Food issues

[Vajazzler]

I have a dd aged 11.She's the second eldest of 5 Dc's. Yr7 at secondary school. Has settled well and is generally a good girl.
I like to think I'm an ok mum. If anything I'm too laid back. For about 5 yrs now we've had food issues and I've tried not to make too big a deal out of it but it's becoming more and more of an issue and I'm now at my wits end and hope to get some advice from you all.

She's always been on the verge of being underweight and she prefers smaller portions which is fine. I allow her to mainly self regulate her portions and she's not a food refuser, eating whatever I make, just a smaller portion.
A typical days menu would be
Breakfast: a slice of toast with jam or a pa k of breakfast biscuits
Lunch: ham/cheese sandwich or wrap with a bag of crisps and a cake/penguin type thing.
Dinner: usual family food roast / slag Bol whatever.
There is free access to fruit and we have a fully stocked treat cupboard.

So here's the problem:
She's not eating her sandwich/ wrap at school and is hiding it in her school bag. It gets to the point where she has 2 or 3 weeks worth that has gone mouldy in her bag. She is eating the crisps/ treat though.
Then comes home, has an afterschool snack and steals more treats from the cupboard, sneaking up to her room to eat them and hide the evidence. She keeps changing her hiding place so when I think it's stopped in reality she's just become more devious.
When asked why she shrugs her shoulders and says she doesn't know! Her friends are eating their lunches and it's not suddenly started happening since secondary. At primary the lunch ladies were aware and tried to keep an eye on her.
Short of going to school every lunchtime and sitting with her while she eats and locking away the treats I don't know what else to do.

I should add that at weekends and holidays she eats lunch fine

My eldest DS has a girlfriend when he was 12/13 who had a real thing about eating in public/in front of people, boys in particular. She had a complex about looking fat or greedy and rarely ate outside her home. Could it be something like that?

steals more treats from the cupboard, sneaking up to her room to eat them and hide the evidence. She keeps changing her hiding place so when I think it's stopped in reality she's just become more devious

This is worrying too. That is very ED type behavior.

I would sit down and have a serious but gentle conversation with her about this and how she feels about food and her body image in general and if it's all related.

This probably has very little to do with the quality of your parenting, don't beat yourself up, eating issues can spring from anywhere, even if there were such a thing as a perfect parent, their kids could have these issues too. Having said that, do you have eating or body image problems yourself? Talk about diets or the like? These things can be a bit problematic.

I hope it improves soon, if it doesn't, and the bingeing/hiding evidence continues I would be discussing it with my GP. In fact that might be wise anyway.

If she is eating the crisps and cake then she is hungry at lunchtime but choosing to eat the junk rather than real food. I would be sending her with just a sandwich and perhaps some carrot sticks or an apple and no junk food.

Also with regards having a fully stocked treat cupboard I would be looking at that. A treat is something that you have once in a while surely, not a help yourself every day type of thing. I would have less of the junk food around for her to help herself to. If she is hungry she will go for healthier options such as fruit and veg etc if she does not have access to the treats.

Make a treat something to have every couple of days where you go and buy a couple of bags of crisps or a pack of cakes/chocolate biscuits.

From your OP it is plain to see that see is filling up on high sugar, salty processed junk food not allowing room to eat a decent meal.