to think my friend is wrong for feeding her dc baby jars?

[haribomum]

had my df over last night with her 2 dcs and asked them if they wanted to stay for tea. she replied yes and that she had already bought something for her dcs. she then got out of her bag 2 heinz baby jars suitable from 4 months, the really runny pureed type!!! now i would not have a problem with this but her dcs are 3 and 4 years old. she then sat them to the table whilst mine had lasagne and force fed them these jars. it was horrendous. both dc were crying and protesting but she still made them eat it.

ive been thinking this over since last night and a few things are bothering me. she never lets her dcs have any fruit or veg, infact the 4 yr old is allowed to have sandwiches etc but she says she the 3yr old is onloy allowed jars and skips, as they melt in your mouth and chocolate buttons.

this seems crazy to me and im worried about the poor dcs. AIBU for thinking this is wrong and in some way child abuse???

But it sounds like the OP has raised it before and this woman's reacted just by avoiding sharing mealtimes. And this time the OP raised it and got snapped at.

I'm not sure what to suggest, but I'm so so sad for the children.

Hi, I just wanted to say that I worked as a nanny for a family with twins and their Mother had a terrible fear of them choking. One of her neices had started to choke when they were out for dinner, and while the child was fine, the event had a bad effect on my old boss. When the twins started on solid food, eating toast etc. she would panic so I would have to send her out of the room until I was finished feeding them. This continued until the kids were confidently able to eat lumps and then their Mum was able to rejoin mealtimes.
It might be that this woman, as part of helping her, would need to be removed from mealimes as she obviously finds this very stressful and in turn this stresses the kids. This poor lady needs someone to step in and help her, sometimes telling people what they don't want to hear is the only way to open communication. It won't be a nice conversation but someone needs to be the bad guy.

Agree 'corabear'.

Also there are ways and ways of talking to someone. Just informally trying to tell her during a mealtime probably isn't going to get through as she's too anxious and defensive but calmly talking when she's away from that flashpoint might carry more weight as she will she how much it has impacted on the OP.

Failing that, professional intervention. As others have said, it's going to become an issue when they start school so perhaps better to address it now.

I think you should contact the hv (not talk to her or her dh) it may have affected the childrens digestive system and just giving solid food may really harm them I have no evidence to back this up but a hv would know where to go with this.

I would say she is scared of choking but still giving formula milk instead of cows milk (which on its own I would find nothing wrong with) says to me that there is a different underlying problem. Maybe she feels lonely and wishes to keep her dc as babies. Regardless of what the problem is I severely doubt just making her give solid food will solve this. She may give solid food and then start displaying other potentially harmful routines.
I think her issues run pretty deep she knows it is wrong or she would not have hidden it from you I think she needs counseling to help solve her own issues and be a good mum.

I'd contact the HV with your concerns. I couldn't stand by and do nothing. She must have mental health issues, and her children are suffering as a result. The woman needs help.

Are the children potty trained or any other stages that your friend has tried to hold off?

I find this really hard to believe- you are telling us that this is your friend and you have had no inkling of this before? Still, you are in the best place for some good advice from people here- it's almost lucky that this happened just in the first week of you joining mumsnet really.

If you are genuinely worried about a real person's treatment of their children, you can always ring the NSPCC for guidance in cases of suspected child abuse.

is this a wind-up then?

how is their speech? if they have been on a pretty much liquid diet their speech muscles wont have developed properly. are they behind in other aspects of their development?

OP in your situation i would tell the HV my concerns. your freind could simply just need reassurance from a 'professional' that her dcs will be fine to eat chunks and lumps. but she definitely needs help to get them eating proper food for their own health.

do you know any extended family memebers ie her Mum that you could discuss it with?

If not i would sit her down and tell her direct that what she is doing is wrong and harmful.
Then I would contact Social services, this is child neglect we are talking about here.

surely this is a wind up

I'm finding this hard to believe, possibly just because it's such extreme behaviour, but also because no one has picked up on this in 4+ years.

You need to do something, I would probably want more evidence that this is the "norm" before involving a HV, but I'd want to act quickly, can you go to her house, you'd be assess the situation much better in her own environment, maybe go over over a mealtime.

I can't believe some of the people here who are talking about involving social services before actually attempting to talk to the mother directly herself. It is just unbelievable - you are implying abuse when her friend could actually be, in her own way, trying to do the best for her children.

