Anonymous wrote:I think you are exaggerating and setting your kid up to feel self conscious. She is only 4, so I assume she is in your care most of the time. You said the side effect is more hunger so she eats more and gains weight, this is how everyone puts on weight. The key is to give her healthy food when she is hungry. Occasional treats are fine. How often is she around huge pieces of cake and lollipops. ( You would have to eat an awful lot of lollipops to cause weight gain btw)
I have a large child, not overweight but solid and she loves to eat. We eat healthy meals 90% of the time and mostly healthy snacks. I let it go when she is with other people. You will drive yourself crazy and drive your kid to hide things from you.
Anonymous wrote:I’m bordering on crazy control freak mom. What’s a nice way to handle this in advance?
DD is 4 and has a metabolic disorder. One side effect is increased appetite which causes rapid weight gain. She doesn’t quite understand but we are working with doctors, child psychologist, dietitian and a plan to manage the weight while they get medical condition under control. We caught it early so with (a lot of) work, DD can have normal quality of life and get ahead of complications.
Our dietitian has a plan that allows for normal kid things like a cupcake at a birthday party, work around snack at preschool etc. The goal is to feel normal and not restricted but manage everything else.
That said -she’s still 4. Other parents, grandparents etc are making this 1000X harder. Giving her extra cake when we aren’t looking, offering lollipops, juice, huge portions and treating her like their kids who are stringbeans that subsist on chicken nuggets and goldfish.
What’s a nice way to say: I know you mean well, but Larla has a medical condition please don’t give her extra cake or please ask me first.
The dietitian said to make it sound like a life or death allergy.
I went crazy the other day. Not my finest hour... I’m going to therapy for it too..
Anonymous wrote:I think you can tell the truth. I have a 4 year old and would never consider that my child’s friends could have such a disorder, but would honor the wishes of any parent who brought it up. Any reasonable person would.
Anonymous wrote:What kind of metabolic disorder can a four-year-old have that causes increased appetite?