Does you cook with wine for your toddler?

[missladybird]

Slightly panicking about dd having beef gravy with red wine yesterday. I have bad anxiety and alcohol is a massive trigger due to my childhood and living with an alcoholic. I would never ever serve food cooked in wine but didn't realise yesterday until it was too late.

Am I overreacting or would you freak out too?

Please, please, please don't obsess about this.

For a start, the amount of wine that will have been put into the sauce will be a small amount - say one glass in a sauce that will serve four people.

And then, during the cooking, the alcohol will be cooked out. There may be a little bit left, but it will be a teeny, tiny amount and will not do your child any harm whatsoever.

None of mine will eat booze free Bol!

My DH has OCD too and has been very worried about our DD accidentally eating anything with alcohol in. I think there was a bit of 'pristine alcohol freeness' going on...and after I committed the 'crime' of letting her taste a stollen bite that had alcohol listed, he actually relaxed quite a bit (after the initial anxiety spike).

Maybe you will find this the same way - now your child has had a tiny inconsequential amount, you don't have to worry about them never having ANY, because that boat has sailed - and with no ill effects.

I hope you feel better soon.

Dude!
chill!
google it
the alcohol mostly cooks off during the cooking process,
it really does
and just leaves the flavor , and a tiny sprinkle in the desert will be OK, that if it was even alcohol and not just a flavored essence!
Dont make a big drama out of it, all you will be doing is making alcohol a big exciting mystery and that is far more harmful than a tiny bit used in cooking! trust me
if you lived in France etc it would be normal for children to be given a small glass of watered down wine with a meal, takes the mystery out of it ( and maybe teaches them that most tastes like shit) so dont panic, take a deep breath and remind yourself you are doing a good job as a mum and every thing is OK!

I'm glad OP has seen a GP.

I really really resent MNHQ deleting my previous message.
I believe this level of anxiety is not ok. I believe it's damaging to children.
It really bothers me that it's not ok to talk about this.

If you can, take a deep breath and tell yourself “This is the anxiety talking. My anxiety is making me question this. Not the food I’ve fed my child.” Anxiety is the worst thing, OP, and I’ve been in your shoes. This might sound counter intuitive but try not to resist the anxiety - acknowledge it and let it wash over you. And tell yourself that you’re feeling anxious and it’ll pass. It will pass. It’s almost like a contraction - tending your body won’t help, but trying to breathe through it will.

I have such compassion for you, OP. If you haven’t already, please do see professional help, I take sertraline for anxiety and it saved me.

That should read “tensing your body”

OP given your recent research with the supermarket gravies and pasta sauces and your own admission that this is about 'breaking the rule' rather than about fear of actual physical harm to DD, would you consider changing your rule to allow sauces and gravy containing alcohol at home but perhaps still avoid products which do have an actual alcohol warning on them such as some trifles and filled chocolates? I think that new rule would give DD a more 'normal' perspective on alcohol.

OP, do re-read those helpful people who have done the calculations for you. Your little one will be fine.

Unfortunately there are also quite a few posters on here who clearly have little understanding of what it is like to deal with an anxiety disorder. Can I say from experience that getting a bit mean and telling someone to get a grip or the like generally is very unhelpful. As a fellow sufferer of episodes of anxiety, I can tell you it usually only makes things worse for the person panicking.

OP, do you have any strategies for dealing with the anxiety? Breathing exercises or mindfulness? Please don't let this ruin your Christmas. This is not your fault.

missladybird

If you try to picture a time or world where your days were freed up of this - what would you do instead? If you weren't researching supermarket websites for example yesterday - what else might you have done in that time?

Can you literally, list down, what else someone (say also a mum, also with a little one, your age) - is doing right now if they aren't obsessing about this?

Are they going out for walks?
Perhaps researching books to choose for their kid?
Perhaps planning the next holiday?
Baking a cake?

Can you think of anything else that your time spent in these anxious spirals may be useful for?

I'm really pleased that you have come down from the anxiety now. It's awful and I completely understand how the rational thoughts don't stand a chance when in the throes of anxiety taking control. The physical feeling of it is horrendous and exhausting too. So I really do get it.

Is the counselling with someone who understands OCD or a regular counsellor? If the latter, you need to push for the former.

I would add my voice to the others who are saying that, at the moment, your anxiety, and the rules you have created around this, is a greater threat to your daughter's health and wellbeing than any accidental breaking of those rules is going to be.

I know you've explained that it's the rule breaking rather than the alcohol that is bothering you but, as you asked earlier, yes, I did give my children food cooked with alcohol in it at your daughter's age. Homemade risottos, bolognese sauces, steak and ale pies, Christmas pudding, rum butter, brandy sauce...

