Are We Giving Our Kids Food Phobias?

I have rather easy rules at home - the kids know they can have one cookie at any time of their choosing (so long as it's not before a meal). My older kids have developed the wisdom to have their cookie at the end of the day...my others, well, it's still in Project Management stage. :)

'sides that, we always have crispy apples for snacking desires. As both I and my husband walk the same walk, we show a good example (ie, it's a normal thing to do).

Data points, Barbara

i was diagnosed an obese kid when i was 8 months old (my mom's fault) as a consequence i was fordidden any fun food for years, and ended up binging on them when i moved to canada as well as putting 90lbs on
i swear i will always teach my kids how to eat sensibly of everything, and will never buy anything for fear they would be tempted. snacking on fruit/water is much more sensible but we can all share that odd can of coke from time to time

I was one a speaker about 'feeding our children' at an Organics conference and I'll never forget one women who came to my talk. She was FRANTIC, and I do mean FRANTIC because her three boys (aged 3,5 and 9) wouldn't eat what she wanted them to. Well when I found out her idea behind healthy eating I wasn't one bit surprised. She was trying to insist they were fruitarians - all they were allowed to eat was organic fruit. And quite naturally they were rebelling, stealing food from other kids at school and so on.

I've long predicted that the new 'eating disorder' will be what Steve Bratman coined at 'Orthorexia' which I have written about over at Ditch Diets Live LIght... (you can take the quizz to see if your habits and attitudes towards healthy eating may be hellish at: http://www.ditch-diets-live-light.com/orthorexia-nervosa-quizz.html) it's when eating well turns to eating hell because of all the over zealous attempts at eating ultra healthy.

It doesn't surprise me at all to see this article - us humans really seem to have a hard time with taking the middle path.

It's a really hard call isn't it? My eldest daughter knows that we don't eat things like "dunkaroos" and oreo cookies because of the "bad sugar" that isn't healthy for us. She understands that, for a while she was upset because the kids at school get to eat them. I tried to explain that natural sugar was better for her body than a sugar made in a laboratory. And she seems to understand.

But that doesn't mean I don't make her banana muffins for her lunch box, or let her have ginger snap cookies, and even pudding. Everything in moderation eh? Except HFCS cause it's in everything. LOL!

I AM trying to get her to eat more veggies and fruit. The kid will eat salmon and chicken like there is no tomorrow, and certain veggies, but getting her to choose a fruit for a snack? Hard. Grapes, and the occasional apple, no problemo. She would prefer a "treat". What kid doesn't.

And where did all these "peanut allergies" come from?

And why can't we take a tray of cupcakes to the classroom on the kid's birthday?

-Steve

I think it is important not to influence your children negatively about foods that are part of a good diet. There is nothing wrong with pasta and healthy food. Encouraging children to try different foods and not have phobias is important.

I think it depends on the kid, really. My 5-yr-old is well aware of why some foods are considered healthier than others. I am on the lookout for signs of obsessiveness so I can nip that black-and-white thinking in the bud right away. But she seems to have a healthy outlook on food, so I'll keep stressing the importance of eating healthy to her.

One thing I have noticed is that as my kiddo gets older, her desire for vegetables is diminishing. She used to regularly ask to eat vegetables for breakfast, but those days are long gone. I chalk this up to the grandparents spoiling her when junk food every time she visits them. If anything, I wish I had held my ground more and not let other people give my kiddo that junk.

Sorry in advance for the length of this post, I guess I have lots of thoughts on this matter:

I think that the attitude parents take towards food will be the attitude the kids take up - in other words, if the parents behave obsessively about it and forbid things then the kids are more likely to pick up the obsessiveness, not the message. If the parents talk about why certain things are better choices than others in a reasonable manner, then that's the outlook the kids will pick up too. You can promote health without promoting obsession - the two CAN be mutually exclusive.

The parents who ban certain foods I think are setting themselves and their kids up for failure. You can do this when your kids are little and they will buy into it because they have little choice in the matter. But you can't raise them in a bubble. By the time they are school age, if they eat lunch at school they will be swapping things in their lunch, (even if you tell them you prefer them not to, even if school policy frowns on it) They will go to friends houses where you will be led to believe they eat nothing BUT oreos and ice cream. They will get an allowance and have the ability to go to the corner store or the movies and purchase all sorts of revolting crap. If you have forbidden sweets and other beguiling snacks what do you think they will go for???

