WWYD - 13 yr old just binged on an entire bag of Oreo cookies

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP may be missing the point. While kids may eat too much junk food, drink too much soda and play video games too late at night, the kids who were raised to help make their own decisions earlier in life are making better decisions on their own as a teen.

Same argument holds true for the college students that experience “freedom” their freshman year.

No, I think you're missing the point. Some kids who have overly permissive parents end up dead before they make it very far into their teens or make it to college.

Are you comparing this thread, cookies and screen time with parental controls for vaping, alcohol and o noly fans?

I am more and more convinced this is a troll inciting a mental heath issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are a family that has sugary dessert only once a week, the rest of the time we end dinner with fresh fruit. We allow occasional treats but we're not really into a lot of junk food.

Our 13 yr old DS bought a bag of Oreos the other day with his own allowance money on the understanding that he could have a couple as an occasional treat. He bought the Oreos on Friday afternoon. They were completely gone by Saturday night.

He knows that we would not be OK with him doing this. When we found out he said he just couldn't control himself around the Oreos.

What's an appropriate consequence for this behavior? We've never known him to binge but this is also the first time we've let him buy a full-size snack bag with his own money.

He's had some issues lying around sneaking video game time but he's generally an honest kid. Clearly cannot be trusted around video games and Oreos tho.

Apologize for restricting his food so he feels like he needs to binge eat? And buy him a box at Costco.

+1
I don’t know a single adult who has a good relationship with food if their parents were restrictive and strict with food growing up. My sister and brother in law and dh all have zero control around food that were restricted when they were growing up.
We have an open policy with food and have tons of sweets. I generally throw out a lot when it’s expired bc my kids eat it in moderation when they want bc they know they’ll always have the option. I’ve learned they have a few friends I need to police when they come over bc they will gorge or take large amounts with them. No surprise - these are the families that are strict about food. OP you should teach your kids everything in moderation and try to fix the damage you’ve already caused.

Not helpful to OP but I needed to respond to the certainty showed by this PP. I never had food restricted when I was a kid. We always had sweets and chips and bakery items with no limits. I have an awful relationship with food. Very hard to control myself around certain items. So I wouldn’t be so smug and sure of yourself, PP.

[Anonymous]

Can’t believe OP you are so defensive when you yourself said:

When we found out he said he just couldn't control himself around the Oreos.

Obviously, your desire to control your teenager failed. This is just the start unless you change your mindset. (Looks unlikely based on your nasty follow up posts).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Let me be clear that we do not restrict healthy food. He gets to eat as much as he wants of non-junk food. Yes, he gets enough proteins, fats, and carbs.

My mind is blown that intelligent, well-educated parents think it's okay to let their kids eat unrestricted quantities of unhealthy foods. It's really OK if your kid wants to have six pints of Ben & Jerry's at a sitting on a regular basis?

As I said, we allow small amounts of junk food as occasional treats but I cannot fathom allowing kids of any age to free-feed on food that crowds out healthy calories.

Sugary junk food is made to be addictive and kids, especially teens, do not have the forebrain to fight the addiction.

Think about inserting other kinds of addictive substances -- vaping, meth, alcohol instead of junk food. Of course forbidding something cannot make it attractive. Does that mean we should allow free access to vapes, drugs, and alcohol?

What a total dereliction of parental duty.

No one is saying kids should be allowed to eat six pints of ice cream in one sitting, OP. But junk food once a week is way too restrictive. It's okay to have a few Oreos or similar as a snack after school everyday.

You guys can't read. That's exactly what we do. I said we allow treats in moderation not that we exclude them altogether.

Then we had a bunch of parents chime in saying enforcing moderation is "restricting" food. Um, junk food isn't real food. It should be restricted.

You said "once a week" in the OP.

