She ate all the biscuits

[Imissmusic]

I got a pack of chocolate chip cookies for today after dinner for everyone to have a few-Dd has a balanced diet but we don’t have a dessert or biscuits, crisps etc every night or in the house that often-more on weekends or if we bake something.
I hid the rest of the biscuits away for another day.
I went to have a shower, when Dd came up to bed, she told me she looked everywhere for them, found them and ate them.

Would you be cross? She’s 7

Ideally you wouldn’t need to ‘hide’ food but the real issue here is why she can’t accept that she can’t have it when it’s in the house? As I’ve just said in my PP my 4yo can accept that. We had a tin of sweets and Christmas and he had a few every day. He didn’t sneak about getting the tin out when my back was turned. I don’t think this sounds like typical behaviour unless she has behavioural issues generally.

I do find it quite strange behaviour. My 8 yo is a sugar fiend but wouldn’t eat a whole bunch of cookies without asking. He will say in the evening “I’m hungry” which is code for wanting a sweet treat and we have the chat of what he’s had that day and what we have that is ok to eat. Sometimes a treat if he hasn’t had too much sweet stuff and sometimes a healthy snack if it’s been a sweet filled day.

Is it odd she ate the pack? Could other kids not do that? She has plenty of food choices, is tall, slim and active…she just loves sweets, chocolates and crisps

Sorry but I disagree with the majority here. This needs to be punishable behaviour at this point. She has absolutely no self control around food and that is not a good thing.

Treats should be labelled as treats because that's what they are. All this "there's no such thing as good and bad food" is nonsense and you are setting your child up for lifelong food problems if you do not teach her how to control herself.

I think so. Mine just wouldn’t because he knows it wouldn’t be allowed, though I know he could in theory, judging from the amount of stuff he packs away at parties and on holiday 🤣

@Imissmusic I’m wondering two things:

• could you notice times when she stops eating of her own accord and positively reinforce that, eg. “Well done for listening to your body/ recognising you’re feeling full now”. I think there’s still so much focus on “eating what’s on your plate” that our kids aren’t learning to listen in to their bodies
• Be curious (if you see her guzzling down a packet of something) about how it feels; what makes it hard to stop etc, so that you can get a bit more of an understanding of it - and then think of something you can struggle to resist and share how you cope with that. I’d be interested to know how she felt after eating the whole packet - a bit sick? Pleased? Filled up? Guilty? And to see whether she thought it was a good idea/ would she do it again? I wouldn’t tell her off because that will take it underground and feel forbidden (a bit like with cigarettes/ alcohol and teens!)

good luck!

But what could be the issue?

For a 7 year old, yes, it’s a lot to eat most of a packet of biscuits and I’d feel concerned that she doesn’t have an off switch. My teens snack on biscuits etc but I don’t think they’ve eaten a whole packet before.

I would be a bit annoyed (that they were all gone) but I wouldn't be cross or angry.

A friend of mine is very strict about sugar and what she considers treat food. She either doesn't buy it at all or rations it. This has resulted in her teenage daughter being quite overweight as a result of eating junk food every time she leaves the house.

Don't make a big deal out of it. Buy plain biscuits that your DD is less likely to scoff. Have them more regularly. Stop hiding them. This will hopefully de-value them in your DD's eyes.

It's not the small child's fault her mother has made biscuits of all things in to something that is restricted to the point the girl is searching everywhere to get to them.

They're biscuits... They're normal items that kids of 7 should be used to knowing that 1 or 2 a few times a week is fine and nothing that needs searching for....

How big was the pack of biscuits? How many had she already had after tea and how many did she eat subsequently after searching for and finding the remaining biscuits? What size were they? She won’t have been starving hungry. I think it’s unusual.

Does she actively know it’s not allowed? Good boundaries in place? How did DH not notice her rummaging around and eating a whole pack of biscuits - I would have been on that in a “errr what do you think you’re doing, they are for tomorrow” way!

People seriously wouldn’t be pissed off if their kid searched for something they hadn’t asked to have and ate THEM ALL? Wow

Fairly normal? My mum had to share and bag up equal amounts of the sweets from a tin, and hide hers and my dads share because of my big brothers pinching them!
Am sure my mum would've loved chilled children but not all families are the same. I heard next door say to his 4 year old just this weekend 'Ivy, have you eaten my chocolate'?!

She already had some.

My kids couldn't. They have free access to all sweets/ biscuits/ chocolate etc but they wouldn't eat more than 1 or 2 biscuits at a time. Eating a whole packet of biscuits would make most people feel a bit sick after?!

I hide things in the salad crisper and veg drawer …. It’s the only place I know they’ll never look in. The washing machine would be a good shout as well, no fear they’re going anywhere near that.

Not in this situation, no.
The OP has made them into something restricted and coveted.

in the lounge, on the toilet, working on the computer, I don’t know. Wouldn’t take her long to walk into the kitchen and find

We get, “Can I have something niiiiiiiice” when ours wants some contraband 😂

Honestly if she has treats when she's at the cafe, from her dad every Friday, over the weekend and stuff when you're food shopping I would have considered all that more than enough treat food and wouldn't be buying biscuits on top.

I was going to say I would just speak to her about it without getting cross and explain that we don’t eat whole packets of biscuits in one go as they’re not good for us. That you were going to make them last so there were still some biscuits tomorrow.

Now obviously you’re in a tricker situation because it looks like this is a recurring event - that she can’t rest if there’s a sweet thing in the house, and feels she has to eat it all in one go.

To a certain extent my DS is like that - he will hoover things up if they’re not nailed down (figuratively). My DD is the opposite- she likes to make things last. So there’s a bit of a clash there!

I do think it’s best to make sweet things just ordinary - not a big deal or a treat. And if it’s gone, it’s gone and then there’s none for tomorrow.

Does she think someone else will hoover it up if she doesn’t, so she has to get in first?

@Imissmusic what is her kryptonite?

If she is a super biscuit/chocolate sleuth, you need to, literally, think outside the box 😄

Do you have pets? (in with the dog/cat/hamster food they go)

Porridge, muesli, weetabix box?

Alternatively, a lock box so the wee minx can't get her grubby wee paws on them 😆

But she’d had several biscuits after dinner already. So clearly OP is not really restricting biscuits all that much. If OP had said “I broke a biscuit in half and told her that was all she was allowed” then sure.

Please don’t punish it without understanding it. What if she’s worried about something/ being bullied and has a feeling which she’s eating to soothe/distract from. Punishing will not stop her doing it if it’s a very powerful pull; she will just do it and hide it and feel guilty and ashamed of it. Please try to understand what is going on for her @Imissmusic