Debate on insisting child eat "real" food prior to filling up on chocolate/candy

OK.. I'm excited to see your responses. I only have 2 kids and the
oldest, almost 3 now, has started this thing of eating nothing but
chocolate/candy if she has her way. We went through this about a year
ago and DH insisted we let her have her fill on the candy so as not to
make it a "treat". Well at the time it seemed to work and within a
couple of days she went back to eating real food and didn't seem to
care too much about the sweets. Now.. here we go again. Now this may
only be happening because there's chocolate in the house from the
holidays and when it's all gone the argument may be moot but here's the
question. I think the child should be encouraged to eat real food (ie a
bowl of cottage cheese or some meat) PRIOR to her having the box of
chocolate put in front of her. Daddy thinks she should not be coerced
into eating anything prior to filling up on candy and believes that in
doing so I will cause irreversible food association(guilt, pleasure,
rewards, etc) that he believes should in no way be associated with food
and may lead to weight control issues in the futere. In your experience
which method seemed to work better?

In article . com,
says...

OK.. I'm excited to see your responses. I only have 2 kids and the
oldest, almost 3 now, has started this thing of eating nothing but
chocolate/candy if she has her way. We went through this about a year
ago and DH insisted we let her have her fill on the candy so as not to
make it a "treat". Well at the time it seemed to work and within a
couple of days she went back to eating real food and didn't seem to
care too much about the sweets. Now.. here we go again. Now this may
only be happening because there's chocolate in the house from the
holidays and when it's all gone the argument may be moot but here's the
question. I think the child should be encouraged to eat real food (ie a
bowl of cottage cheese or some meat) PRIOR to her having the box of
chocolate put in front of her. Daddy thinks she should not be coerced
into eating anything prior to filling up on candy and believes that in
doing so I will cause irreversible food association(guilt, pleasure,
rewards, etc) that he believes should in no way be associated with food
and may lead to weight control issues in the futere. In your experience
which method seemed to work better?


Well, it looks like the
reverse-psychology-less-let-the-forbitten-fruit-thing-wear-off-possibly-even-aversion-therapy
approach isn't working.

(You mean your DH is actually putting the box of candy in front of her??)

The no-candy-in-the-house-out-of-sight-out-of-mind thing works better, as you've
already observed.

Better for the adults in the house, too, for that matter.

And cheaper to boot.

Cheers,
Banty

Hi -

I think it's a silly argument. Throw the chocolate into the garbage
(while your child is asleep or out of the house) and have done. It's
not good for anyone and is clearly causing your child to ignore her own
body signals (or else the excess sugar is corrupting her body signals).

My two cents,
--Beth Kevles

http://web.mit.edu/kevles/www/nomilk.html -- a page for the milk-allergic
Disclaimer: Nothing in this message should be construed as medical
advice. Please consult with your own medical practicioner.

NOTE: No email is read at my MIT address. Use the AOL one if you would
like me to reply.

I think most almost-3's are smarter than you are giving them credit
for. If she knows she can eat nothing but candy, of course she will
eat nothing but candy. If she knows that candy is a 'treat' and only
to be eaten as a supplement to other, healthier foods, she is capable
of understanding that. (And then choosing to either eat nothing, or eat
healthy foods followed by a small portion of candy.)

We have many kids at the preschool where I work who are about this age.
They usually have desserts packed in their lunches, and they know that
they can't eat the candy/cookie/whatever until they've eaten a
reasonable amount of their lunch.

Naomi

In article . com,
wrote:

I think most almost-3's are smarter than you are giving them credit
for. If she knows she can eat nothing but candy, of course she will
eat nothing but candy. If she knows that candy is a 'treat' and only
to be eaten as a supplement to other, healthier foods, she is capable
of understanding that. (And then choosing to either eat nothing, or eat
healthy foods followed by a small portion of candy.)

We have many kids at the preschool where I work who are about this age.
They usually have desserts packed in their lunches, and they know that
they can't eat the candy/cookie/whatever until they've eaten a
reasonable amount of their lunch.

Naomi

You're right, I'd forgotten about packed lunches. My 5 y.o. does wait
until she's had her main lunch items before anything sweet she might
have in there -- but she's the only kid in her school (very small
school, so I was told this by a mom who watches them all at lunch) who
waits to eat her sweets, eats slowly, and eats some part of each thing
I've packed every day. I had asked the mom why Sage was so far behind
every other kid in finishing her lunch (probably 10 minutes slower than
the others), and it turns out she's the only one who's actually
bothering to really eat!

