To despair at the crap some people feed their kids

[Apotofrealcoffee]

Currently watching a kid who can’t be more than age 3, tuck in to a packet of ‘squashie’ sweets on the bus. No sign of a tantrum, kid seems perfectly happy looking out the window, but out come the sweets. And to pre empt the ‘snobbery’ thing, the parent seems middle class to me and certainly eloquent.

I regularly see kids tucking into chocolate bars, packets of crisps, lollies, all on the school run. Many of them toddlers in their buggies dropping off older siblings. Parents meeting kids at the school gate with full packets of Oreos, bottles of pop, doughnuts.

I’ve been trying not to judge for years and have been repeatedly told it’s ’just one snapshot of their day’ but honestly, I feel like the time for judgement has entered. I have never fed my toddlers crap like that, let alone just after breakfast. My 3 year old has never had a fizzy drink.

Why, just why! AIBU to feel there needs to be some kind of very direct public health campaign at this point? Maybe even a ‘no sweets at the school gate’ rule?

No, it really is not everyone's business.

Keep your nosey beak out.

Wish I had so little to worry about that I could concern myself about other people's children's diets.

Autoimmune diseases and chronic illnesses are experiencing a significant and well documented increase among adolescents and young adults globally.

A high consumption of ultra-processed foods, artificial additives, and low-fibre intake disrupts the gut microbiome, which controls roughly 70% of the immune system.

Growing up I was friends with a girl who had two siblings and her mum was a very very high up Consultant for a well known private healthcare brand - on the board for Europe type level.

They were absolutely loaded, and utterly fucking miserable. They had everything, horses, holidays to Barbados and Africa, new cars, lovely house.

She didn't let them have sweets, processed food, pizza, fizzy drinks, ice cream etc etc ever. And I mean ever. Everything was a sit down meal made from organic this and that.

When she was away they would eat chocolate and sweets until they were sick. The youngest daughter even turned to shoplifting sweets and was well known in our town for being a rich thief. As an adult she has absolutely ballooned and her teeth are holding on for dear life.

Be very careful with your holier than thou attitude, I have seen it go the other way and its not pretty.

However I think you’re on a loosing battle - there is a low sugar policy at schools and yet the teacher hands out birthday sweets - 30 kids in the class and 60 in the year! There isn’t a week without teachers giving them sugar!

A banana is a good option after physical activity. Mine always had a banana after swimming.

But on the other side, obesity and obesity related diseases are much much higher than anorexia/orthorexia diseases - that’s just a fact. So it’s every one’s business on a societal level to improve this. Or “judge” if that’s how you would rather phrase it.

Most 3 yr olds have never had a fizzy drink.

My 8 yr old recently started liking fizzy drinks, I let him have fizzy water with sugar free squash, sprite zero etc as a big treat. Those are big value treats for him. I get more mileage out of a can of sprite zero than any sweet treat. I can't really see where it's a problem and it's roughly once a week.

My 5 yr old drinks only water or milk. No interest in juice even

They've both had more sweets since Halloween because there's sweets about, lots.of them.even then you've talking a lolly or little haribo bag. Again, in the grand scheme of things is it a big deal?

Yet at 3? A treat was a plain digestive biscuit.or a yoghurt or fruit.

Give it 5 years and see if you're still as stoic. Maybe that child's the youngest of 3 and the mums realised a wee bag of sweets fornt he Halloween haul does not make it break a parent or child.

I can’t believe how many people are being nasty to OP for bringing this up?

With childhood obesity and child tooth decay in the UK being among the top three in Europe I imagine what she’s saying is absolutely correct.

Children these days off being fed absolute junk, think about the amount of overweight kids you see who can’t even run a few steps. This is a daily occurrence in any play area.

I too am horrified by OP. It seems these days having healthy active children is the minority struggle.

A child age 3 eating a pack of squashes is absolutely diabolical, anybody who says otherwise probably feels guilty for following their kids offered sweets and having to acknowledge it to themselves

Agree! I start most days with a banana! Easy and nourishing.

Well it is normal to be honest, as is way too much screen time, being ludicrously over scheduled and having vast amounts more stuff than prior generations.

You are right it doesn’t mean it’s good. You are highly unlikely to persuade anyone to change with your approach as the reflex reaction to it will inevitably be defensive.

I am absolutely someone who will acknowledge I let my kids have too much junk type food. I was super on top of that and screens and not doing too many activities and not buying too many toys and all the things like that till Covid. It all went off the rails somewhat when me and husband were each doing 50 hour work weeks from home with a 3 and 5 year old at home because we didn’t qualify as key workers. We got into some poor habits we haven’t fully got out of. I’m sure many people are similar and I’d also say it’s easy when you just have toddlers, gets harder when you have older kids and younger ones. Add in that the messages around what the right things to do around food and developing a healthy relationship with it are super mixed and that many people have food issues and it’s a real minefield.

