Does my 6 year old eat too much?

[Anonymous]

He's not eating enough

[Anonymous]

I think body shape and weight is a good reflection on whether he eats too much. Some pudginess is normal for kids but a big stomach is not for a 6 year old (toddlers do have big stomachs though).

Everyone is different. My dh eats so much it’s insane, about 4k calories a day. He’s thin with lean muscles. Idk where the food goes. I eat about 1400 calories and am a little chubby. Sigh.

[Anonymous]

I think there’s something wrong with a mother keeping track of her kids daily food intake in such detail.

[Anonymous]

He’s tall AF! My 6 year old eats about the same amount OP.

[Anonymous]

My kids would revolt if I said they could ONLY eat protein for breakfast and no carbs. They aren't evil.

My six year old's appetite varies but it's been very big this week. I suspect it's a growth spurt starting. I do actually do wish he'd eat more types of protein, but when he's hungry it's not the hill I'm going to die on.

[Anonymous]

Without quantities, it's impossible to judge whether a kid eats a typical amount. Is he eating a handful of pretzels or one of those giant tubs?

However, he's eating a wonderful variety, his height is increasing well, and his body is proportional. It's safe to assume that he's listening to his own body's cues, and eating what's right for him. Interfering with those cues by restricting him would put him at risk.

TL/DR: You and he are both doing great! Don't change a thing.

[Anonymous]

no. i eat that much and i am a 22 year old man who is 6 foot 2 and weight 210 pounds

[Anonymous]

This is a question for your child’s doctor, who can assess your child’s BMI. Tall kids, muscular kids, and active kids need more calories than their short, sedentary counterparts. My kid ate like a toddler until puberty and was always the smallest in the class. Then started eating man portions at age 13.

As for the suggestion to pump your child full of protein to satiate them — no. Kids don’t actually need that much protein. And the obsession with blunting hunger with high protein diets in adults should not be transferred to children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think there’s something wrong with a mother keeping track of her kids daily food intake in such detail.

I don't. I can't imagine a parent who can not answer a question about what is a typical day of eating like for your young child.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would try and change up the breakfast slightly. Yogurt and fruit are fine, but try eggs instead of hash browns. More filling and more nutritious. Unless he has a late lunch at school he should be able to go breakfast to lunch without a snack.

An easy to give your kid issues is to make him sit through snack time at school, while all his friends are having snacks, and not get one because “he should be able to go from breakfast to lunch”.

[Anonymous]

He is really tall. My DS 9 is 4’3” and 57 lbs.

[Anonymous]

My twins were big eaters as kids. Age 6 they would eat a big breakfast (we would usually do leftovers so they would have like spaghetti, carrots and hummus and scrambled eggs),

Lunch they would eat a bunch of fruit and some muffins and cheese. They would have fruit and crackers for midmorning snack at school and then some kind of snack after school (varied widely)

Then for dinner I remember their favorite weeknight dinner was this “bean salad” made from a can of corn, a can of kidney beans, a can of black beans, a can of garbanzos, and two cans of sliced olives and they would inhale it topped with sour cream and scooped up with tortilla chips. They would polish off about half of it in one sitting which means they were each eating basically a full can of food plus topping and chips for dinner.

They were consistently in the 20th-50th percentile for both height and weight.

Now in 4th grade and they ate two california rolls and a specialty roll each at a sushi place last night.

Some kids are just HUNGRY.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op - he will also eat things like full bowls of frozen blueberries or yogurt smoothies or chocolate protein shakes.

He is 4’4 and 60 pounds. I feel like he never stops eating.

I had a kid about that size at 6, maybe a couple pounds more, but solid muscle because he never stopped moving.

He ate what seemed like unbelievable quantities. It's hard to know whether he ate more than your kid, because you don't specify quantities, but definitely 3 large snacks, and 3 large meals a day.

His pediatrician said that it was fine, and now he's a very athletic teen who is still growing like a weed, and eats even more!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is a question for your child’s doctor, who can assess your child’s BMI. Tall kids, muscular kids, and active kids need more calories than their short, sedentary counterparts. My kid ate like a toddler until puberty and was always the smallest in the class. Then started eating man portions at age 13.

As for the suggestion to pump your child full of protein to satiate them — no. Kids don’t actually need that much protein. And the obsession with blunting hunger with high protein diets in adults should not be transferred to children.

You don’t need a doctor to assess BMI. Doesn’t OP have access to a scale, a tape measure, and the internet?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a question for your child’s doctor, who can assess your child’s BMI. Tall kids, muscular kids, and active kids need more calories than their short, sedentary counterparts. My kid ate like a toddler until puberty and was always the smallest in the class. Then started eating man portions at age 13.

As for the suggestion to pump your child full of protein to satiate them — no. Kids don’t actually need that much protein. And the obsession with blunting hunger with high protein diets in adults should not be transferred to children.

You don’t need a doctor to assess BMI. Doesn’t OP have access to a scale, a tape measure, and the internet?

I put OP’s kid’s measurements into a calculator, using 6.5 for his age. His BMI is 55th percentile which is a very good place to be. Clearly he’s got an appropriate appetite for his body and OP is doing a good job feeding him an appropriate variety.

I think that strategies like low carb, fixating on protein, or having a kid not eat snack while other kids are having snack a school, are problematic for any child but for a kid like this they are particularly bizarre.