DSD eating all my kids pack up food

[ChocolateFlamingo]

I'm getting really annoyed now. DSD is 16 and she keeps helping herself to the food I buy for my kids packed lunches for school!!
Now they don't have enough for tomorrow or Friday!!
I can't afford to keep forking out, she gets bought her own food but she stuffs it all at once and then moans that there's nothing for her to eat!!
Am I right to feel frustrated here?

She has plenty of food. I'd never let her go hungry, when she's not at work she's just too lazy to make herself anything and I'm at work during the day too so I'm not around to.

So, there's plenty for her to eat, once the things she's picked out for herself have gone in thirty seconds, and she's choosing not to eat many of the alternatives available to her? Or she's eating her things in thirty seconds and the only things left are younger DC packed lunch items?

How are you sure she's got enough food? I only say this because the other day, we had a takeaway, and DS13 ate a whole pizza. Declared immediately that he was starving. I said, don't be so ridiculous, and he then proceeded to eat three slices of toast and a banana.

It baffles me how he can consume that. But the boy is a veritable bean pole. He's just genuinely ravenous all the time, and the portion sizes do seem crazy, that's three times more than enough food....for me

OP, can you DP create a box of snacks per week, which he fills. He then tells his DD that they are her snacks. Packed lunch snacks are then in another box?

Sorry but “teenagers are just bottomless pits/maybe she’s hungry” isn’t good enough.

Unless there literally is no food in the house other than that which is intended for the other DC’s lunches she needs to learn some manners.

If she’s hungry she can have toast, fruit, cheese, assuming that’s available to her. A sandwich even.

If she’s got a job then she can buy additional snacks rather than eating those that are intended for the other kids.

Being a teenager doesn’t give someone cart Blanche to disregard everyone else’s needs.

Get a lockable container to put the lunch food in. If she can’t be trusted not to eat it, then she can’t be trusted to have access to it.

@MeridianB he's pretty good in restaurants, but that is absolutely him in the supermarket.

"What do you want for breakfast this week? Crepes. Pain au chocolate. Cereal. Fruit loaf?"

"Dunno......that" (limp gesture towards crepes, plus heavy sigh that I've inconvenienced him with an hour at the shops rather than letting him stay home glued to his phone)

Said crepes come in pack of 8. He will have eaten them in two breakfast sittings, plus "what you eating there mum?" as he eyes up then makes himself more toast.

So, I buy 3 packs of crepes. Plus back up cereal. Plus fruit toast. Because if I don't, what he's actually asked for, lasts him two days. It would last me the week. So I'm wondering if OP is comparing the outlandish amount a teen puts away, to what she eats, and thinking that's plenty.

The phrase "teenagers eat you out of house and home" was not plucked from the ether.

Oh and, I have an 18 year old.

I buy snacks on the understanding that when they’re gone they’re gone. If he eats them all in one sitting then frankly my bank balance isn’t a bottomless pit and he can have toast/fruit/mac n cheese which he is capable of making for himself.

The only agreement we have is that if he finishes off anything else in the house he tells me so that I can replace it. But snacks can’t be a never ending cycle because I simply can’t afford it.

If there are other choices then crisps/biscuits etc are gone when they’re gone and other food has to be eaten if he’s hungry.

Thing is that crepes and cereal are pure sugar and carbs. They’re not filling in the slightest which is why they eat so many of them, because their metabolisms are fast at that age they’re burned off quickly.

Cheese/ham/hotdogs/ contain protein and don’t burn off as fast so it’s always a good idea to have a balance.

All the ‘does she have enough food/buy more’ not everyone as endless funds to repeat buy everything., also she is taking snacks as she’s too lazy to prepare anything.
She sounds incredibly rude and entitled, time for DH to step up.

If it doesn't stop after both of you have told her I'd start to hide your kids food and buy a lockable box for fridge items. At 16 there is no excuse.

My 16 year old did this, drank cartons of juice he was a locust I lost my shit one day and he’s never touched it since. I keep stuff that doesn’t require to be in the fridge in a bag elsewhere so it’s not touched by mistake and the general treats in another bag so he can’t just help himself to all of it.

He’s now being mega healthy and we have plenty food so doesn’t eat that kind of food anymore - joy but was so stressful to find no cartons etc

All the ‘does she have enough food/buy more’ not everyone as endless funds to repeat buy everything

Well someone has to pay for this child's food! Buy cheaper brands. We adore Lidl, it's amazing value.

Also she is taking snacks as she’s too lazy to prepare anything.

Or is that all that's left after she's eaten what's been designated to her, which appears, isn't enough.

You have to hide stuff like this from teens. They just eat it otherwise.

@ChocolateFlamingo

What are the actual items she's eating that make up the packed lunches?

Can you get her one of those famous mumsnet chickens that feed a family of 10 for 2 weeks?

You need to clearly mark the pack up supplies as off limits.

