To not want DS to eat processed food all the time

[GeneralCustard]

DH was brought up on, quite frankly, a rubbish diet. DH remembers having Pot Noodles and crisps for dinner two or three times a week, tinned macaroni or beans on toast with crisps on other nights, a Milky Way for pudding and Vesta curries as a weekend treat.

He does not remember eating vegetables!

Anyway, even though he now knows about healthy eating and I’M A COOK he still comes back from the supermarket with absolute crap. Ready meals, stuff full of E numbers designed to appeal to children, huge bags of sweets, multipack of crisps, plasticy looking puddings, juice drinks, full sugar pop, flavoured stuff...

I cook. I cook every day. There are homemade “ready meals” in the freezer. But DH says it’s fun to buy these things and it didn’t do him any harm. It did! He’s overweight and has a sweet habit that he’s had since he was a toddler. The doctor has warned him about his diet. He’s put on overvtwo stone since DS was weaned because he’s rediscovered his childhood food. He’s ten years younger than me and I can out run, walk and swim him.

I am determined that DS doesn’t go the same way but the minute my back is turned he’s being fed crap. Luckily I’ve taught him about healthy eating and unlike his father he shuns most of it. He’s five.

Ponoka7

We both should make sacrifices. I gave up my horse because DH wants to live in the city so he doesn’t have a long commute to work. I’m a cook, I now have a tiny kitchen and had to give up my herb and vegetable gardens and my canning and juicing tools etc. For his part he should leave his crisps and junk (none of it needs cooking more than microwaving which they have in the office kitchen) in his big corner office that is bigger than our kitchen!

I think you need to compromise a little...theres no harm in a child having the odd bag of crisps or a ready meal now and then...
Can you sit down with him and devise a shopping list or weekly meal planner thing where he gets one day to feed your child whatever he thinks is fun? Or he gets some free choices in the shopping list but then has to buy the things you've written dow as well?

Your dh has the right to eat what he likes no matter how unhealthy. You are his partner though and do have the right to tell him that this will do him no good longterm. As a parent I would absolutely go ape if my dh was trying to feed our kids processed food all the time. We are both capable of cooking fresh food from scratch and do. I believe in everything in moderation so will give my kids fish fingers if they want them, equally I will make them them homemade fish cakes too.

I would be having a serious discussion about how his diet is his choice but you dont want his negative eating habits affecting your child. It's a shame his mum didn't cook for him ( who knows why she would give packet, tinned food over fresh but that was her choice for her child), you can choose to do things differently if you want.

Your dh has the right to eat what he likes no matter how unhealthy.

Absolutely. I am asking him to not feed DS with this stuff, not himself. He actually tempts him saying how delicious it is and if he’s feeding him and I’m not there he’ll always cook junk and not offer a choice.

Family meals, if the vegetables aren’t integral, DH never takes a portion. If I’ve plated the meal, he’ll leave them often. I used to worry about this but fortunately DS loves a lot of vegetables. But if they are not offered, he can’t eat them. When they went away overnight, DS told me they had had McDonalds for dinner, bacon sandwiches for breakfast and McDonald’s again for lunch 😩. DH’s defence was “it was easiest” but DS came home staving because he didn’t eat much. The healthy snacks I had packed for the car remained in the boot!

Krisskrosskriss has the right idea - a bit of give and take. 1 or 2 meals from his choice seems fair.

You've already said your husband is only around at the weekends for family meals. I don't really understand how much damage he can inflict on your child.

And returning/removing food he likes because you don't like it seems a bit draconian.

And your title is misleading - the majority of the meals your child eats are nutritious (as you are cooking them).

Notonthestairs I meant DH wants him to eat processed food all the time. I don’t.

DH thinks I am being unreasonable because “that’s what children eat”. It isn’t!

I think you have to expect him pushing back if you come across to him they way you are here tbh.

I've never seen such superiority and smugness on here as there is in this thread!

But if you are doing the family cooking and your DH only gets involved/is present at the weekends then the harm from his preferred diet is rather diminished.

You can't control your husbands diet but you are controlling the vast majority of your child's - I'd leave it at that.

Yanbu. This is a hill to die on, so to speak. He's setting your son up for a lifetime of struggles with weight and health. Can you have a "come to jesus" with your DH? He can feel free to eat his junk outside the home, but as a parent he NEEDS to be responsible for setting a good example. That means not displaying unhealthy behaviors, not feeding or eating crap in front of his son when its just the two of them. My husband used to do this and it drove me batty. A slurpee on the way home before dinner for 3 and 4 yo? His excuse? Well I had to stop at the convenience store on the way home and couldn't not get them anything!! I would say "really? I say no everyday. They give me no trouble because they know it's not happening! " uggg...sorry, your post is triggering bad/frustrating memories for me. But bottom line, stand your ground! His health is worth it.

Notonthestairs it’s become more of an issue because of the holidays, DH was around more. On holiday I was shocked by what he ate, 5000 calories ish I guess in a day!

But he is around for dinner time and weekends and that’s when he tries to tempt DS. So it’s a daily thing. There’s enough pressure outside the home for bad habits without being exposed daily inside as well.

