Teachers said my DD didn't have enough to eat

[StoppinBy]

First off I think I am BU at how much I let this upset me for personal reasons but I am seeking clarification on whether I actually do send her enough.

When I picked up DD6 the teacher in charge at the time said to me that one of DD's teachers had said that I wasn't sending enough for her to eat, yesterday she had :

A vegemite sandwich, two cherry tomatoes, an apple, a chunk of cheese cut off the block and a big handful of nuts, she brought home a cherry tomato, some of her crust and some of her nuts .

The reasoning behind saying she didn't have enough food was that she had eaten her sandwich and a tomato and her cheese at 'snack time' - 11am and then had her nuts and apple at lunch - 1pm. Apparently she often does this.

We usually have lunch at 11:30 - 12 at home to fit around DS's naps so personally I can't see the issue with how she ate and I feel that if she was actually hungry that she would eat everything in her lunch box but she regularly brings stuff home.

AIBU to think that she does have enough food and that the teachers are actually wrong or do most kids eat more than that?

OP Just re-read and I hope it was obvious I do NOT think YOU are the weird one on this thread!

Food waste is a real problem and sending extra food for no purpose is not sensible at all.

School also should NOT be policing when kids take on which calories. Don't they have something more worthwhile to worry about?

I actually think there is an issue here.
The school has raised it with the parent.
Parent refuses to accept any issue
Next step will be social services.

OP is very angry about my posts, so I'm not sure I'm adding anything to the discussion, but if a child is flagged as hungry at school, and by the mother's admission eats the crusts with her little brother when home, then there is a lot wrong with this picture.

You can all pander to this OP etc., but there is a lot that I can see wrong here and I am glad the teachers are on it.

What on Earth would they tell social services? That a child eats her food at different times to others but says she has plenty of food and isn’t hungry?

A vegimite sandwich? That's like two pieces of bread.

Despite what the OP has said about the DC normally getting deli meats, I'd be willing to wager a bet that the OP is either neglectful or wants her DC to be veggie.
The teacher's attention has been drawn to the lack of food.
The parent disagrees.
The parent is being a complete and utter asshole on here.

Yes, I would be reporting neglect if I was the teacher.

Knee highs comments are so ridiculous I think she’s the one with food issues. Nutella on toast as a meal. Really.

OP - to give you an idea of what 15 year old ds eats (when given free reign he too eats his lunch at 10.15am break time)

8am - small bowl of weeto protein crunch with milk or yoghurt

10.15 am - one sandwich or crusty roll or half a bagel with Philadelphia. Lentil chips or bag of French fries. Grapes

12.30noon mini rice pudding pot or yoghurt or mini flapjack/cake Bar

I also used to send crispbreads or breadsticks and Philadelphia but they were never eaten. The same if I send extra grapes or cucumber/carrot sticks. I send a whole bagel and half comes home. I put money on his lunch account so he can buy a slice of pizza or pasta pot and it’s unused. He does however arrive home and 4pm and is straight in the kitchen making himself pasta or eating hummus chips.

Evening meal is then 6.30pm

On weekends he prefers not to eat breakfast but have brunch instead around 11am.

I think the posters who say you are starving your child are being very rude.

The lunch contents are fine.

DD eating in what order she chooses is fine.

All of this is fine. Except being called some of the things you've been called, so I've reported those.

Ok, I have two DC. Eldest will eat and eat and eat and we have to monitor (and yes, 'control') what she has access to. She will be 12 this year.

Youngest has a fluctuatinf appetite. She used to eat like a bird and is very, very skinny and beanpole-like. But over the last year she has begun to eat so much more and we don't know where it goes, either.

I was called in to one of their schools (we moved, before anyone questions that) to talk about what I was sending them in with, and was repeatedly pushed to put them on school dinners. But at that time, my youngest was dairy free and the school wouldn't adhere to that rule, so if they fed her I would be called in because she would soil herself.

Sometimes she ate more, sometimes she would bring home almost the entire contents of her lunchbox. But mostly I would send her in with at least a meat or vegan cheese sandwich, fruit, sweet snack, maybe some veg sticks and her water. Occasionally they were allowed crisps or an unhealthier treat. Sometimes I sent a sandwich made from one slice of bread folded over. But they picked on me all the same and kept on about the free school meals. I didn't trust them to feed her properly. On more than three occasions they gave her milk to drink, then poosplosions happened.

OP, the only thing I would add to her lunchbox is something lile a cereal bar which is wrapped and can travel back and forth unopened, because foodwaste is a huge deal. I know for me, back when my kids were at the school I've described, I wouldn't have been able to afford them wasting food.

It's fairly obvious to anyone who has more than 2 brain cells that the child must have complained about hunger. Teachers don't go around policing lunch boxes!
The OP won't accept that, she wants to go head to head with the teacher.
Honey, no matter what you say, if your child is hungry, they're being neglected.

