To have given her extra food?

[jerkorperk]

Last week I looked after a friend's DC for an afternoon as she is going somewhere her DC can't.

I offered. No problem there

She was given a packed lunch when her mum dropped her off. I said there was no need but her mum just said 'oh no, honestly, it's fine'

Assuming fussy eater etc I didn't question it and just let her have her packed lunch. We had some lunch alongside her

She had finished what she had and asked if she could try what I was eating. I said no problem, of course. And gave her a plate. I said eat what you like and don't worry about leaving what you don't

She ate it all. And for all of us afterwards, I had a cake. It was a red velvet cake from Costco. It is really yum and a nice treat

She had a slice and then another slice because she enjoyed it. She left a bit of the additional slice. Again, a non issue

I got a harshly worded text from her mum that said 'Hi, Y said you gave her additional food after her lunch provided. In addition to this, she had gorged on a lot of cake too? Please in future can you stick to what I provide'

AIBU to think what's the big issue? Have I overstepped some mark I didn't know about The little girl is 7. My own daughter is 2

Seems quite controlling of the mother, obviously I don’t why.

YANBU OP the child /guest asked for some food and you gave her some. I can’t see anything wrong there.

Good. Don't.
Just leave her ungracious text hanging there.

Children know from quite small if they have allergies and/or intolerances so will tell you as they don't want to be sick from them.

I would text back something along the lines of.
”Perhaps you should provide enough food so that your child isn’t desperately hungry”. And then block her.

Is this the first time you’ve looked after her?

How good a friend is she?

I’d be very angry if I’d received that text from a friend. It would be the last time I ever did her a favour I’m afraid, and the friendship would do a slow fade.

Not always true to be fair.
Many of them do but it can’t be relied on.
I would always check with a parent before I fed a child in my care.
It is a potential reason why mum wouldn’t want her fed - doesn’t seem likely in this case to be fair.

You did over feed her child when she said she just needs her packed lunch - but I would have let it go and not been so rude.

Considering you were doing her a favour this was massively rude, unless the child has special dietary requirements the mum is way out of order and you should call her out on it. I have a reciprocal childcare arrangement with a mum friend, sometimes she gives my DC more sweets than I would but ultimately it's not doing him any harm and she's doing me a favour so I'd never dream of sending her a message like this mum has sent you, so rude.

Absolutely this

I feel really sorry for the daughter. I don’t think you did anything wrong there at all.

I can never understand why people can't let things go or be more tactful.

A text like that is never a good idea.

It sounds like the child's eating is very much - too much - controlled at home and she was revelling in having more than she usually gets. The lunch she was sent with doesn't seem very filling for a 7yo.
I wonder if mum has a difficult relationship with food and is passing it on to her DD.

She’s incredibly rude!

I would go back and simply say “X was hungry after her packed lunch, she asked for some of our family food and then everyone shared some cake. Is there a reason why I shouldn’t give her food when she is clearly hungry?”

if there is a genuine reason why, she should have told you when she dropped her off. If there is no reason then shes just being a controlling weirdo

I wouldn't have given two slices of cake.

But if someone was doing me a favour looking after my child, I wouldn't complain about it either.

YANBU. I would reply saying that the daughter asked as she was hungry after eating her packed lunch.
My DS6 would eat more than that for lunch!!

If she was mine I would think it was really kind of you to spoil her while she was with you! It sounds like she might be very controlling around food.

In future - have you agreed to minding her daughter regularly or has she just assumed?

I wouldn’t be minding her again. If it was a regular thing and she was concerned about food consumption than that’s one thing, but a friend doing a a one off favour (especially when you don’t have kids the same age so not like she was just fitting in with your usual routine) then it’s just rude.

What weird thing to say! What sort of strange person gets annoyed because their child has been offered plenty of food when they are being looked after by someone else?

Please in future can you stick to what I provide

In future? She's presuming that you'll have her kid again? Text her back that there won't be a 'future'.

Of course you weren't being unreasonable to have offered her some of what you were eating. That's normal polite hosting etiquette surely?

Wonder if her mum has an eating disorder and half starves her daughter as a method of control? I had a friend whose mum was like this and friend was always offered food when she came to mine as she was always so bloody hungry, poor sod. 🫤

Well she wouldn’t need to worry about next time because there absolutely wouldn’t be a next time if she spoke to me like that after I did her a favour. My 7 year old would absolutely eat that much, I’d just be happy the person didn’t mind my dc eating so much of their food!

I’ve got a 7 year old daughter and she’s like a bottomless pit when it comes to food. Rake thin and eats like an adult. What this girls mother provided would be a snack to her.

This woman sounds like she’s got issues with food. What you did was normal and not overstepping. The text was judgey and the language “gorged” was goady. Very rude.

Maybe she should have packed her a decent lunch then.

You deffo didn't do anything wrong here. That woman sounds very rude. You did her a favour and she's concerned over some extra food and cake?
Maybe the child is restricted food and that's why they wanted extra at yours as they aren't usually allowed.

Please tell me you’ve told her what she can do next time she needs your childcare. Also, tell her how rude she is.

i have a 6yo allergy child she knows what she can and can’t eat. By 7yo most children will tell you what they can and can’t eat whether allergy or parent rules.

I regularly have kids at my house, I make it clear to parents I’m very relaxed on snacks, with the exception of eating just before a meal I don’t restrict what the children that come here have, whether it’s crisps, fruit, cake, smoothies icepops, as long as they aren’t taking the piss. Tonight I picked my DDs 7yo friend up after school, it was late as they had afterschool club, I met them with a bueno each, then the 2 of them tucked into my 6yos left over popcorn from her lunch box in the car. At 5pm they asked for a snack but I was serving dinner at 5.30 because they had rainbows at 6pm so said they could wait and help me set the table up. The 2 of them ate 3 potions of curry and rice, no idea how many poppadoms they ate, the packet was empty one had bananas with her curry. I had served up enough for 4 of us, if anything it would easily have served 5 and left the rest in the pot for my DH to have. My 12 yo had a normal potion, so did I but I ended up getting half of DHs out and letting the 2 little ones split it. The rice was enough for 4, I had a bit but not much and older dd had very little, the little ones practically demolished the rest. We didn’t have time for desert so they grabbed a lollipop and a seal bar each, the lollipops they had on the way to rainbows and the seal bars they left in the car for after. They also had 2 innocent smoothies, they got one ready for dinner but drunk them fast so both grabbed a 2nd one.

I’ve also had children come here who barely eat anything. I will happily make a child a jam butty or bowl of cereal if they don’t like what’s on offer. If a parent didn’t like the fact their child had a jam butty instead of veggies and rice that’s their problem, I won’t see a child hungry in my house, if I have something they want to eat, as long as it’s not a 10th slice of cake, they are welcome to it.

Neither my dd or her friend are overweight, my dd is tiny but has a huge appetite, the other child has an even bigger appetite, it’s a standing joke she comes to my house every Tuesday to eat all my food. I will guarantee if I message her parents she would have said she was hungry when she got home and would have a second dinner. I also guarantee if they got shitty about any kind of care I was giving their child they wouldn’t be getting care from me ever again.

It would be a very different story if there was an eating, food or health issue, but I’d expect to be informed if there was.