My kids steal food.

[Anonymous]

What you’ve described sounds like the result of food restriction, which includes both real and mental restriction. Binge eating and bulimia are actually delayed responses to real or mental food restriction... there is a cycle that involves shame, guilt, self-loathing when someone knows they are “not supposed” to eat something. Then when they do, they self-loathe for the “bad” behavior. This then leads to a period of restriction again to correct for the mistake, which will inevitably result again in the binge.

I recommend you have your daughter speak to an eating disorder specialist, and possibly you too. It sounds to be like there is a relationship here between control, restriction, food and body that has already become toxic and may lead to disordered eating or an eating disorder if it has not already.

Food issues are very real and are rooted in control and emotional regulation issues in the individual or family system. Also, be sure not to make associations between body size and eating behavior or food choices if disordered eating is suspected to be present. This will exacerbate feelings of shame and guilt etc... which make it worse.

In the meantime I would recommend completely getting rid of locking food up and any measures you have in place to forcibly prevent or restrict your kids intake of specific foods. If your kid wants lasagna and their favorite part is the top then let the kid cut a big slice and eat only the top if they want. If the kid wants a big bowl or two of their dads favorite ice cream that’s awesome! Tell them to go for it! When access to food becomes free again then your kids might have the chance to start figuring out for themselves what it is that they want. Their bodies won’t betray them.

[Anonymous]

I agree with 20:35 except about the ice cream. Sugar addiction is real and you do not want to enable it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree with 20:35 except about the ice cream. Sugar addiction is real and you do not want to enable it.

Kindly, 20:35 sounds like they have some training or at a minimum deep knowledge about how disordered eating works (I speak from professional and personal experience) and based on your comment I don’t think that you do. You are not enabling a sugar addiction by allowing your kids access to foods. It’s too much to go into here, but this is why op really need help from someone trained in this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: My kids — 9 and 5 — are home all day distance learning and cannot stop stealing food. They eat three squares, I’m always ready with a healthy snack. They get plenty of treats. hot chocolate, bake something, etc. but they will still go into the cabinets and fridge and eat an entire box of crackers or pick the top layer off of the lasagna left over from last night. My husband locks his ice cream in our chest freezer but if we forget they will destroy it.

They know because we’ve said really clearly what they can and can’t have. We’ve tried taking away electronics and putting things in time out or canceling fun stuff when they disobey but honestly the problem is so pervasive that they’d have to be in perpetual lockdown if we punished every infraction. Also, sometimes the perfidy is not discovered until later which complicates things. It’s not just carby sugary things, they will pound a box of lunch meat or a pint of strawberries, leave the trash, and lie about it.

At first it was annoying but is getting to be a big problem. My 9 yo is getting seriously overweight. Her stealing is obviously compulsive in some way. She has discussed it with her therapist and has made some progress but often backslides. The 5 yo is a normal weight but now refuses food at meals because he knows he can just get something better later when he pokes around. He is sharp enough that when he gets caught she blames his sister which causes extra strife.

I feel like locking things sends a bad message. And I have a healthy diet with a good amount of splurges and I don’t want to stop buying things I like because they can’t hang. Any advice appreciated.

What kind of person uses the word perfidy on a message board?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: My kids — 9 and 5 — are home all day distance learning and cannot stop stealing food. They eat three squares, I’m always ready with a healthy snack. They get plenty of treats. hot chocolate, bake something, etc. but they will still go into the cabinets and fridge and eat an entire box of crackers or pick the top layer off of the lasagna left over from last night. My husband locks his ice cream in our chest freezer but if we forget they will destroy it.

They know because we’ve said really clearly what they can and can’t have. We’ve tried taking away electronics and putting things in time out or canceling fun stuff when they disobey but honestly the problem is so pervasive that they’d have to be in perpetual lockdown if we punished every infraction. Also, sometimes the perfidy is not discovered until later which complicates things. It’s not just carby sugary things, they will pound a box of lunch meat or a pint of strawberries, leave the trash, and lie about it.

At first it was annoying but is getting to be a big problem. My 9 yo is getting seriously overweight. Her stealing is obviously compulsive in some way. She has discussed it with her therapist and has made some progress but often backslides. The 5 yo is a normal weight but now refuses food at meals because he knows he can just get something better later when he pokes around. He is sharp enough that when he gets caught she blames his sister which causes extra strife.

I feel like locking things sends a bad message. And I have a healthy diet with a good amount of splurges and I don’t want to stop buying things I like because they can’t hang. Any advice appreciated.

