what others do creating a constant battle with your kids? Your DC eats 2 breakfasts and a snack before dinner. My DC have one breakfast and aren't allowed a snack mid morning at school. So it's lunch, then after school i give them crisp and fruit or similar. Then they eat their dinner and sometimes have yogurt or a pudding. I don't know anyone who gives their kids the amount of snacks you described tbh.

[EpoxyResin]

But (some) people are that way about food. 'I feel a minor twinge of not having a full stomach,' morphs rapidly into 'WHERE'S MY SNACK?'

Yeah, I can imagine this, although I don't know if I know anyone like this... except how would I know if I did?? I'm sure it definitely happens though.

Equally it would be ridiculous to say, "no! I'm not going for a wee, I'm going to wait until a specific time when I'm going to have a really big wee - like I do every day - even though I definitely feel like I need a wee RIGHT NOW". We'd all have UTIs in no time

[EpoxyResin]

Just going back to those saying the French don't snack; all the time I've spent in France the children definitely did have a "snack" of sorts after school, then a late dinner - as is usual on the continent. We even learnt the word "tartine" in school before our first exchange as referring directly to that universal French after-school snack (usually a sandwich). Have things changed??

[helpmeplease2045]

And our culture seems to have developed a complete fear of hunger.

I completely agree with this, there seems to be a fear that a toddler or young child might get hungry, but surely that's the point, they get hungry by dinner so have their dinner? The problem is it seems so ingrained by such a young age. Even at nursery pick up around 3pm (and my DD 3 is provided with a snack at nursery plus had already had lunch before the session) the majority of parents are handing over a biscuit / banana / sandwich etc).

Maybe I seemed hypocritical when I said they could have fruit before tea, I guess I mean that I don't offer it nor give it regularly but if they were genuinely hungry for some reason then I wouldn't mind them having an apple / some carrot sticks etc, but really I'm sure they can wait till half five for dinner!

[Imabadmummy]

I've never had set snack times for my kids.
They have breakfast, if at home and they ask for snacks they can have fruit. Then they have lunch.
Again in the aft fruit between meals.
Then tea. They can have a pudding after tea which can be pretty much anything they choose then that's it till morning (or fruit if they are really really starving & won't stop nagging!).

They are given fruit and veg at school as snacks before & after lunch but it's not often my kids have any - unless it's bananas as they can't get enough of these!

I find we develop bad snacking habits for a few days after we have been around other familes/friends as they might have more set times and allow biscuits etc so mine are like I want that!

My youngest can graze all day on fruit if I let him (& wont bother with actual meals) where as eldest is all about sweets & choc!

I think some people do take it too far. We never had "snack time" as kids but I knew I could ask for stuff if I wanted it at home.

[Algebraic]

I never had snacks when I was younger. If I told my Mum I was hungry between meals then of course I'd get a piece of fruit or some cheese. I remember going to a childminders aged 10 and she had snack time at a dedicated hour (4pm ish). I remember finding it really strange having to sit with my cut up apple on a plate that I didn't really want...

[clearsommespace]

IME French children have four meals a day. Dinner is rarely before 7pm, so they have 'gouter' after school. It is often a sweet tartine of jam or choc spread on bread with milk or yoghurt and fruit. But they will usually sit at a table (at home or at after school club) to eat it.
It does vary though. DSIL is in a traditionally poorly educated inner city with high levels of unemployment and the parents wait outside school with bags of crisps. There are a lot of overweight children where she lives. Not all French people are slim!

[MrsHathaway]

But they will usually sit at a table (at home or at after school club) to eat it.

Another really good point. The snacking "on the go" - literally running round with a biscuit in their hand - can't be healthy for anyone!

[clearsommespace]

I forgot to say that school usually starts earlier than in the UK so breakfast is earlier, lunch is around 12 so French kids do need to eat something between lunch and dinner.

[BeyondThePage]

Wasn't Marilyn a size 16 or something

No - according to the dresses on display (and her dressmaker) - she weighed 118lbs (8st 6) was 35 - 22 - 35 inches and 5ft 5. There is no modern size equivalent as modern sizes do not cater to the hourglass figure. Even a UK size 6 has a 23 inch waist.

[Zaphodsotherhead]

I'm another hater of the word 'snack'.

Grew up in the 60's and my parents didn't have much money. Even fruit was strictly rationed within the household and my mother kept her iron fist tightly closed over the fridge handle. We ate three (decent sized) meals a day and that was that. Neither my brother nor I died of malnutrition and we got to adulthood with a healthy understanding of what 'hungry' felt like, as did most of our peers.

[IDefinitelyWould]

My dd never snacks, never asks for snacks and other than a cup of milk sometime after tea and before bed never seems to want anything. She eats well and healthily at mealtimes. My ds does not eat much in one go, ever. He will have a tiny portion of cereal or half a slice of toast for breakfast, a slice of bread with marmite or a pear or a cup of milk mid morning, lunch is sandwich or toast or scrambled egg, afternoon snack will be a banana or a biscuit and then dinner is something and rice or something and chips. He is underweight, and if he misses any of these snacks it often sends him into a spiral where he refuses the next meal/snack and so on. No idea what is going on really. So if we have to go to assembly or something then he will have a snack in the middle of it, because otherwise his behaviour and mood deteriorates until he turns into a hungry, manic little hulk.

I don't snack because I am incapable of doing it healthily. I don't want to be overweight so don't have snacks.

[blackteasplease]

Snack is a very irritating word.

Nap is quite annoying too.

I love both things but the words are very grating. I think perhaps I don't want to hear about other people's snacks and naps - they are things to keep to yourself.

I did think eating little and often was good for you, as long as it's healthy food. That could be described as "snacking"?

If I don't eat little and often my blood sugar drops and I act very grumpy/ cross-patchy if I don't make a conscious effort not to. I also have acid reflux and need to avoid big meals.

[MiddleagedManic]

Some kids walk a long way into school and back, others go in the car. Some run around in the playground, some sit on a bench and chat.

It was the same at playschool. Some kids would walk there at an early age, some would be in a pushchair constantly til age 3 or so.

Some people do seem to burn through calories quicker - or at least the results are more obvious and they get irritable, etc. - than others.

Some kids can't/won't eat certain things. It is surprising how many calories are in a glass of cow's milk compared to the other alternatives e.g. oat milk. Therefore a child having non-cow's milk may eat the same breakfast as another child but will be consuming fewer calories in the otherwise same meal.

Eat when you're hungry, try not to eat/feed kids rubbish and do exercise. Not rocket science. There are many kids who are overweight but I think it's less 'snacking' and more what they eat and how much.