Tina.

wrote:
OK.. I'm excited to see your responses. I only have 2 kids and the
oldest, almost 3 now, has started this thing of eating nothing but
chocolate/candy if she has her way. We went through this about a year
ago and DH insisted we let her have her fill on the candy so as not
to
make it a "treat". Well at the time it seemed to work and within a
couple of days she went back to eating real food and didn't seem to
care too much about the sweets. Now.. here we go again. Now this may
only be happening because there's chocolate in the house from the
holidays and when it's all gone the argument may be moot but here's
the
question. I think the child should be encouraged to eat real food (ie
a
bowl of cottage cheese or some meat) PRIOR to her having the box of
chocolate put in front of her. Daddy thinks she should not be coerced
into eating anything prior to filling up on candy and believes that
in
doing so I will cause irreversible food association(guilt, pleasure,
rewards, etc) that he believes should in no way be associated with
food
and may lead to weight control issues in the futere. In your
experience
which method seemed to work better?

I agree with your husband that it's good to try and avoid bad food
associations. And when my kids were younger, I did offer them dessert
right along with every thing else, instead of withholding it as a
reward.

However, I feel it only works if you offer small quantities; at this
age, for example, one or two hershey kisses at dinner, and even then,
not every day and with every meal.

The way I look at it, refined sugar was scarce for much of human
existence. Even though we are designed to prefer sweet food, it was the
rare occasion we got any. (Remember Little House on the Praire? And how
they were so excited to get a single piece of candy in their stockings
at xmas?). Today, unfortunately, sugar is no longer ra it's in
everything and anything that's processed, and easily available in large
quantities.

The human body hasn't learned to handle such large quantities. We have
not evolved fast enough. We react with blood sugar swings, etc. I know
I personally can't handle large amounts of sugar on an empty stomach,
even if I may crave it. It will leave me feeling sick within the hour,
and oddly craving more!

In general, if you leave a kid alone, they will select the foods that
their body needs. This maxim, however, simply doesn't work with sugar
(or with salt, for that matter). It's an evolutionary thing. Salt and
sugar circumvent our body's natural signals and interfere with them
until they're misleadingly out of whack.

For all these reasons, it is best to limit candy. I recommend keeping
it out of the house (or at least somewhere the child can't find it). A
few things we do in our house include:

1) Once a week, I buy one sweet item for the whole family, usually a
quart of ice cream. When it's gone, it's gone, and I don't buy more
until the next shopping trip. Therefore, I don't limit intake on a
daily basis. If everyone wants to pig out and eat their 1/4 share of
that quart on the first day, then so be it. The kids have figured out
that they can ration it over the week to have a little each day. I
don't fret whether they eat it all on the first day, or a little all
week long, because either way, it is the same percentage of their
weekly calories.

2) For occasions such as Halloween or Easter, I let the girls go
hog-wild and eat to their heart's content. Then the next day, the candy
disappears - either I take it to work and leave it in the break room,
or I have also been known to throw it in the trash. I've been doing
this for so long, they've never complained or balked about it.

They're now at the age where they are old enough to come home from
school with candy they bought with their allowance or traded. I do urge
them to hold off eating it until after their stomach is full. Not as a
reward for eating a meal, but because the body can process sugar better
on a full stomach rather than empty. So in that way, you are just as
right as your husband, IMO.

jen

shinypenny wrote:
1) Once a week, I buy one sweet item for the whole family, usually a
quart of ice cream. When it's gone, it's gone, and I don't buy more
until the next shopping trip. Therefore, I don't limit intake on a
daily basis. If everyone wants to pig out and eat their 1/4 share of
that quart on the first day, then so be it. The kids have figured out
that they can ration it over the week to have a little each day. I
don't fret whether they eat it all on the first day, or a little all
week long, because either way, it is the same percentage of their
weekly calories.

2) For occasions such as Halloween or Easter, I let the girls go
hog-wild and eat to their heart's content. Then the next day, the
candy
disappears - either I take it to work and leave it in the break room,
or I have also been known to throw it in the trash. I've been doing
this for so long, they've never complained or balked about it.


Replying to my own post (hate it when that happens). I forgot #3...

3) The day after your bday, you can have bday cake for breakfast!! Then
we dump the rest of the cake in the trash. Don't ask me why I started
this tradition, because I don't remember. :-)

jen

In article . com,
wrote:

OK.. I'm excited to see your responses. I only have 2 kids and the
oldest, almost 3 now, has started this thing of eating nothing but
chocolate/candy if she has her way. We went through this about a year
ago and DH insisted we let her have her fill on the candy so as not to
make it a "treat". Well at the time it seemed to work and within a
couple of days she went back to eating real food and didn't seem to
care too much about the sweets. Now.. here we go again. Now this may
only be happening because there's chocolate in the house from the
holidays and when it's all gone the argument may be moot but here's the
question. I think the child should be encouraged to eat real food (ie a
bowl of cottage cheese or some meat) PRIOR to her having the box of
chocolate put in front of her. Daddy thinks she should not be coerced
into eating anything prior to filling up on candy and believes that in
doing so I will cause irreversible food association(guilt, pleasure,
rewards, etc) that he believes should in no way be associated with food
and may lead to weight control issues in the futere. In your experience
which method seemed to work better?