I prefer brown rice but in 12 years have not been able to totally convice my kids of it's superiority - so we compromise. Sometimes we have brown, sometimes we have white that at least has some fibre in it, like basmati. Nobody has any problems with whole grain spaghetti, it's covered in sauce anyway. But for pasta that they prefer "naked" they also prefer it white - and there seems to be a lot of options with fibre for that as well. (ie catelli smart pasta) They prefer white bread but know I won't buy it - they don't like bread with lots of grainy bits in it -so we've compromised and usually get light rye bread.

We have no forbidden foods and my kids eat oreos and they even eat sugary cereal but in all honesty I would say I purchase one box of each a year, ie oreos are something we'd buy for an annual ski trip, sugary cereal is something that you would only eat at the cabin. It's clearly understood that sugar pops or fruit loops or whatever horror they have selected are a sugary snack, not a breakfast cereal, and you can have a bowl of it every few days as a treat.

My kids are fans of organic produce and meat but it's because I've explained the environmental side of it - kids are better at being pro-environment than pro-healthy eating I think because the evidence is more tangible to them. And as they grow there are payoffs. My older son the other week told us he wanted to try a new way of eating - he didn't want to eat most meat anymore, just fish. It's been relatively easy to support this because there are lots of convenience options for fish and seafood - canned salmon, individual fish servings that can be cooked from frozen in the microwave in 5 minutes, and I've found individual servings of frozen scallops that cook quickly as well. He was delighted last night that the spaghetti sauce was made with a meat substitute. Now, if I had come up with the idea that we were going to be vegetarians except for seafood, he'd probably be hiding out somewhere scarfing down raw meat.

In the aftermath of a high-conflict divorce involving two young children... food, diet, and physical fitness have become a regular, recurring issue in our respective households.

While my household has always done a pretty darn good job in giving the children age-appropriate information regarding the right balance of good stuff and "treats" - they have no such support at the other household and virtually zero restrictions on the types of foods that they eat nor snacks. The frequency is alarming.

We believe we're handling things okay on our end with the children, but unfortunately there is a by-product of the polar-opposite approaches at each household... we have to work hard to give them more information than I think that they need to be burdened with at ages 7 and 10.

It's truly a shame that they can't count on BOTH of us to have primarily right choices (and controls) in place to ensure their ongoing health and wellness.

Great article.

~Mister-M

The best thing to do is lead by example. Making thnings black and white is not a good example. In fact, it's the basis of many eating disorders. Teaching healthy eating by keeping healthy foods in the house and serving them appropriately will not harm a child. Banning foods, in the other had will.

One thing my mom did when I was a child was tell me we couldn't "afford" the sugary snacks and little Debbies other kids had at lunch. Granted, thinking that we were poor did make me feel bad. But, it wasn't until about 5 years of living on my own (heading straight for the produce dept. and shopping around the perimeter of the grocery store) that I realized what she had done! Boxes of little Debbies were 3/$2.00 and I was buying grapes on sale for $6.00/bag!

I confronted my mom about lying to me and her response was "well, it is too expensive for sugar, fat and white flour. We didn't have extra money in our budget for that." I guess she did have a point...

Like many others here, I have lots of thoughts on this subject. I was brought up in a house filled with lots of food & lots of fattening foods. I knew nothing else & therefore I learned to love the stuff that added all that weight on me as a youth.

I think that children learn by example so why not start them right from the beginning eating a variety of foods but lots of healthy foods, fruits, veggies etc. but do not make anything "an evil". If the parents are eating a certain way without being obsessive about it, the children learn from that.

The thing the irks me the most is that there are parents that really are overweight & obese due to their eating habits & they "bring the kids along with them". Then they seek out help for their overweigh children. They have to make the sacrifice as well to eat better & introduce healthier habits to the children. Look in the mirror before you start blaming the kids. Many parents have brought on adult diseases to their children by introducing them to their bad habits but are too selfish to change their own habits.