Try and remember what’s easy for you may be less easy for someone else, that you may encounter circumstances when it’s harder in future and that people generally are doing their best with lots of fairly essential things competing for their attention. Maybe offer suggestions for how you can substitute healthy snacks or manage meals for a week whilst juggling everything else vs proudly stating you judge people? That might actually help a bit vs just making you feel superior and riling other people up or making them feel a bit shitty another themselves?

I think even as far back as 100 years ago 50% of kids didn't... Survive to adulthood that is.

When record levels of innocent children are now considered clinically obese and adults obesity issues are draining the NHS it is absolutely everyone’s business - on a societal level.

I agree OP. No DC needs to be eating a whole bag of sweets - ever! And if that's just a snapshot of their day, I hate to think what the rest of it is like.

You literally are what you eat. That's what you body is built from - the food you put into it. And if DC are being given crap food full of sugar and additives and other shite, that's what their bodies are being built from. I think a lot of parents just don't THINK before they give their DC some utter crap to eat.

It's no wonder to me that we are such an unhealthy nation. Every checkout is stuffed with chocolate, sweets, utter junk. WHSmith not so long ago would have a prompt asking you whether you wanted any of the huge chocolate bars stacked up by the checkouts. Fucking unbelievable!!

The ADHD kid in my daughter’s class had white bread jam sandwiches, crisps and a chocolate bar for lunch.

I went to someone’s house once and their 6-yo was very chubby - she was eating a packet of Doritos. This was 10.30 on a Sunday morning. Who eats crisps at 10.30 on a Sunday, who even gives their fat kid crisps? I couldn’t do that.

But my daughters say I’m cruel because I’m like “No you can’t have that, it’ll rot your teeth and you’ll get fat.” I’m like - you’ll be grateful when you’re older because I am so glad my own mum enforced good eating habits in me.

(Both my kids eat very well - obviously I wouldn’t say this if they showed signs of not doing so. That is not a concern in our house!!)

I've told this story on here before, but somebody I knew never allowed her children ANY processed sugar in any form, and really restricted natural sugar in the form of fruit. She discovered her 6 and 4 year old kids drinking the liquid sucrose out of the hummingbird feeder (I'm in Canada).

But what if the other 6 days the child is having apple slices, oatcakes and peanut butter?

There are no medical conditions or illnesses that are experienced exclusively by fat people, so any research and treatments for such illness or disease are beneficial to the entire population.

And judging a parent for giving a kid some sweets a few days after Halloween is a massive stretch from dealing with a societal issue! This is just about being judgy about someone else’s parenting choice. Which is still no one else’s business as I said earlier.

Imagine being so bothered about a child eating a sweet. Get a bloody grip.

Reminds me of my mum's advice from a few days ago that I should sprinkle some sugar over my 5 year olds rice krispies to get her to finish her breakfast. Mental!

Public bus, public concern. It's also a choking hazard, an allergy risk, and an unwelcome smell in a tight space. If it’s nobody else’s business, drive a private car.
You wouldn't mind if your child starting choking and people tried to help I am sure.

Calm your tits. It is absolutely none of your business what other parents feed, or indeed how they raise, their own children. Are you not more concerned that people will catch you staring at their children on the bus?

I despair also OP. Since when is it OK to have a bag of crisps, chocolate biscuits, sweets, can of fizzy EVERY day.
My neighbours idea of a balanced diet "you've had a bag of crisps today already, you can have a kit-kat"... the kid is 7. Deserves "a treat".

Yeah, I'm with you on this one OP.

My children had sweets - but not for breakfast! When mine were at primary school, I used to see loads of youngsters walking along, eating crisps / sweets / chocolate / drinking fizzy pop. And this was on a daily basis, same kids, every single day.

Neurodivergence often comes with restrictive food intake. I've just sent my 5 year old who is very restrictive with her food just now, to school with a cheese sandwich, a satsuma, a container of dry Cheerios and 2 rich tea biscuits, I need her to eat something. I could send her with homemade vegetable soup etc etc, that's the sort of things they are as toddlers but when they physically won't put the food into heir mouths and start losing weight you need to make sure they eat something. My eldest also has a cheese sandwich today but with homemade trail mix from seeds and dry fruit, 2 pieces of fresh fruit and carrot sticks. He's autistic but thank God gradually accepting more of a range of foods. You're seeing a snapshot and making a massive judgement

I don't think supermarkets help having sweets right at the checkout.