Kids, particularly teens, should have practice making their own choices and seeing how their body feels. Then they can figure out what's right for them. They will make mistakes along the way, but not letting them make mistakes is not letting them learn. It's like if you decided to do your kid's math homework for them to protect them from any mistakes. Then send them off to college to fail miserably. Similarly, if your kid hasn't made mistakes, and learned from mistakes, when you aren't there to restrict, they'll make huge mistakes and they won't have a forgiving teenage body.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP may be missing the point. While kids may eat too much junk food, drink too much soda and play video games too late at night, the kids who were raised to help make their own decisions earlier in life are making better decisions on their own as a teen.

Same argument holds true for the college students that experience “freedom” their freshman year.

No, I think you're missing the point. Some kids who have overly permissive parents end up dead before they make it very far into their teens or make it to college.

Holy overreaction. OP is talking about a bag of Oreos and somehow that is connected to overly permissive parents and dead teens…? This is next level catastrophic thinking.

[Anonymous]

One surgery treat a week??? This can’t be real.

You created this OP - you are forcing your kid to follow a restrictive diet, I’m not surprised AT ALL that he binges when he gets the chance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s obvious you want to teach your kid to make healthy food choices, but at 13 they are developing more autonomy and food isn’t an area you want to be fighting them on. You could inadvertently create issues with binge eating. It’s advisable to have reasonable options for “sometime foods” or desserts in the house for him to have in moderation outside of fruit.

Don’t consequent him, his stomach will take care of that natural consequence. But it is time for you to come to terms with him no longer being the little kid whose food intake you can manage in the same way.

Um, we're already doing that. Sorry but his stomach created no natural consequences. He did not feel sick. He was perfectly fine. However if he kept up this pattern of eating he'd be on track for developing insulin resistance and Type 2 diabetes for which we unfortunately have family history.

People are crazy to think that all kids have natural off buttons if they are allowed to free feed on junk food. That's totally wrong in the case of many kids. I have the opposite example of a sibling who was never restrained in eating junk food and never stopped. He's now in his 50s and is physically a mess.

I’m the pp you’re quoting and I was going off your OP about mostly having fruit for dessert. It seems like you’re leaning into some rigid thinking here. If someone suggests more free will around food choices you’re responding with 6 pints of ice cream, “keeping up” eating packages of Oreos and getting diabetes, and vaping. What I’m suggesting is there is something in between this. Buy the Oreos he enjoys and tell him he can have a few for dessert, buy those mini ice cream cones, fruit pops, etc. Teach him about moderation. That’s where the switch is developed assuming he’s not already developed an unhealthy relationship with food.

No, I think you like most of the posters on here tonight are jumping to your own conclusions without actually reading my posts. I said that we have treats in moderation and, yes, we have a small supply of treats in the house. He's had a few Oreos in his life before, too, along with candy bars, chips, and other things that I classify as junk food. We have taught him about moderation. He knew it was not okay to eat a whole bag of Oreos.

I am using the extreme examples because several posts have said that parents should not restrict sugary foods.

I said that I have a sibling who was never restrained from eating junk foods and ended up physically a mess and has diabetes by the way. It's totally false that all kids will moderate their food if allowed to free feed on sugary foods. As with any addictive substance some people have a genetic predisposition to becoming addicted to unhealthy foods.

The issue with the Oreos was that our son knew that was against our house rules. We'd set consequences for him violating any other house rules, whether it's not doing chores or sneaking video gaming time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Let me be clear that we do not restrict healthy food. He gets to eat as much as he wants of non-junk food. Yes, he gets enough proteins, fats, and carbs.

My mind is blown that intelligent, well-educated parents think it's okay to let their kids eat unrestricted quantities of unhealthy foods. It's really OK if your kid wants to have six pints of Ben & Jerry's at a sitting on a regular basis?

As I said, we allow small amounts of junk food as occasional treats but I cannot fathom allowing kids of any age to free-feed on food that crowds out healthy calories.

Sugary junk food is made to be addictive and kids, especially teens, do not have the forebrain to fight the addiction.

Think about inserting other kinds of addictive substances -- vaping, meth, alcohol instead of junk food. Of course forbidding something cannot make it attractive. Does that mean we should allow free access to vapes, drugs, and alcohol?

