To remove all sweets and chocolate from the house?

[BatFor]

We eat relatively healthy, mostly home cooked meals from scratch with the odd takeaway as a treat, and I’ve never been one to be overly strict on sweets etc as long as the kids are eating healthily otherwise.

However, DS 10 has put on a noticeable amount of weight recently, and I’ve realised that he’s been sneaking significant amounts of treats (on top of healthily meals).

I’ve tried being more watchful over what he eats. I buy very few treats for the house myself (mainly just multipacks of popcorn, crisps and cereal bars), but I have a well meaning but misguided aunt who brings an inordinate amount of junk food for the kids when she visits at the weekend, think £10-15 worth each time. I’ve asked her politely and told her bluntly not to bring so much, but she continues to do so, and the treats tend to hang around after they leave and get eat throughout the week by the whole family. This is a bone of contention in itself, and I’ve often ended up chucking huge quantities of it in the bin.

It’s been coming to a head recently, and we’ve found large amounts of empty/hidden wrappers in his room several times, which led us to banning any food upstairs. However, I’ve just argued with him again this evening as I caught him trying to sneak treats upstairs, and in a fit of annoyance I’ve chucked all the chocolate and sweets out and have told the kids that in future, they can have some treats on the day that my aunt visits, but everything else will be donated or chucked.

AIBU? I feel mean for making everyone suffer, but it’s rightly annoying me.

We have a similar situation and I wish I had the balls to do the same. I think you should.

Please don’t bin them, donate them to food bank. Or do what I do which is to have a “secret cupboard” where they are stored and only brought out in small amounts.

I understand the instinct, but there is a risk if you're too strict it'll cause more issues.

So just buy a healthy amount, and stop discussing it.

Tell the aunt she either brings a sensible amount or she stops getting invited, she's being a pain.

You’re right to limit sweet treats in the house, also look into a sport or something DS can do to improve his health.

Firstly, I'd focus less on being annoyed and more on why your son is sneaking food up to his room/overeating in this way. He needs support to tackle this.

I think donating the leftover treats to a food bank is an excellent idea. Keeps it out of the house and people living on the breadline will appreciate a treat in amongst the basic staples they often get. I would engage your children with this rather than it being "Right! That's it! I'm throwing all the sweets away because of you! There'll be no more sweets kids because your brother is fat and greedy". It's be far better to approach it as a family project to redistribute your (sweet) wealth.

IMO You will make the desire for forbidden foods increase and give him a complex about his weight. From a former fat child who ate her feelings, there could be more going on.

I’m not going to ban my aunt for bringing junk, our relationship is worth more than argument over treats. She’s a bit daft but does mean well.

Secret cupboard I would love to have but I know ds would sniff it out so it would be pointless.

YANBU to limit treats but I think you need to be careful that your son doesn’t link the argument you had and binning of treats with his weight.

I also think that he must be eating far more than you are aware of to have gained significant weight if he is otherwise only being given healthy food. Does he have access to a shop or anything at school or on his way to/from school?

I would try a locked cupboard where he needs to ask for permission before you do a total ban. Making things completely off limits will not be helpful but he clearly needs help as he has no self control.

This.

Have you tried to find out if your son is ok? How’s school? Has he got friends? Why is he bingeing on snacks? Is it because you are overly restrictive?

I think you need to tell your aunt she’s not welcome if she continues to bring sweets. Something along the lines of “Our son is overweight, I won’t be telling him he’s overweight because I don’t want him to get a complex or develop worse eating habits. However, as his parent it is imperative that I get a handle on this whilst I still can. He is at higher risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease if this continues. Please limit what you bring to one chocolate bar or one pack of sweets going forward. I would appreciate you not mentioning this to our son.”

It’s not just about his weight OP as you know. You sound like you had a good approach without her well meaning sabotage. Hopefully you can get back on track. My Dad did similar to my kids and I had to tell him, I found it very hard.

I haven’t pointed out the weight thing to him, but his behaviour suffers when he’s had excess sugar and I have pointed this out as a reason for why I want him to eat less treats.

He has been diagnosed with adhd and impulse control isn’t amazing so that might be why he tends to overeat/finds it difficult to stop.

And no, we’re definitely not over restrictive, as I’ve said, I’ve been lax if anything up to now.

Ah, now the mention of adhd and lack of impulse control. This is what is known as a big drip feed.

he literally can’t help taking the food (I have a son who has adhd and does the same), therefore you need to sneakily take it away and donate it.

If he has ADHD then you need to make sure it’s not in the house at all. However, you will also need to work with him for when he isn’t at home and wants to binge on it.

What medication is he on? That should be helping.

I think there needs to be a new family rule that sweets are for Friday and Saturday. Pretend you’re Swedish!

Make sure he has enough good food to eat if he’s hungry.

Don’t bin the sweets otherwise you’re a heartless bitch, give them to a poor persons kids. Sugar from processed food is linked to weight gain and obesity, which are significant risk factors for several types of cancer. but they’ve got nothing else right? They’ll be grateful.

Don’t be overly strict or you’ll give him a complex and it’ll be your fault he binges, has got mental health issues, is fat and has type 2.

But also, don’t be too lenient otherwise he’ll (well basically see point 2 minus the bingeing)

Fuck me there’s no wonder we’re frazzled. All sarcasm of course but jeez enough MN for me for tonight.

No food should be banned you’ll make it worse. Just have less of it.

He was on methylphenilate for a year, only during term time, but came off it because it as making him feel low. His psychologist agreed to trial without the medication and he was doing ok without it in terms of school so they were happy to let him stay off it. Behaviour is ok (apart from when sugared up) so no worries there.

I was your son. My mum restricted it, and it didn’t help. I’d go absolutely nuts anytime I was anywhere where the opportunity presented itself because it was restricted. Restriction made it scarce and scarcity creates desire. So anytime I went to family, friends I went absolutely berserk and ate anything and everything. I piled on weight. Half a stone every time I went to my nan for a week. It led to extraordinary binges.

As I became a teenager I would eat in secret, go to the shop on the way home from school, I’d spend pocket money exclusively on junk.

It was only when I became an adult and it was available 24/7 that I lost interest.

If impulse control is a problem that’s the part you have to work on. For me, banning it just made it ten times worse.

But the point being, treats are rationed. Ie the stash is physically locked away.

That said, tou need to find the cause of DSs need to steal food. Is he actually hungry, is he comfort eating due to exam stress or bullying?

Removing them entirely will likely cause eating issues later so do tread carefully.

Life long problems with food follow this shaming strategy

i would remove it entirely. junk food shouldn’t be normalised as part of his regular diet.

I'm sure I've seen locks to lock a cupboard.