Again, if a healthy attitude towards food starts from day one, then things would be a lot better. And don't talk the diet stuff in front of the children as well .. they hear it & respond to it! They get enough of that on TV!

The really sad thing too is that these children that are so overweight & obese not only have the weight issue but are teased & taunted in school & elsewhere.

Adults with children need to take responsibility & provide a healthy but not obsessed attitude to food in the household

This is a topics used to make headlines. I mean, get real. We have an obesity epidemic. Children are the unhealthiest they have been in recent history. People are worried about kids getting food phobias? Kids should know that unhealthy eating habits are the leading cause of disease and chronic conditions later in life. Tiptoeing around the situation is not the way to go here. A topic like this contributes to the "pussification of America."

I could see this happening, especially since there is more info available now than ever before. When I was a kid, my parents were sort of opposites to each other when it came to nutrition...my mom liked white bread and Spam sandwiches with mayo and my dad was a total health nut. Good thing for us that he did most of the grocery shopping...every time we came along, we had rules that we had to follow: 1) Breakfast cereal had to be either sugar-free or low in sugar. Which we hated, because it meant no "fun" sugar cereal 2) We were only allowed to drink OJ, grapefruit juice or other fruit juices with pulp. If it wasn't made with real juice, we weren't allowed to drink it. 3) No soda 4) Snacks were either fruit, yogurt, or something that was sort of healthy. My dad always made it fun by letting us pick the type of fruit we wanted or whatever flavor of yogurt we liked.

My sibs and I turned out ok...we all like a variety of foods and we read labels, but we're not obsessed and we don't get too worked up over any specific foods.

OMG! Do we really need to go out of our way to find a justification for deliberately feeding kids processed junk food? You can guide your kids in their food choices without making them neurotic. And you should be making GOOD choices for them - YOU'RE THE ADULT!

How about making YOUR OWN COOKIES? It doesn't mean they have to be made out of flaxseed - just leave the transfats out and half the sodium and... WOW! WHAT A CONCEPT! Seriously, there's NO REASON in the world you should be feeding your child a transfat, sodium laden Oreo to protect them from psychological distress. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard.

I grew up thinking Kraft Dinner was for poor people. It was what my friends whose mom was on welfare ate. My grandmother made something similar... but it was with REAL CHEESE and on pasta I helped her make by hand. I'd invite them to my house for dinner because the thought of eating at their house didn't really appeal to me so much. And thirty-some years later... they STILL talk about the food at my house... because IT ROCKED!

I grew up with weight issues, but they started in my adolescents and NOT because I rebelled. It was because my parents divorced and the "structured family meal time" evaporated. My mother had to work three jobs to make the mortgage payments and I was left to make my own choices about when and what I ate. Now THERE is a recipe for disaster!

Feed your kids healthy food at home! YOU ARE THE ADULT - they're relying on you to make good choices for them. There will be no shortage of processed garbage in their lives. And if you don't make a big deal about it and you LEARN TO COOK PROPERLY - they'll probably be quite happy to eat most of what you put in front of them.

Daisy - Amen, sister! You totally rock. I hope people will see the common sense and complete logic in your comments. Michael Pollan has the same advice: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." By eating food, he means to eat REAL food - whole food that is NOT processed. Obviously we shouldn't overdo the portions. And a mostly vegetable, legume and fruit diet is a good idea. Kids eat what adults teach them to eat, so we should all do better. Our children are worth whatever effort it takes for the adults in their lives to help them make good food choices.

Food Phobias? Man, what the heck will they think of next?!

The cupcakedisordersyndrom? People are thinking into this sh*t wayy too much.

Let children be children, and parents, make sure you parent them! You don't have to give em hell and get them all worried about "trans fats" and "saturated fats"... just take the crap away when they've had 2 or 3 cookies.

Save the complex explanation for when they're old enough.

My 2c.

I agree with Daisy.

Reading people's comments makes me realize what a good job my parents did. They made us dinner every night and it always included a green vegetable, a protein, and a starch. They kept a variety of foods in the house and we weren't taught to obsess or avoid anything.

Unfortunately I learned to obsess as an adult though! Not my parents' fault!