What a total dereliction of parental duty.

No one is saying kids should be allowed to eat six pints of ice cream in one sitting, OP. But junk food once a week is way too restrictive. It's okay to have a few Oreos or similar as a snack after school everyday.

You guys can't read. That's exactly what we do. I said we allow treats in moderation not that we exclude them altogether.

Then we had a bunch of parents chime in saying enforcing moderation is "restricting" food. Um, junk food isn't real food. It should be restricted.

You said "once a week" in the OP.

Kids, particularly teens, should have practice making their own choices and seeing how their body feels. Then they can figure out what's right for them. They will make mistakes along the way, but not letting them make mistakes is not letting them learn. It's like if you decided to do your kid's math homework for them to protect them from any mistakes. Then send them off to college to fail miserably. Similarly, if your kid hasn't made mistakes, and learned from mistakes, when you aren't there to restrict, they'll make huge mistakes and they won't have a forgiving teenage body.

I said we have sugary desserts once a week. Can you not read?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One surgery treat a week??? This can’t be real.

You created this OP - you are forcing your kid to follow a restrictive diet, I’m not surprised AT ALL that he binges when he gets the chance.

Yep. Stop restricting the food OP, or he will continue to binge every chance he gets.

It's really telling he used his own money to buy Oreos.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s obvious you want to teach your kid to make healthy food choices, but at 13 they are developing more autonomy and food isn’t an area you want to be fighting them on. You could inadvertently create issues with binge eating. It’s advisable to have reasonable options for “sometime foods” or desserts in the house for him to have in moderation outside of fruit.

Don’t consequent him, his stomach will take care of that natural consequence. But it is time for you to come to terms with him no longer being the little kid whose food intake you can manage in the same way.

"consequent him"??? Someone should consequent you for that ridiculous wording.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP may be missing the point. While kids may eat too much junk food, drink too much soda and play video games too late at night, the kids who were raised to help make their own decisions earlier in life are making better decisions on their own as a teen.

Same argument holds true for the college students that experience “freedom” their freshman year.

No, I think you're missing the point. Some kids who have overly permissive parents end up dead before they make it very far into their teens or make it to college.

Holy overreaction. OP is talking about a bag of Oreos and somehow that is connected to overly permissive parents and dead teens…? This is next level catastrophic thinking.

Jaysus you are ridiculous. Read the post to which I was responding. "Kids may [make bad decisions] .... but kids who make their own decisions early in life are making better decisions on their own as a teen." That's totally wrong. Lots of kids who have absent or permissive parents that make their own decisions in life make the wrong ones, sometimes fatally so.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous]+1 to revisiting food restrictions, OP. I have a lot of issues with food/sweets and I absolutely attribute them to scarcity mindset around food when I was young. Forbidding things does not teach self control, as you've just found.

Also, as a teen I was HUNGRY. As in, not getting enough calories because our meals were planned for dieting adults. Make sure your kid is getting enough protein, fats, and carbs. [/quote]

Hungry yes but most kids that are exposed to more sugar just end up eating it like a habit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One surgery treat a week??? This can’t be real.

You created this OP - you are forcing your kid to follow a restrictive diet, I’m not surprised AT ALL that he binges when he gets the chance.

Yep. Stop restricting the food OP, or he will continue to binge every chance he gets.

It's really telling he used his own money to buy Oreos.

Learn to frickin' read before you post.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]+1 to revisiting food restrictions, OP. I have a lot of issues with food/sweets and I absolutely attribute them to scarcity mindset around food when I was young. Forbidding things does not teach self control, as you've just found.

Also, as a teen I was HUNGRY. As in, not getting enough calories because our meals were planned for dieting adults. Make sure your kid is getting enough protein, fats, and carbs. [/quote]

Hungry yes but most kids that are exposed to more sugar just end up eating it like a habit.[/quote]

Yes because there's this little thing called insulin resistance. Eventually you get to the point where your body cannot turn food into energy and you need more and more sugar to feel okay.

[Anonymous]

You are creating issues around food. Let it go.