I couldn’t help noticing your language in describing your children’s food and eating behaviors... there is something about it that’s almost punishing and connotes strong disapproval and a sense of wrong-doing... have you noticed this? I wonder if this is also how you might be communicating when you describe food choices and their with behavior them? I am not finger pointing or trying to blame... just noticing. Maybe try using more neutral and less loaded language when it comes to food and eating? I also realize you might be just spent and so frustrated by all this and it is just coming out in the language which would be so understandable. But just bringing voice to it in case it is something deeper.

-stealing
-destroy
-pound
-disobey
-perfidy
-splurges (your own)

[Anonymous]

I am the adoptive parent of a child from an orphanage with significant food trauma. When she came home to us, we got very bad advice about how to deal with her food issues. They got worse over the course of 2 years.

Read Ellyn Satter's work and books. This has turned our child's life around (no therapist...just the books and method), and if it can help her, then I'm pretty sure it can help a child that has not had trauma regarding food.

Let me reiterate what some other posters have said...from a long hard road of experience. There is NO controlling your child's food intake. The only thing we are responsible for doing is help them learn to control their own intake. That is what they need to learn if they are ever to be healthy and happy with no issues surrounding food.

[Anonymous]

You should address your own, obviously significant, issues. Let your kids eat. You cannot control another person's food intake. Poor intake.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You should address your own, obviously significant, issues. Let your kids eat. You cannot control another person's food intake. Poor KIDS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What you’ve described sounds like the result of food restriction, which includes both real and mental restriction. Binge eating and bulimia are actually delayed responses to real or mental food restriction... there is a cycle that involves shame, guilt, self-loathing when someone knows they are “not supposed” to eat something. Then when they do, they self-loathe for the “bad” behavior. This then leads to a period of restriction again to correct for the mistake, which will inevitably result again in the binge.

I recommend you have your daughter speak to an eating disorder specialist, and possibly you too. It sounds to be like there is a relationship here between control, restriction, food and body that has already become toxic and may lead to disordered eating or an eating disorder if it has not already.

Food issues are very real and are rooted in control and emotional regulation issues in the individual or family system. Also, be sure not to make associations between body size and eating behavior or food choices if disordered eating is suspected to be present. This will exacerbate feelings of shame and guilt etc... which make it worse.

In the meantime I would recommend completely getting rid of locking food up and any measures you have in place to forcibly prevent or restrict your kids intake of specific foods. If your kid wants lasagna and their favorite part is the top then let the kid cut a big slice and eat only the top if they want. If the kid wants a big bowl or two of their dads favorite ice cream that’s awesome! Tell them to go for it! When access to food becomes free again then your kids might have the chance to start figuring out for themselves what it is that they want. Their bodies won’t betray them.

You say this yet so many children are fat and make bad food choices so their bodies obviously are betraying them. Kids are poor judges of what food is good or not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree with 20:35 except about the ice cream. Sugar addiction is real and you do not want to enable it.

Sugar addiction can be real but is more of a myth. Same for carbs. This is nothing but a "new age" drivel for most people. The invention of some fad diet "doctors" read youtube gurus who are profiting off of people's gullibility. Most people have no problem regulating eating carbs, sugar, and the rest. We should never, ever, equate the few people with serious eating problems to the whole population. People who have this addiction are very few and in between.
For a while, I restricted my sugar intake. Totally insane. Now I eat candy when I want, and I am able to moderate and easily. I am not saying some people are not addicted to sugar, but any restriction of any foods can lead to insane binging. Please do not equate children's eating habits to your own. No child should be told this is locked and you can't have it.

[Anonymous]

I can’t bring myself to read through ten pages, but I got to page three and no one said the words “yes basket” yet. If it hasn’t been covered, OP, Google it.


Also it is possible - but VERY expensive - to only stock “yes foods” in the whole house. Requires lots of grocery trips (or instacart deliveries) and meticulous meal planning, but it’s possible. Not often feasible, but a potential last resort., OP, quote and respond if you need details.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:#1: Stop buying any food that is not healthy. When you guys want treats, buy single servings or make it as a family. Ice cream, crackers, lunch meats don't make the cut. Stick with fresh fruits and vegetables, raw meats, whole grains, etc.

#2: Don't make extra food for meals so there aren't leftovers.

#3: Get into the habit of doing physical exercise as a family--not to lose weight but to emphasize what a healthy lifestyle looks like. Tell the children that being healthy is a three-legged stool of Sleep, Exercise, and healthy Eating.

