Nephew’s behaviour

[BluegrassAndRoses]

My Nephew is 9. When he visits he complains a lot, for example the latest was that he is hungry but doesn’t want anything we offer. He had refused to eat the dinner his parents had made for him. He then agrees to eat something but very quickly puts it down and says ‘this x is horrible. It’s the worst tasting x I’ve ever had’.

This is quite rude behaviour. At his age, surely we should be explaining that he shouldn’t be so obviously negative about something kind someone else has done for him? Of course when he was offered cake he managed to eat it all.

He's not my child and were following his parents lead but curious to know how other parents would handle this. His parent has quite a passive parenting style.

I taught my kids to not say anything while in company but to not eat it if they didn't want to.

It is (reasonably) say to train them to not say anything.

It is damn near impossible to get them to eat something h they do not want to and to be honest I have sympathy as I've choked down some pretty inedible meals out of politeness.

He has his dps dancing on strings.. Don't you entertain that. Eat out then they can deal with his needs. Anyone who disrespected my cooking wouldn't be invited back..

Probably because I’m old, in my house, it’s my rules. You get asked what you want to eat. If you are given something that you say you like, you eat it or you don’t. No alternative. If it’s the worst x you’ve ever tasted, tough luck. That’s how we make it in this house, take it or leave it. And no whinging, whining or rudeness is tolerated. It’s worked with two generations of my family (no neurodiversity or special requirements).

He is 9, mine would have the cop on at that age to lie if they didn't like something.

But they can be too honest still at that age and rude. I would expect the parents to say, okay you don't like it but you say thank you etc, did that happen,?

I'd point out to his parents that he doesn't seem to enjoy your cooking and has commented that he said your meal was the worse X he had ever had. Suggest to them that he eats before he comes as you don't want to waste your time cooking meals he doesn't like. Don't criticise him directly but subtlety point out you won't be cooking for him again. If he comes and asks for cake I'd say ' are you sure you want my cake? You don't seem to enjoy my food, I don't want it wasted?'

Food is a real pain with my three. But they have to at least try the food in front of them. So I normally say well you need to eat 5 more mouth fulls. I also go with the mantra of you need to try something 20 times before you say you don't like it. This works with my child but my SS are very very fussy and it's like a stand off at dinner time at times. If they don't eat enough they might get an alternative of a sandwich or fruit, but they forfeit any treats or pudding if they haven't tried it properly.

If your children have food issues engage with medical professionals. Extended family member here is twelve and all medical professionals have advised never mandate eating a food always put a safe food.

We have had to sit on family members who were trying to mandate your approach, which completely went against received medical advice.

Just ensure you are following medical professionals and not so called appointed parenting professionals. I hope it gets easier we are now preparing for what teen years bring.

9 is old enough to know that is very rude behaviour, and if he doesn't understand that, then someone needs to point it out, and keep pointing it out. He doesn't have to eat it, but he doesn't need to be rude.

My DCs didn't behave like that at 9 and neither does my god-daughter.

No. She has been working on being more empathetic I think, so she is just acknowledging/ reflecting things like this. And saying ‘oh dear, well just put it down then’.

It is total pain with my nephew and I do get that. He absolutely refuses to try something he’s decided he doesn’t like, and that applies to a hell of a lot!

I was curious more about letting him get away with poor social manners in other people’s houses!

There's a good chance he probably wouldn't do this in a friends house but if you are close family then you may get the unvarnished child 😉

Yes he was visiting me. He does like visiting us. Usually we make him food we know he likes. So it’s possible he didn’t eat his dinner at home first because he was hoping we would have something better for him but we hadn’t planned for that.

My nephew was this - a rude little sod. Used to point out everything he didn’t like and tell me my house was a 'bombsite' (it wasn’t) and that my food was horrible even though we used to do a buffet with plenty of beige kid-friendly stuff that we wouldn’t normally eat. My SIL would just smile quietly like he was amazing. Never pulled him up on his rudeness. None of us enjoyed the visits and we didn’t include them in the wider family events just because he was a pain. We hardly see them now because of it. Their loss.

What did you actually do though, did you just sit there and take it?

If my nephew was rude like that I'd say 'hey neph, a) that's all there is and b) if you really don't like something it's OK not to eat it but it is very rude to say what you just said and it has hurt my feelings. Far better to say, "I'm sorry auntie, I don't like it very much, is it ok if I leave it" if you really can't manage it. Go and make yourself some toast if you're hungry but that's all I'm cooking tonight.'

In the same vein, I took DNs out for lunch recently, the service was to be fair appallingly slow, but DN1 wouldn't stop going on about it. I just said 'when someone else is paying it is very rude to keep remarking about an issue, you're allowed to bring it up once, maybe twice, but after that you must change the subject and talk about something else.'

They don't always know

I agree @HelloMyNameIsElderSmurf you're right. I will do that next time rather than follow his parents style.

Yes he does like visiting us and asks to visit us. It can be tricky because he would prefer to play computer games the whole time and we encourage him to do activities with us rather than just be on a screen the whole time. We make him special food from scratch that he loves so he really enjoys that. We do day trips together, we’re going on a short holiday together soon. We babysit him over night sometimes and he really likes that and would like to do that more. We have a lot of fun together and he can be lovely and chatty. I’m not sure why people are questioning our whole relationship because of this.

You’re reading too much into it. A poster said food was a pain for her three children, and I said yes it’s similar, my nephews parent finds food a pain with him too.

you’re completely misinterpreting some things. I said he loves eating what we make for him, it’s one of the reasons he likes visiting us, because we show him special care and consideration because we love him and want him to be happy.

his parents style of parenting is passive, that’s simply the term for it.

he loves gaming and it can be a challenge to do other activities with him as he knows we have a console here, but we do try to limit it so we can spend quality time with him.

you really are projecting / reading too much into things, and that is a “you problem”, as they say.

I didn’t call him a total pain and I’ve already explained that you were misinterpreting that comment.

If you don’t think the example I provided was my nephew being “rude” then say so and explain why. I’m completely open to others perspectives. No other posters on this thread have challenged me on that so happy for you to do so.