There should also be other food available for a hungry teenager. She shouldn’t have to spend her own money to eat at her father’s house or have to ration her food. You can limit the amount of treats, but she should have free access to nutritious filling food of some sort.

Consequences are needed.

She should have to replace it and if she refuses then she loses something else. My DD would have been told to get to the shop and replace them and if she refused she would have been having her phone removed. If she refused to hand that over I’d cancel the contract.

If she’s been told already at 16 she knows. She’s not starving to death more than likely she’s eaten her own nice snacks and what’s left isn’t as appealing as her Step siblings snacks so she’s having that. Getting away with it so why wouldn’t she.

Consequences 100%

Lockable containers are a good call too. We actually put a lock on the kitchen door as my DD was staying up until 1/2am and going downstairs and eating chocolate/anything she could find in the cupboards and fridge. She was warned a million times but continued and didn’t even try to hide it. So we put a lock on the door so when we went to bed we locked it. Solved the problem and we don’t actually lock it now.

She wasn’t starving either, she’d eaten a massive tea and desert and then snacks if she wanted as long as at a reasonable time/ but she was not waking for school and this is because she was purposely waiting to do this until everyone else was fast asleep! It’s not even stuff she wasn’t allowed just she wanted 5 chocolate bars instead of just 1. Teens are greedy but also quite disobedient if you let them too. I don’t usually resort to such drastic action but I had exhausted all other options at that point and containers weren’t an option because it was all the food rather than just bits I could fit into one container.

All this teenagers are bottomless pits...really? When I was a teenager it was breakfast, dinner and tea..no snacks and same with my kids, we couldn't afford it, it wasn't available.

If they eat a decent meal they can manage without the constant snacks teenager or not. The teenager in question is taking the piss unless meals are the size of a childs

HerMammy
I agree with you. Being 16 doesn't mean your parent/step parent should provide you with a bottomless pit of assorted snacks.

If she's actually hungry she could have a sandwich or toast, or make herself something, not expect to polish off the treats and expect more buying for her.

Another RTFD issue She chooses what she wants from the shop and she get it bought for her.

All this are you feeding her enough.... a lockbox?! She is 16, she knows not to take someone else's food when she is told. And she still takes the food meant for others A sharp word in her ear, a bit of personal responsibility is what is needed..

If it’s in the cupboards fridge she might just see it as ‘available’.

My tip would be to buy some large ziplock food bags and literally prep the lunches for the week in them, zip them up and store in separate bags carrier bags in the fridge with each DCs name on them.

That way the food isn’t available as it’s already been allocated to a lunchbox.

when she's not at work she's just too lazy to make herself anything

So, again, what exactly is she eating that belongs in the packed lunches. A sandwich she'd have to make, so it's not that. A packed lunch doesn't comprise of just ready made snacks, but that's what she's eating?

Am I the only one who thinks it is unusual OP had to ask for food when she was a teen and couldn’t help herself?

I remember being scolded as a teen for wearing all the chocolate wrapped biscuits that were meant for lunches, but it was this much drama.

There seems to be a lot of issues around for both this teen and OP. There are also odd issues with money and food between OP and her husband. Are the other children his? If so why isn’t he normally contributing to their food?

If she is not over weight and simply hungry - people think she should be punished and buy her own food in her home.

I hide what I want from my DCS - because my 13yr old is a bottomless pit and if not nailed down it will be eaten. I shopped on Saturday - today 2 loaves of bread gone, 6 packs of crisps between, 2 packets of biscuits, no bananas, no strawberries and the jaffa cakes are gone oh and the bugger has used all the eggs to make himself cheese omelettes.
If they want to sue pocket money they can ut I would not expect them to buy food in my house.

"Am I the only one who thinks it is unusual OP had to ask for food when she was a teen and couldn’t help herself?"

No.

Although I'm in my 50s, we weren't particularly well off & as a rule you ate the meals that were provided & not much else.

So you asked in case something was for a meal or the biscuits/cheese & crackers were for visitors.

Maybe that was too much to one extreme, but certainly were weren't so selfish that we would be eating whatever we wanted & thus leaving others without food.

Especially if we had already been told.

Sounds as if she knows but just doesn't care!

Perhaps when there isn't endless food to discriminately stuff when you can't stop yourself it's not a bad thing!

We put things designated for packed lunches in a separate fridge drawer, not for home eating. Also make sure you buy plenty of extras to put on another shelf. Teenagers eat a lot, you just need to have plenty in!

Diddl

Growing up, certainly by 16, we were making our own lunches and breakfasts- parents worked. In fact we made family dinners.

We weren’t allowed to eat food that was designated for guests etc but could help our selves to the fruit bowl and arrange our own meals. It wouldn’t have worked to ask permission for food - parents worked, we would have starved. Parents also by that age would have left us for a weekend.

What did you do when your parents were out? How did you cope when you lived independently?