to refuse to make dc more food if they don't eat their dinner?

[glasgal]

Hi, this is a slight divergence from another thread. If your dcs don't eat the (healthy) dinner you have cooked for them do you

a) cook them another meal
b) make them sit at the table until it's eaten
c) send them to bed
d) allow them a snack they get themselves

I refuse to make them anything else. They are allowed water and milk and are not supposed to have anything else but in reality ds usually manages to sneak some bread (wholemeal) from the kitchen later on.

I do none of the options given. I usually make them eat a portion of it and then tell them there is nothing else and they can go without until next meal. I def don't cook anything else.
The only exception is if I've experimented with a new dish that has ingredients people often don't like and no normal ingrediants like potato and vegetables. In that case I'd still make them eat some of it but would get them a cheese sandwich or something similarly easy to make and boring.

I rarely do puddings. If I do people only get a pudding if they have eaten ALL of their dinner.

I made home made meatballs for my children and 'pilau rice' just rice with sauted onion and peas.

They swore blind they wanted it. It has been sitting on the tabel for twenty minutes. they will be trying to eat bananas and toast in five minutes i know it.

grrrrrrrr

I certainly wouldn't cook anything else.

a) cook them another meal
b) make them sit at the table until it's eaten
c) send them to bed
d) allow them a snack they get themselves

None of the above, usually my meals involve a main dish, let's say meat and a few veg + pasta or rice or potato so they will eat something if not everything but I am not cooking "a la carte"

I must say that by now, I know the taste of most of my family members and tend to prepare meals I know will suit most of us if not all.

There is an exception to the rule when I or DH craves something very spicy or that I know for a fact the Dcs will not eat, then I usually make something different for them but that has happened so seldomly that I cannot remember actually doing it!

If my DS, 2.2 years old, refuses his food without even trying it I ask him to at least try it because he might like it. Usually myself and DH have the same so we talk about how nice our meal is. I then put a little on his fork and offer it to him. Tonight I did this and he ate almost all of his dinner. I never expect him to empty his whole plate. I almost always give him pudding no matter how much he has eaten and tend to think that as long as he is full and has tried to eat most of his dinner he should get pudding. Most days he will eat about two spoonfuls of his main before asking for pudding!! He's usually then asked to eat a few more spoonfuls of his main. I know its not ideal to always give pudding but I think my DS has quite a healthy view of food because of this.

YANBU, but I don't accept your option list as complete.

a) no way, very bad precedence to set, I'd never be able to take them anywhere else.
b) unproductive and painful for all involved.
c) again, counterproductive as they aren't actually being naughty by having eating preferences.
d) maybe when they are teenagers and supper is over.

How about
e) DC can either eat what is loving prepared for them or not. No pressure to eat, but no complaints accepted either.

This is the one battle I've chosen, in the hopes of creating stress-free meal times with conversation other than what dc would rather be eating.

dd just eats the bits she wants to eat, then she gets pudding which is usually custard/rice pudding with some fruit.

if she is hungry later then she can help herself to fruit from the bowl.

she is 3.7

i give her snacks too, one about 10am, another at 2pm and a bedtime one. i tweak what i give her at these times to suit how much of other stuff she's eaten. so if she hasn't eaten much all day i offer cereal at bedtime. otherwise it can just be a breadstick.

Eat it or go without.

When they were toddlers I used to introduce one new thing at a time, if they ate everything else but didn't like the new thing Ok. They got pudding.

If they refused to eat everything on the plate.....well, they couldn't have been hungry in the first place imo there were/are no other options offered.

I'm amazed so many people serve puddings. I don't see a pudding as part of a normal meal but an extra for special occasions. I also feel you only have a pudding if still hungry after main courses.
For those of you who regularly give your children puddings when they haven't eaten all their dinner why not give them less dinner?
I don't eat puddings unless I'm still hungry after dinner. If I'm out and don't finish my dinner as full I don't eat a pudding as I don't need one.
Encouraging kids to leave their savoury food and fill up on sweet stuff seems weird to me.

"If your dcs don't eat the (healthy) dinner you have cooked for them do you

a) cook them another meal
b) make them sit at the table until it's eaten
c) send them to bed
d) allow them a snack they get themselves"

Mine are older but ds still a bit fussy. I certainly don't cook them another meal- we run to a tight budget and I am indeed not a restaurant. Pudding question doesn't arrive as we only have that on special occasions. Normally, they would be expected to stay at the table and talk to the rest of us. They don't get punished and frankly, they don't really go hungry either: they can always eat rice, or vegetables, or whatever else is served on the side. I don't get cross: I just don't pay a lot of attention. Any more than I want them paying a lot of attention to how much I eat.

We have a basic rule that everybody (including me and dh) is allowed three foodstuffs you really won't eat, and those we either serve very rarely or provide alternatives. Other than that, we are expected to be gracious to the cook and make at least some pretence of eating, but otoh I don't look too closely at size of portions: if ds has one sprout, I'm not going to quibble.

