How much sugar is too much sugar for my toddler?

[aggielocke]

I don't know about everyone else on here but I really don't know how much sugar is okay for my DS. I've read multiple articles and research papers but they can contradict themselves so I wanted some advice.

I know natural sugars are good so he has lots of berries, yogurts and juice pouches. But I don't want to limit him too much and create disordered eating from early on.

He's just started attending parties and so I let him eat the cake and sweets that are available. But now he's asking for more at home? Should I keep it to a weekend treat or is something small a day alright as well?

I'm just trying to prevent any food issues from forming early on but also want to encourage a healthy lifestyle.

Any advice?

@Zenlifeforme honestly I think it’s too much eg jam and honey for breakfast most days and a sweet treat every day.
but I have learned I am on the “stricter” side, my friends kids (incl toddler) have haribo every day 🤷🏻‍♀️. Plus puddings at weekends.

I am always worried about teeth and obesity. Frankly being overweight has ruined a lot of my teenage years, so I do worry about it a lot. And I see a lot of overweight children in primary school now.

I am more relaxed on holidays now and they can have ice creams and whatever they want. They often choose crossaints and pancakes for breakfast. But these are holiday treats.

Find it a bit weird that you encourage your child to eat a lot at parties. Here they get a pizza, crisps and veggie sticks usually or sandwiches and take a cake home and have some sweets in a goody bag (sometimes not always). My children can eat what they want at parties, but I don’t encourage them to “knock themselves out”. Not sure I understand that, isn’t that encouraging to overeat?

DH father was a dentist so he was brought up having minimal sweets, chocolates and other bad snacks. He claims you soon develop better habits which stay with you for life.

To this day he still can’t understand the obsession some people have with chocolate. The same goes for sugar in hot drinks and as for biscuits well we’ve been together nearly 20 years and I can’t recall him ever eating one.

I’ve followed a similar method with our DS who is now 3. He never asks for sweets and chocolate and has little interest as and when he comes across it. He is more likely to ask for cucumber sticks than haribo.

DH has never had so much as a filling so hopefully DS gets the same benefit in the long run.

I don't really understand why anyone would give sweets and chocolate to young children. I understand it's sometimes unavoidable at parties but why would you have it in the house? If you don't introduce it they won't miss it or expect it.

For me a key thing isn't so much the amount of sugar but how steadily it's consumed. Some kids seem to graze throughout the day and it's so bad for their teeth and jeans they're not hungry enough to eat proper meals.

Did my kids (5 and 2) it's 3 meals a day and 2 small snacks.

Also healthy cereal on weekdays but crappy kiddie cereal allowed at weekends.

Squash no more than a couple of times a week.

I generally try to feed them healthy food without too much sugar. I just think of little ways to be careful e.g just jam occasionally and not 2 days in a row that kind of thing.

Both kids have great teeth so I must be getting something right! It's hard though and something I constantly think about.

We have a 22-month old, and we’re careful with sugar but not obsessively so. She’s a fussy, fairly light eater and always has been, despite us weaning her on all sorts of veg, so it’s a challenge to get food into her. She loves carbs - bread, pasta. She manages to snaffle the odd biscuit (from
playgroups mainly) and is very triumphant about it, but other than that we try not to do much sugar (apart from fruit) at home. No chocolate or cake yet, except on a special occasion (birthday/Easter), and even then very limited quantities. No ‘kids’ cereal or breakfast spreads like jam, and no fruit juice. She does have the occasional veggie & fruit based Ella’s pouch, because the veg situation is tricky for us. Sugar free yoghurt and plain Greek only. We’ll relax slightly as she gets older and we don’t use the sweeter things she does like as treats or rewards.

We find it harder to limit salt tbh.

Because berries are expensive and usually not grown in Uk! As opposed to smoothies/juices/“winder” forms of fruit

Given that 40% of 11 year olds are overweight, 40% of parents are overfeeding their kids.
We are doing lots very wrong. OP I wouldn't have sugary snacks in the house. If they ask say they are party food or distract don't make a big thing of it.
It becomes impossible to control as they get older and can buy their own stuff so getting their palate more intune with savory stuff is key.