I basically agree with your DH - don't make candy some special treat
that is very limited in nature. I think this can lead to bingeing and
other food related health issues in later life. We keep a jar of candy
on top of the fridge for the kids (DH & I don't eat it). They ask for
some ( a very small handful in a bowl) maybe once or twice a week. I
let them have it if there is more than an hour to go before a scheduled
meal. They are more likely to ask for fruit than candy, but that's
their preference, as I buy cheap generic chocolate candy but keep a lot
of very nice fruit in the house.

It does seem, however, that *you* and *DH* have a problem with having
candy in the house and it would seem to be just easier to throw it in
the trash can than to keep fighting over it. It's not like candy is a
vital food group. If the kids really want some, they'll ask for it at
the checkout or wherever and get their fix that way.

eggs.

In article ,
eggs wrote:


I basically agree with your DH - don't make candy some special treat
that is very limited in nature. I think this can lead to bingeing and
other food related health issues in later life. We keep a jar of candy
on top of the fridge for the kids (DH & I don't eat it). They ask for
some ( a very small handful in a bowl) maybe once or twice a week. I
let them have it if there is more than an hour to go before a scheduled
meal. They are more likely to ask for fruit than candy, but that's
their preference, as I buy cheap generic chocolate candy but keep a lot
of very nice fruit in the house.



I agree with this concept, and try (yeah, I'm still working on it!), to
keep healthy snacks always accessible, like fruit, veggies, nuts,
crackers even, and occasionally I'll put in their baskets chocolate or
hard candy. It's very funny how differently my kids' palates are
attuned, after the same -- or similar -- attitudes from me for both of
them. My 5 y.o. will eat candy until she's sick (and used to do this
with fruit when she was a baby -- I guess it takes her awhile to figure
out 'fullness') just because she loves it so much! The 3 y.o. doesn't
like sweets, hardly at all, and most of the time, three quarters of her
candy is given to her sister.

It's not that we ration it, and they're certainly allowed treats at
least as much as any healthy household I know, but our older daughter
has her Dad's attitude toward food, I think, and our younger has mine.
I'm the kind of person who will be at the store and think "I love
chocolate donuts!", and buy a dozen of my favorite donuts, eat half of
one, put them away and then end up wasting them because I forget to eat
the rest. And I don't like to waste food, so I get out of the habit of
buying them. My husband, apparently looks at it like "She bought donuts,
and she hardly ever does, I'd better eat all of them before they go
bad." Which brings me to your next point...


It does seem, however, that *you* and *DH* have a problem with having
candy in the house and it would seem to be just easier to throw it in
the trash can than to keep fighting over it. It's not like candy is a
vital food group. If the kids really want some, they'll ask for it at
the checkout or wherever and get their fix that way.


We have ended up with less in the house lately, for kind of this reason.
We weren't fighting so much, but my husband doesn't want to eat sweets,
we don't like to *offer* them to the kids too much, and it's not worth
the worry or annoyance. If my kids are eating pasta and veggies, I sure
don't want them to 'save room' for sweets!

I remember as a kid -- with no rationing, really -- having to throw out
what was left of my Halloween candy before the Easter Bunny could come,
and then doing the same thing with leftover Easter candy before going
trick or treating. So I do think the no rationing thing can work, but
it takes the right kind of palate. My younger daughter and I could
probably have dinner every day with a chocolate sculpture centerpiece,
and not take a bite for weeks; older daughter and husband, not so much.
(Oh -- and the only weight issues in our family are not gaining fast
enough, so really if they wanted to keep eating candy, I'd probably let
them!) (And we do still have Halloween candy sitting in the pantry.
Maybe we end up not loving the candy because it's so darn old!)

Tina.

Tina Petrone wrote:

I remember as a kid -- with no rationing, really -- having to throw out
what was left of my Halloween candy before the Easter Bunny could come,
and then doing the same thing with leftover Easter candy before going
trick or treating. So I do think the no rationing thing can work, but
it takes the right kind of palate. My younger daughter and I could
probably have dinner every day with a chocolate sculpture centerpiece,
and not take a bite for weeks; older daughter and husband, not so much.
(Oh -- and the only weight issues in our family are not gaining fast
enough, so really if they wanted to keep eating candy, I'd probably let
them!) (And we do still have Halloween candy sitting in the pantry.

Us too. I have to keep weeding out the candy, because
the progression from Halloween to Christmas to Valentine's Day
to Easter pretty much keeps the candy dish full. The kids are
quite good about it. They know they can't snack on candy
night and day. Our general rule is that you can have what
you want after you've eaten a respectable amount of "growing
food." Both boys are very thin, so clearly weight is not
an issue. Our rules probably restrict their eating sweets
more than they might do on their own, but they have plenty
of access to sweets as well as to healthy foods and they
eat reasonably well overall.

Best wishes,
Ericka