"I'm hungry, can I have something to eat please?"...every 10mins....

[NorbertDentressangle]

This is all I hear all day, every day from 5 yo DS.

Does anyone else get this? How do you deal with it? Its driving me nuts.

I appreciate that he may be hungry on the odd occasion but its obviously become a habit as other times hes saying it minutes after a meal or even, on one classic occasion, when he was actually eating something!

Ds (6) does this too. I have a bowl of apples (in his view, edible but not too desireable) which he is free to eat whenever he wants. This has lead to a reduction in his non-genuine claims of hunger!

Mine do this - sometimes through a mouthful of toast.

I do the apples trick too.

"I'm hungry"
"Have an apple"
"I don't want an apple"
"you're clearly not hungry then"

ad infinitum...

ds1 is 3 and does this... was rather hoping he'd grow out of it!

i do tha apples thing too

all day

every day

[exasperated emoticon]

the apple thing.... wasn't trying to be ghetto or anything, just can't type

I just say no. Meals are quite copious and there is no food outside meals.

Eating between meals is a very bad habit to get into, as it prevents you from eating properly balanced meals at meal times.

The thing is he would happily have an apple or two but then would use the "but I've had 2 apples already can I have something else" line, which is understandable really as theres only so many apples you can eat in a day.

Glad to hear that I'm not alone in this though

Oh yes, DS does this - again sometimes with food in his hand! He is very welcome to eat fruit until the cows come home but he still says every half hour or so "I'm hungry" Thank goodness for apples!

I have two (out of 3) who do this. I think it is habit mostly.

I give them standard options - bread stick, rice cake or apple (often turned down). They are usually angling for a biscuit but they don't get it

Set aside snack food for him to choose from? Cheese cubes, different fruit, tinned fruit, cold meats - it just can be annoying when they are hungry but don't want anything!

Ds has done that with the apples. I offered him carrots instead!! If he claims he is full on carrots I offer him broccoli. He has only once taken me up on it.

Anna -he generally eats well at meal-times (healthy, home-cooked, very little/no convenience food) and the DC have always had a snack mid-morning and mid-afternoon.

He used to be quite chunky (not fat by any means, just chunky in that toddler/pre-schooler way) but since starting school in January hes really slimmed down and is starting to shoot up a bit. Extra calories certainly are not a problem with him

IrishDraught -I did think about setting aside a snack box of healthy, nutritious for him (something I've seen suggested on MN) but TBH I think he'd eat the contents by mid-morning.

DP did try an "experiment" the other day -everytime DS said "I'm hungry...." DP gave him something to eat to see if his requests would slow down or stop but they didn't!

Yes, my two (7 and 5) go though stages when they need to eat quite a lot. They are usually good at eating their meals at meal time, so I tend to feed them when they need a little snack. Usually fruit, but also ice cream (in the summer, we are in italy after all) or breadsticks or a small sandwitch etc.

Just a thought- could he be thirsty? I'm sure I read somewhere (yes, I know, very vague) that thirst can sometimes feel like hunger. Would he drink a glass of milk, maybe?

Tried that but without any success I'm afraid.

A bit more protein for a snack? And put your foot down.

Mine do it if they are bored.
I agree more protein for snack as endless biscuits just hypes them up and doesnt actually fill them for any length of time.
And agree about drink as well - how about glass of milk?

Hes not overly keen on milk TBH.

Definitely agree on the boredom thing -if hes not sure what to do next he'll just think "food"

I'll put some thought into protein rich snacks -any suggestions other than nuts which he already has (hes not a great meat lover BTW).

Snacks at the moment tend to be things like:

fruit
pot of dry cereals (Cheerios, Shreddies)
pot of dried fruit and nuts
breadsticks
sometimes biscuits

Cheese cubes or rolled up cold meat slices (you could try some different kinds?) will fill up a child nicely. Beans on toast? Needs preparation... Yogurt that isn't too sweet, and not non-fat, has the added benefit of calcium. If your DC's meals are carbfests, maybe you could increase protein there, too -- eggs in various forms are handy for breakfast and lunch.. The carbohydrate-rich foods, even dried fruits, leave them craving more, so they are probably counter productive.

a/a agree Protien is the key to ''filling'' them up along with low Gi fruit/vegatable snacks.