I understand the origins of your anxiety; both my exh's parents are alcoholics and, whilst he doesn't have anxiety around it, he chooses not to drink. But he does cook with alcohol and does feed the children that food.

So why is it labelled beef and red wine gravy if it's not like drinking wine?

Because red wine gravy sounds more luxurious and luxury equals a premium price. The rules governing alcohol consumption are a lot stricter than a lot of the other ingredients that manufacturers use in the manufacturing process. Op if you only knew how little chicken can legally be in a can of soup for it to be called chicken soup, you’d be amazed/ angry.

I drink less than ten units of alcohol a year (never developed the taste for it) but I’ll add large glugs of the stuff when cooking because most of the alcohol will be converted to sugar when exposed to high heat. I recently ate beef made in a slow cooker and it tasted vile because wine was added at the beginning of the cooking process and because of the low cooking temperature, the alcohol didn’t evaporate.

Anyway as you know deep down, this isn’t an alcohol issue it’s an anxiety one. Good luck.

*I'm glad OP has seen a GP.

I really really resent MNHQ deleting my previous message.
I believe this level of anxiety is not ok. I believe it's damaging to children.
It really bothers me that it's not ok to talk about this.*

You are right that this level of anxiety can be damaging to children, but think how much more anxious you could make the OP by suggesting what you did. How was it going to help her??? It was extremely irresponsible.

Actually, although it might sound like you are feeding your anxiety by researching products on supermarket web sites, I think it's been quite a positive thing for you to do, as you managed to draw the conclusion that a bit of wine in a lasagne or a Bolognese is "obviously safe for children to consume".
You have armed yourself with a bit of knowledge and that will help you avoid surprises in the future.
Obviously the ideal would be that your counseling will help you cope with anxiety a when lot better, but as it's not until the end of January, you have given yourself some useful information to help you cope short term.
Try not to spend hours every day looking stuff up ( as a PP said, why not research books for your DD or play a board game with her in that time instead?).
But as a one off exercise it seems to have alleviated your fears.

My parents regularly gave me a small glass of watered down wine with Sunday lunch from about the age of 5 - I am still here to tell the tale!

I just want to say thank you to everyone on this thread who have helped me through this. OCD is evil and although I keep on top of it most of the time, sometimes it does get the better of me.

A couple of posters have been quite harsh, particularly the one who said I shouldn't be able to 'keep' my child - I agree that my anxiety could have a negative impact on dd but I'm trying my best to overcome it and always will. It doesn't define me and it certainly doesn't make me a bad mother.

A couple of posters have been quite harsh, particularly the one who said I shouldn't be able to 'keep' my child - I agree that my anxiety could have a negative impact on dd but I'm trying my best to overcome it and always will. It doesn't define me and it certainly doesn't make me a bad mother.

That comment was absolutely vile and I’m so glad it got deleted. I’m just sorry you had to see it before it did.

My mother has anxiety and my father has very severe OCD, possibly even worse than yours. There were difficult moments in my childhood but overall I had the most loving, supportive upbringing anyone could hope for. The suggestion that they shouldn’t have been allowed to ‘keep’ me due to their mental health issues is absolutely laughable.

I really really resent MNHQ deleting my previous message.
I believe this level of anxiety is not ok. I believe it's damaging to children.
It really bothers me that it's not ok to talk about this.

It is ok to talk about it, just not ok to be needlessly cruel. Why not try to have a bit of compassion?

@missladybird I am glad you are feeling better and hope you can ignore the comments from the GFs and take the good from this thread.

OCD doesn't and will never make you a bad mother. In fact, the fact that you worry about being in the bad mother indicates that you are a good mother... Bad mothers wouldn't care if they were doing a good job or not.

It's not a lack of compassion. I think this is a serious issue for the child involved.

Telling someone their child should be taken away because they are ill isn't a lack of compassion?

Oblomov17, you do realise that a child can be badly damaged by being removed from a mother who loves her more than anything? I have 2 adopted DDs. One of them has Attachment Disorder, which is common in adopted children.

Obviously sometimes it has to be done for the child's safety, but it should only be as a last resort.

You should be ashamed of yourself speaking about it so glibly.

Yes. I'm well aware. And I'm not talking about it glibly or flippantly.
It's a very serious issue that needs to be addressed.

Oblomov as you can clearly see if you read my posts, it is being addressed. I'm doing everything I can to get this under control. You have no idea who I am or what I'm like as a parent - my child is 100% happy, loved and cared for. Why on earth would she be better off without me?

Are you a perfect mother?

Oblomov17

First of all, it is a lack of compassion. Your comment was completely devoid of empathy.

Secondly, you seem to be under the impression that no action is being taken, despite the op giving updates as to what she is doing to address the situation - suggest that you rtwt.