I try to encourage mine to eat a few mouthfulls, but they don't get anything else.

But I know what they genuinely don't like and don't make that child eat that food (so ds1 doesn't like chicken or rice and I don't make him eat it), but if they are just being fussy, then tough!

I am watching this thread with interest as my 4 year old is having serious eating issues at the moment. See this thread I started about ds1 four year old will eat ONLY pasta and cheese for tea I therefore cannot comment as at the moment I have no answers!

I used to be of the 'eat it or don't eat it - your choice' camp. This worked well because my DD ate everything I gave her and asked for extra! I was VERY smug!

However, since she turned 3 it has all gone pear-shaped. She quite often won't even pick up her spoon in an obvious battle of wills. So after many meal times where she ate nothing, I have ended up spending a lot of time coercing (along the lines of 5 more forkfuls and you can have a yoghurt!) but I NEVER cook anything else.

If she really hasn't eating ANYTHING at all (which does sometimes happen) then she leaves the table with nothing but has a small piece of toast with her milk later.

I could never make her sit at the table until it was eaten. My mum did this with me and it made both of us very miserable and achieved absolutely nothing.

I usually offer fruit if they are still hungry after dinner. They don't normally refuse to eat their dinner though.

Pudding is not dependant on eating all your meal in our house, but there is not always pudding and it is usually something healthy in any case.

No other food is served, but there is no punishment/re-serving of food or anything like that. There are things I know he likes and things that he doesn't like and I do take that into account, but sometimes other people's preferences trump his (the same for DH and I).

I don't do food/power battles. It is my job to provide him with lots of good healthy food, totally his choice whether or not to eat it.

I provide dinner, you eat what's put in front of you, or get nothing until breakfast. ALL my DC's (even the ones with SN) understood this by age 3 at the latest. NO-ONE has ever died through refusing just one meal. A child will eat if truly hungry. Even something they really detest. If they're hungry enough. Having said that, I never dish up peas, radishes or courgettes to DD (11yo), I would not dish up 'proper' tomatoes to DS1 (7yo) (he can cope with tomato based sauces/ tinned tomatoes, but only from 5yo), or anything remotely spicy to DS2 (6yo). I know their likes & dislikes, and cook accordingly. They don't have to stay at the table and/or empty their plate, but they will not get any fruit/yoghurt/ pudding/anything else until morning if their plate is not empty.

DS will always eat something form what I have cooked, even if he doesn't like it, so no I don't provide any alternatives. He knows that if he doesn't est enough he might feel hungry later so he never refuses to eat any of it.

Maybe that is a result of never providing alternatives. He has learnt from experience and is not a fussy eter.

And I never with-hold pudding just because DS hasn't eaten as much as I would like him to eat.

AndI never make him finish everything on his plate, especially if I have served him, after all, I probably gave him too much.

I feel that if you wouldn't force an adult to finish everything on their plate or eat something they don't like then you shouldn't force a child. They should have the same rights and be treated with the same respect.

Morloth I agree with your sentiments.

2rebecca pudding in this house is only ever a yoghurt or some fruit, and just an optional extra if DS wants it rather than somethng that happens all the time.

I wouldn't make another meal, or force them to eat cold food. I tend to make what they both like expect my 6 year old doesn't like the pastry on pie so if he doesn't finish he might get toast if he's tried.

DD was a horror but now (nearly 5) she's a lot better, largely I think to having school dinners, as she has now eaten stuff with her classmates that she would turn her nose up at when I cooked (ie mince).

I always let her get down if she says she's not hungry any more as I don't see the point of clean plates nor in forcing 'just a few more mouthfuls' on her (providing of course she's been eating all parts of the meal, which generally, she does) - that, to me at least, is a surefire way of ruining a child's natural saiety mechanisms and putting them on the road to trouble with overeating in later years (I speak from experience...)

DD knows that if she gets hungry later there will be cheese or fruit, possibly a yoghurt if there are any in, and that's her lot. She rarely wants it, though, so I've come to relax over it and let her judge when she's had enough.

I won't cook a second meal, but nor would I make a child sit at the table until a meal was finished or punish them by sending them to bed. I used to get in a right state with DD when she was younger and much, much fussier (6 months on bread and butter, anyone?), but then thanks to advice on here I have become very relaxed about it.

I see some have said they don't like the waste of food, but it's as big a waste giving your child calories it doesn't want/need as it is to scrape it into the bin. I know this isn't easy to rationalise when you've spent an hour slaving over the dinner, but it's what I try to tell myself!

none of the above.

I provide 3 meals a day. DS is allowed one snack mid morning, and one snack mid afternoon.

That's it. Take it or leave it. In our house we never have to eat anything we don't want. We don't need endless snacks. If we don't eat our meals. There is nothing else until next meal/snack time. End of. We just don't make a fuss about it. DS has a very healthy relationship with food. He eats well but doesn't stuff himself.

If he does ask for food inbetween meals he can have fruit, but if it's nearly meal time or he refused dinner I would say no.