Can you work near the kitchen so you can monitor a bit better? My kid was not in the kitchen alone so this never came up.

I’m seriously curious. Do you work? What do you eat for lunch every day?

I am not the pp, but I basically eat the way they’re describing. I work, also. It’s really not that hard with some preparation. Make a whole chicken, eat the meat as leftovers for the next few lunches. Roast several different veggie sides at the same time, eat them for the next few days. Keep lettuce and various salad fixings on hand so you can throw together a salad and warm up some leftover chicken and throw it on top. Make a big batch of homemade veggie sauce and gluten-free pasta. Freeze some of the sauce. It is really not that hard.

I am going to go and bet my savings that this is not how regular middle-class Americans, nor any country people cook and eat! People hold on hand meat, rice, potatoes, noodles. Some veggies, unless you are a vegetarian or a vegan. One chicken doesn't last few next lunches! Not in a regular family of four, where kids are not 1 and 6 months old! Keep lettuce to fill the appetite of 9-year-olds? Gluten-free pasta? Why? Freeze the sauce? Normal families with normal eating family members, finish regular gluten pasta with meat sauce in one meal,, meal and a half. Any leftovers are the next day's lunch, and then you need a new dinner.
Several roasted veggies, let's say with the roasted chicken, hence all in one, do not last a few days! They are normally gone in one day. And that is with making pretty good portions. Please refrain from giving advice to people about eating and food when you clearly have a severe eating disorder!
Have lettuce on hand, so you can make a salad, my something! Only in WASP dcum insanity! Do you know what any normal person in any normal country that has normal growing kids would ask you if you served them a salad? Is this an appetizer!

lol so much to unpack here. First of all, there are three of us, not the “regular” 4. Second of all, someone in our house has gluten intolerance but I also tend to think something like chick pea pasta has more nutritional value than regular wheat pasta. I’m also talking about making big batches of things- so for sauce, for example, think more along the lines of a giant pot on the stove filled with a base of canned tomatoes and then tons and tons of sautéed veggies. Like enough sauce that half of it is left over after covering a whole box of penne pasta.

Also, please expand your understanding of salad. I’m not talking about a sad bowl of ice berg lettuce, think more along the lines of arugula with roasted sweet potato, goat cheese, avocado, topped with chicken.

We do keep some snacks, mainly crackers and fruit and we do dessert several times a week. There is a wide spectrum between kids snacking all day on junk food and depriving children of food.

Trust me, my family is well fed and happy. How were you raised that a whole family eating a healthy diet sounds so strange for you?

No thanks, I will not expand my understanding of the salad. I grew up eating the Med diet and it served me right! I know healthy eating when I see healthy eating! Yours is not! I also grew up knowing that growing kids need protein and greens and carbs. I eat broth-like soups as a starter, as does most of the world. Perhaps you need to rethink your eating habits? I have yet to meet a person that talks about salad of any sort as a proper meal for kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with 20:35 except about the ice cream. Sugar addiction is real and you do not want to enable it.

Sugar addiction can be real but is more of a myth. Same for carbs. This is nothing but a "new age" drivel for most people. The invention of some fad diet "doctors" read youtube gurus who are profiting off of people's gullibility. Most people have no problem regulating eating carbs, sugar, and the rest. We should never, ever, equate the few people with serious eating problems to the whole population. People who have this addiction are very few and in between.
For a while, I restricted my sugar intake. Totally insane. Now I eat candy when I want, and I am able to moderate and easily. I am not saying some people are not addicted to sugar, but any restriction of any foods can lead to insane binging. Please do not equate children's eating habits to your own. No child should be told this is locked and you can't have it.

And >70% of the country is overweight. With the abundance of food of every kind, people aren't able to self regulate well. Moderation and portions have to be learned and practiced. There is no way around it. Skinny kids that "self-regulate" well in childhood still are growing into obese adults.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can’t bring myself to read through ten pages, but I got to page three and no one said the words “yes basket” yet. If it hasn’t been covered, OP, Google it.


Also it is possible - but VERY expensive - to only stock “yes foods” in the whole house. Requires lots of grocery trips (or instacart deliveries) and meticulous meal planning, but it’s possible. Not often feasible, but a potential last resort., OP, quote and respond if you need details.

Not OP but id like more info

[Anonymous]

Your overweight 9 year old girl is entering puberty. Your food restriction is going to damage her mentally and physically.

You need therapy.