Thing is not everything has to be home cooked, nothing wrong with the odd bacon sandwich, bag of crisps, ice cream etc. No reason why ds can’t have home cooked food and a bag of crisps now and then.

Most of your ds meals are home cooked by you so his hardly being stuffed full of junk now is he. Keep home cooking, giving veg and the odd bag of crisps is fine as it all balances out.

Your dh is an adult and can eat as he wishes. You can raise concern but bare in mind nobody has ever been nagged in to a diet!

Also most parents go for ease when away with a child and McDonald’s while not the best choice it is just a burger and chips 🤷🏻‍♀️ Not crack

You are going to have to chill out on this......

well the holidays are always an odd blip. You'll soon be back in to routine.

We have pre teens. My DH doesn't eat the way I do. He is only around for meals for a small percentage of the week. The kids broadly follow my lead not his. I haven't had to ban or bin anything. When I'm not around they'll eat Dominos - this doesn't bother me because the rest of the time they eat well (ish).

If your child eats well the majority of the time then this isn't the hill to die on.

I have to go out now so I'm not ignoring any reply - just sorting secondary school uniform!

YADNBU op. M’y mum did cook, but she really didn’t like veg, fruit or salad so I grew up believing they were optional and that only weirdos liked broccoli. In fact I didn’t eat broccoli until I was in my 20s!

It took a long time, but I generally eat a great diet now - bar the odd bacon sandwich. I can’t remember what changed me though... going to uni and meeting people who were vegetarians and eating with them. Reading about food and wanting to try new things. I lived part time back at home while doing a masters, and that was tough. My mum was still eating the same way... so I basically took over cooking when I was there simply so I could include some veg / salad in our meals. My mum was uncomfortable with being served veggies and salads. Even now, many years later, she refers to me «forcing her to eat huge plates of lettuce» this is not true! When ds was a newborn and really unsettled, she suggested that somehow the salad / veg I was eating at mealtimes (normal food, cooked by DH!) was affecting my milk and making him windy...

I know it’s unfair, but I have very little patience with adults that eat like fussy children. It’s bad enough that all that crap is marketed at kids - but for grown, rational adults to actively choose to eat it?

Sorry, no suggestions, but lots of sympathy. Hopefully once the holidays are over a more healthy routine will get underway. Would your husband agree to compromise if you work out a few occasions during the week when «junk» is on the menu?

A bit of crappy food is okay (we had chips for dinner), but it shouldn’t be a regular thing.

Your partner chose to be a parent, when he made that choice he should have realised that not only do his children come first, but he also needs to be setting a good example.

If he wants to eat a lot of junk he needs to do it away from the children, such as at work.

SimonJT that’s what I think and what I have said but I think his greed overtakes that. I think he has a problem actually, he’s eating more and more.

I’d made chicken stew tonight. DS couldn’t help much as it was chopping and simmering mostly, but when it was done I let him ladle out the bowlfuls. DH immediately said he didn’t want it. Even though it was there on the table. Consequently DS refused to eat his. I had spoken to DH earlier in the day before I made it and he said it was fine. So angry.

An hour later DS was hungry. I served it up again and DH, chagrined (I had said nothing but he knew he was at fault for not even pretending to eat some for DS’s sake) had some with him. They both ate it all.

DH is now eating Magnums again.

Wallywallywally

”...she suggested that somehow the salad / veg I was eating at mealtimes (normal food, cooked by DH!) was affecting my milk and making him windy...”

😩

I don’t know how to cope with ignorance like this. My MIL told me to drink whisky when I was breastfeeding because it “knocked the baby out for the night”.

😶

Notonthestairs

Hope you got your uniform sorted. We’re going for shoes tomorrow.

You see I don't know the background to you having a child, but these are the types of things you need to discuss beforehand.

Dh is a pain in the arse with food. Due to a very strict mother force feeding regardless. He won't eat a lot of veg, and would exist on purely meat. He gets its bad, and would never make a face or a fuss infront of DD.

It's a bit like saying you know you married a gambler, but thought you would change that, after the child was here. It doesn't happen.

You made the decision to have a child with someone who has these lifestyle choices and who is an eucalyptus parent to you, so I don't see how you change or overrule that now.

Equal parent.

moobar I googled eucalyptus parent!

DH was never as bad before we had DS. He was certainly more of a junk food eater than I but used to like my cooking and was upfront about the crap he was brought up on. In fact he learned to make several dishes better than I because he had the cooking bug for a while.

But as posted, being a parent means he has rediscovered all the crap he used to eat and he’s searching for it 🧐. He never had magnums in the freezer before. He didn’t have a sweet tin or buy crisps in bags of 18. He was looking for processed cheese in little square slices the other day because he remembered when we were at the beach that he used to have it as a child and in a hot day it melted and you had to lick it off the plastic. Huh? He wanted to buy cream in a tin(sterilised or maybe evaporated milk, he didn’t know) to go with some tinned fruit in syrup he’d found. I’ve never seen him eat such stuff ever before DS was born.