My view is do not make any food forbidden or the dreaded “treat” (people grow up then wanting to treat themselves constantly and have weight issues) . Instead teach self regulation across all food groups. Everything in moderation. Yes it is harder, but Introducing a varied diet, nothing forbidden or seen as a treat and self regulation is key. Lead by example.

we did this, snacks of all sorts were all freely available, she could help herself, and of all her friends bar one, she was the only one who could take it or leave it, and is still like this as a young adult. She will have say two Lindt balls as that’s all she wants, and not hoover up the box as she was told it was a treat and restricted.

With our son (2.5), we just limit his sugar in the same way I do my own: is he eating a reasonable amount for the context he's in? Has he had a lot of treats already today?

Most of his snacks or desserts at home are fruit and yogurt with maybe one processed treat a day max. These tend to be crackers, or we still get the toddler specific crisps and biscuits from brands like Organix.

Ok thanks for those replies, I see it’s so varied, some people see what we have as normal or even less than they do. And some think it’s more and have less.

@SuuzeeeQ ah you took me too literally. With parties I just don’t have any rules at all. We have so many rules about sugar and food so with parties I’m just like go for it love (but I don’t literally say those words to her) 😂

I think it just comes down to what I’m comfortable with. I’m clearly not completely comfortable since asking on a public forum!

I also need to ponder on self regulation a bit more. It’s so hard to teach it when she is always blumming asking for sugary things 🙈🙈

Ok thanks for those replies, I see it’s so varied, some people see what we have as normal or even less than they do. And some think it’s more and have less.

@SuuzeeeQ ah you took me too literally. With parties I just don’t have any rules at all. We have so many rules about sugar and food so with parties I’m just like go for it love (but I don’t literally say those words to her) 😂

I think it just comes down to what I’m comfortable with. I’m clearly not completely comfortable since asking on a public forum!

I also need to ponder on self regulation a bit more. It’s so hard to teach it when she is always blumming asking for sugary things 🙈🙈

@aggielocke totally piggy backing on your post 😂

Same here.
I think it's only hard if you keep sweets at home, or after you introduce them.
When we go shopping, my dd never points at chocolate or sweets- simply because she isn't familiar with them. She wants fruit, hommade ice lolly or yoghurt as a sweet or snack.

With my husband, we love my chocolate, but I we keep them at home where she can't see it and we don't eat it infront of her.

The main thing I'd do is swap the juice/pouches for water.

My daughter has fruit after lunch and they have switched to carrot and cucumber after dinner as she has a cavity due to acid reflux. She some times has a homemade biscuit or a little fairy cake if it is someone's birthday.
She has a tiny amount of marmalade on toast on a Saturday and Sunday.
She has some chocolate and a packaged snack - soreen loaf or cake bake thing after swimming on a Wednesday
She has fruit at home during the week too but it is always served with cucumber and carrot sticks too.
She gets chocolate now and biscuits now and then. She had a couple of jammies dodgers at the weekend as she had grandparents to visit.
She has such a tightly controlled diet due to her food allergies and reflux and dental considerations it's usually us that instigates the "treats". For us treats are not about the food as she has them at all times but for us treats are an occasion so at the weekend we all sat out in the sun is with coffees, her with a cup of oat milk, and all enjoyed a biscuit together. She loves it when she can share a food experience with others as it doesn't happen very often. She had another the next day which was just with her lunch which was lunch and not a treat.

@Superscientist I heard via a Dietitian that oat milk doesn’t have enough nutrition in it to be used as a cows milk substitute. Apparently if giving kids non dairy milk it has to be soya 🤷🏼‍♀️.

I was giving my DD oat milk as that is just what we drink at home but she started getting a dairy intolerance as she wasn’t exposed to enough so I switched her to cows and she’s fine now. I did consider doing soya though when I heard re not enough nutrition in oat milk.

Daughter is allergic to dairy, soya, coconut and other things so oat milk is the only milk like drink she can have.

There are actually now a few oat milks with comparable nutritional qualities to whole milk cows milk with the required 3g of fat, 60+kcal, 120mg calcium per 100ml and iodine too. We use oatly barista as recommended by our dietitian. There is also alpro growing up oat milk which is similar nutrition to oatly barista but all of the alpro oat milks contain pea protein which my daughter is also allergic too!