6 year old raiding chocolate

[FedupofTurkey]

Every weekend the same thing - 6 yr dss raids the chocolate cupboard. He knows he's not supposed to as i say it every week but it makes no difference. The consequence is he doesn't get chocolate for the rest of the day but again it makes no difference. What can I do, the chocolate is in a cupboard as high as possible.

If the others are older, then sign them up to help. Just say that for a while, while the 6 year old learns how to moderate his snack intake, everyone has to ask before they take anything.

Or have a named box for each child- and when it's gone, it's gone.

agree with Holiday Criminal's experience.... just wait till your nicely mannered 6 yo turns teen.... they eat anything in sight... mine will eat cake, cake and more cake.... he has been known to consume a whole box of mince pies as a pre-dinner snack.... and last week's effort was a whole Ginger cake bar as 30 mins is a long time to wait for dinner...

Mine used to ask before helping themselves to crisps, biscuits etc.... and I always thought my friends whose older DC helped themselves and gorged were doing it because they'd been allowed to get away with it and not taught manners.... roll the clocks forward and I have two teen raptors - they eat anything they fancy when they fancy... the only way to restrict them is not to buy stuff and not to give them money :) mine also get dinner tickets that can only be used to buy a meal at school rather than cash for dinners....

A lockable cupboard sounds great but they would probably break the lock off if they were desperate enough too :) a padlock just would not stop a determined teen grazing for treats...

once there is no chocolate or cake or bsicuits left, then they turn to cheese, cooked meats etc.... they are in fact locusts....

I do hate the the charqcterization of teenagers as selfish, greedy louts........

My mother used to buy each of us a huge tub of ice cream a fortnight to eat whenever we wanted. My (much older, teenage) brothers scoffed theirs within 48 hours, I always saved mine for last 2 days. (So my brothers snuck some of mine [peeved smiley] ).

Just very different people.

DC always ask for what can they eat. Except when they know I'll say no (like too much sugary food). Then some of them get sneaky about trying to get sugar anyway ... [another peeved smiley I'm not allowed]

I hate that characterization too Martorana. My teenegaers are still growing, and are very active my DD alone does 18 hours of physical exercise a week and can easily eat over 3000 calories a day. Her body needs it- they are not greedy and selfish - they are often hungry.

Do you have any teenagers? One of ours ate the Mothers Day chocolates I had bought for mil. They had MUm written on them......

One teenagers are worse than locusts. They can strip a fridge bare in 10 mins

THe contents of my fridge belong to everyone in my home. If someone is hungry they are welcome to snack. Thta's why I keep my fridge full of healthy nourishing food.

I have two, orange. I can't imagine circumstances where they would eat chocolates bought for someone else. And if, by some freak chance they did,it would either be a mistake and they would be mortified or I would be so incandescent with rage they would never eat another chocolate

A lot of adults can't resist the temptation of chocolate because sugar addiction is so strong, very unfair to expect a six year old to control themselves. I don't see why anyone needs to have addictive, sugary foods in the house. Your mission should be to break his addiction, the attitude that junk food is necessary and it would be unfair to the other kids not to have it is the problem.

If you insist on maintaining his addiction and providing constant temptation, you can't complain when he gives in to it.

A cupboard full of cakes, biscuits and chocolates is a ridiculous thing. Get a biscuit tin, have some bog standard biscuits in it. There's no need to keep cake and chocolate in the house for daily use. As for it being "unfair" on the other children not to have any...it is unfair to provide them with shite on a daily basis which will affect their long term health.

Cake is something to have after a meal but not regularly and chocolate is a once a week thing which should be bought when it's to be eaten. A bowl of fruit and free reign is best. If my 6 year old thought there was a cupboard full of sweet stuff in the kitchen then she'd be constantly trying
to gain access...most would.

The only sweet tooth occasional guzzler in my house is dh. My two teenagers do not help themselves to everything in sight, nor did I at their age. We don't have lots of snacks (except for dh's sweets which he appears to be as addicted to now as the cigarettes he failed to give up ) I don't really think always access to snacks is a very good idea.

I think the issue here is that the consequence is a bit meaningless. The dss just eats his chocolate earlier than his siblings. So either hide the chocolate better if you don't want to get rid of it, allocate the chocolate for the weekend and police that and/or punish him more effectively for helping himself.

To the OP, one thing I would probably change is the punishment you are using. I know it seems like the obvious punishment to take away the chocolate for the day but it probably just emphasizes the precious nature of the booty and makes her want it even more. Once she knows that there is no question of it being denied to her, she might actually be less fixated on it.

I think I probably wasn't clear in my earlier post that I wasn't suggesting complete unrestricted access. I just think if they are offered a certain amount of sweet stuff reasonably regularly (before they start nagging for it), they don't see it as such a holy grail. This is the approach I'm trying to take and I feel it's working (at least to a degree. And I'm definitely stressing about it less) My 7 year old daughter has a huge appetite in general and adores sweets. The other day, I witnessed her say "no thank you" to the offer of a packet of jellies as she left a birthday party. I'm still recovering from the shock.