I think you should talk to her properly and ask her why she is still giving them jars. Try and explain to her that past a certain age jars don't contain adequate nutrition and try to get her onside this way. By involving HVs / social services you will no doubt lose her as a friend and you could inadvertently make the situation worse.

oh my word you really do have to inform someone,those poor kids.
surely if she is a good friend you can say something and even if she does again come back at you with the "my kids my rules" line tell her you will be informing HV/SS as it is not on. the kids are waaaay more important than a friendship.

You certainly can't do nothing, but I also don't think you can go from seeing this once to calling SS in one leap.

At risk of repeating myself, why hasn't someone else picked up on this sooner, the father, gps, other friends?

She's kept it hidden for years and then randomly produces these jars at your home and proceeds to force feed her dc in front of you.

A cry for help?

An odd thing she does away from home because she wants to control what they eat?

Why suddenly bring it into the open?

But their extreme reaction (crying, protesting, trying to spit it out etc) suggests to me that eating pureed food isn't all they're eating all the time, because if they were only eating jarred pureed food for 4+ years everyday, it would seem perfectly natural to them, or at the very least they'd be resigned surely? Have the children never eaten out anywhere else or childminders/family without supervision etc? It's the sort of thing that would be hard to cover for such a long time. This doesn't quite add up for me.

Ali - so its acceptable to feed 3 and 4 yr olds baby food?

shiney, I'm not sure about them being resigned though, on that recent Jo Frost series there was a mum force-feeding her 4yo and the girl certainly was putting up a fight.

OP hasn't been back in a while, does make me but stranger things have happened haven't they

good point Tea, about a cry for help.

I would call your HV. If you are both in the same area then your HV will be able to speak to her HV and arrange a visit. I thought this thread would be a snob one about jar foods versus home made purees. Ds lived on jars as a baby (HV's strong recommendation) to make sure he would eat.

If a friend of mine had done the same at my house I would have told her that she should speak to the HV about healthy eating. Formula at aged 4 is completely ridiculous and food for 4 month old babies doesn't have the nutritional content needed for a 4 yr old. Do they only eat jar food when out? Their reaction seems odd, as if they weren't used to it.

Ali - feeding 4 yr olds food suitable for 4 month olds is not doing the best for your children. This mother needs help and surely the HV route is the best way of getting it when she won't listen to her friend?

i agree with poster who said about OCD and hygiene issues

it may be that at home they are allowed normal food, cooked by her.but that she isscared to let them have food that someone else has prepared, hence the jars and hence their reaction to them
I am pretty sure that a child that had been brought up on that food would eat it fairly happily because to them it would be normal
their response to being fed it however was NOT one of a child that regularly eats it

I would definitely either ring the health visitor or the dad. You could ring the dad and just ask after them as they wwere so upset and then maybe bring it up after that???
i mean, let's face it, if you call the HV she'll know it's you anyway... and the dad may be able to cast some light on why she does this

How often do most people see their HV?

From this thread, I'm getting the impression that a lot of Mums are in and out of their HV's office.

My son is 17 months old and the last time I saw my HV was at the 8-month check, and before that, just a couple of times at routine checks. I have no need for her.

An HV would have to actively seek me out to question me on an issue such as this, and I would therefore know that someone had 'told on me'. But maybe most people see their HVs regularly, so it wouldn't be so obvious.

I honestly think it is better to have a word with the friend, away from mealtime when she will be stressed and defensive anyway, before going down any sort of official route.

The fact that they were putting up such a protest also makes me think that they don't exist entirely on purees, and the OP does say in a later post that she feeds her children sandwiches, so it's not purees 100% of the time. Not that this makes it a great deal better, but still...

Phone the NSPCC now or Social Services and ask them what the suggested course of action would be.

A nice little chat with a woman who has allowed this display in front of you is going to get nowhere. At best it's a cry for help, at worse it is someone who is quite severely ill and has no concept of her wrongdoing or the consequences.

I haven't seen my HV in months! we don't get an 8mth check

and no reason why HV/other professional would pick up on this problem anyway, unless they happened to visit at mealtimes - you can quite easily lie for a start! I could feed my 2 on nothing but Maccy Ds and she'd be none the wiser.

There is a supernanny episode that is often shown(discovery? chanel). Family had 2 sets of twins age 5 and 3.

Mum and dad were nice, highly educated but truely clueless - they thought bottles, nappies, baby jars were normal - just making life easier, no harm done.

The scenes where they were force feeding the 3 year olds baby food were upsetting to watch - it must have been awful for you at your house.

Anyway supernannys appalled look and telling them that their children's speach was delayed really hit home.

The children took straight away to real food, cutlery, no bottles.

Any chance of tracking it down and maybe showing her?