The lunch sounds perfect. My 15 year old has always eaten the majority of his lunch at break then his "snack" at lunchtime and he has breakfast.
I also work in a high school and see our students often eating their sandwiches at break.
Don't let the buggers get you down

The child has not complained of hunger. If they had the OP would have been informed of that.

Instead they complained she ate her lunch at snack time.

OP does sound a bit controlling. Who gets so irate about a one off comment? Of course a teacher might be concerned about a child who is hungry enough to eat their sandwich at snack time and has nothing but scraps until home time? Then eats a load of crusts with her brother as an after school snack? Why just give her an extra sandwich with something better than vegemite? If she doesn't eat it then you can stop providing it? Why the huge melodrama?

You know OP my mum had a similar thing years ago with my brother. She got told by school he wasn’t given enough in his packed lunch.

My brother has always had a huge breakfast. As a kid it was between 3-5 Shredded Wheat. He then eats very little for lunch (I work with him and he usually has lunch around 2pm - egg on toast. At school he simply was not hungry at 12 noon. So mum used to send him with half a sandwich and a bag of crisps and he’d bring the sandwich home and eat the crisps on his way home from school.

He’d then have a huge tea at 5pm.

Just ignore the idiots and step away.

@knee then you would be shocked to know we butcher our roosters and that it is me the does the job.

Social services will not be knocking on my door and if they do they are more than welcome to do so, I have nothing to hide.

You sound like a nasty person, I am going to assume that you have had a shitty day and that you normally aren't such a shitty person.

Thank you everyone, I will talk to my daughters teachers on Monday and get it straight from the horse's mouth so to speak as to why it was actually brought up and will go from there.

"Better than vegemite"?! What an outrageous suggestion. There is nothing more appropriate for an Aussie kid's lunch than a vegemite sandwich!

DS1 has in his lunchbox a vegemite sandwich and a banana. He has in his pocket a smartphone with the capacity to order/pay via the canteen app if he wishes, it is tied directly to my credit card, I have not set a limit and he is free to use. He also usually has cash with him and passes shops on his walk. He doesn't bother because he has breakfast at home, his lunch at school, a snack when he gets in, followed by an evening meal.

Children are not starved by eating a sandwich and a bit of fruit for lunch. The vast majority of children are now overfed.

Not everyone's vegemite goes right to the edges OP.

I think a PP has probably cracked it. The teacher who was concerned didn't know about the earlier sandwich eaten at recess, so all she saw were the smaller bits.

I am sure you will smooth it out no worries.

We ate in our classrooms as we had no communal eating area, and no cooking or heating facilities so no school food. This is still the case in primary schools in Ireland afaik

@mathanxiety yes. Still the case in most schools. They have break at 11ish and lunch at half12ish. They can eat whatever they want whenever they want. All schools are finished by LATEST of 3 ( my DD,s school finishes at 1.20 for infants and 2.20 for the rest of school.

Nutella on toast as an evening meal??!!im presuming this is viewed as ok because of the lovely nanny state the english education system has created by providing hot meals. 🙄 parents being unaccountable as usual

My kids were given fruit at break and we could pay for milk, perhaps the answer is to give breakfast closer to school start time - mine used to eat it about 8.30, or even on the way as they were not early risers (they still eat en route today as adults)

@Kneehigim yes actually when I worked in the uk we checked all the lunches for unacceptable items as did the midday supervisor

God you can't win can you. My dds are only allowed one item at snack time whether they are starving or not it really grinds my gears

I thought thw nutella on toast was a before bed snack. Common in families with early dinner times (think milk and cookies).

Nothing wrong with it. When you ban food like nutella entirely and never eat food with sugar in I think youre setting yourself up for an ED. Othorexia is currently a buzzword. But in my ED group many adults had v controlled diets as kids.

She may be eating the sandwich at snack time because it's quicker to eat so she can go out to play.

Her lunch is totally fine and if she’s not even eating all of it she’s clearly not hungry. It doesn’t matter if my kids or someone else’s kids would be hungry - OP’s clearly isn’t and I wouldn’t be wasting food just to appease some teacher.

I thought thw nutella on toast was a before bed snack. Common in families with early dinner times (think milk and cookies). Still unnecessary as I read her full post! If she knows DD is having dinner in after school I would be holding off on her dinner til later (then a before bed “snack” is not necessary!) mine don’t have dinner until half 5/6 and then they play and have bath and bed. So something like this;
7.15 breakfast
11.00 small break in school
12.30 lunchtime in school
2.30 snack in Afterschool
5.30/6 dinner time at home
7.15 bed

@Kneehigim teachers most certainly police lunch boxes as do lunchtime supervisors, I am always surprised how strict they are.