nanny models terrible eating/kids complain. would you say anything?

[Anonymous]

we have a part time nanny for my 8 and 10 YOs. the one negative thing her reference said was “I wish she would model better eating habits. the fact that she is obese doesn’t get in the way of her ability to do her job/keep up with the kids, but I dont like what she eats in front of them.”. this was never a problem pre-covid since my kids were in school and didnt see her eat lunch (I sometimes would see the fast food wrappers in the garbage, but whatever).

however, now that she is with them during the day, my kids frequently complain that she takes them out to get bread at the local shop (they like the fresh baguettes) and gets herself pizza, chips and a soda. They get legit dessert every day and pizza for dinner once a week, so it isnt like they never get this kind of food, but they would happily eat it as much as she does if I let them.

So far I havent said anything - I figure they are old enough to connect the diet to her size and understand why my choices for them are different... but should I? I can understand their frustration at watching her eat that stuff all the time.

[Anonymous]

This could happen with a skinny nanny. She is not the problem. As you said your children are old enough to understand she is overweight because of what she eats (it could have been another reason though).

Stick to your rules and as long as the nanny doesn't get junk food for your children, i'd let it go. You can't control her.

[Anonymous]

I would let it go. I used to drink a Coke at work every day and the kids knew and also knew they were not allowed to.
If she is buying lunch out with them though when are they eating? Does she bring it back to your house to eat? Or do they all eat our and they eat something else?

I actually feel like a slice of cheese or veggie pizza with a side of fruit is not a terrible lunch. I would skip the soda and chips though.

[Anonymous]

Years ago, I was hired as a Nanny for two small children.

I was required to bring in my own lunch and I usually would have a mustard + lunch meat sandwich, a small bag of potato chips, an apple, a cookie + a juice box.

The Mother would get annoyed w/me & tell me their family only ate organic food.
She would constantly tell her kids that I was eating junk.

Upon hire - she never disclosed to me that I only bring in healthy food.
Needless to say, my lunches became a huge bone of contention between us and I ended up quitting.
If she wanted me to only eat healthy lunches I feel she should have disclosed this to me upon hire or else let me eat whatever I made for the children’s lunches.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Years ago, I was hired as a Nanny for two small children.

I was required to bring in my own lunch and I usually would have a mustard + lunch meat sandwich, a small bag of potato chips, an apple, a cookie + a juice box.

The Mother would get annoyed w/me & tell me their family only ate organic food.
She would constantly tell her kids that I was eating junk.

Upon hire - she never disclosed to me that I only bring in healthy food.
Needless to say, my lunches became a huge bone of contention between us and I ended up quitting.
If she wanted me to only eat healthy lunches I feel she should have disclosed this to me upon hire or else let me eat whatever I made for the children’s lunches.

This doesn't ring true - all the bolded foods can be organic.

[Anonymous]

They complain about going to the local bakery and getting bread they like?

[Anonymous]

Provide her lunch case close

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Years ago, I was hired as a Nanny for two small children.

I was required to bring in my own lunch and I usually would have a mustard + lunch meat sandwich, a small bag of potato chips, an apple, a cookie + a juice box.

The Mother would get annoyed w/me & tell me their family only ate organic food.
She would constantly tell her kids that I was eating junk.

Upon hire - she never disclosed to me that I only bring in healthy food.
Needless to say, my lunches became a huge bone of contention between us and I ended up quitting.
If she wanted me to only eat healthy lunches I feel she should have disclosed this to me upon hire or else let me eat whatever I made for the children’s lunches.

This doesn't ring true - all the bolded foods can be organic.

Sounds like the nanny wasn’t going to pay for organic.

[Anonymous]

This is one of the (many) reasons I’m so picky about families. Child learn more from what we do than what we say (even at 8 and 10).

Your kids are feeling envious every. single. time. this happens. Because you (reasonably) don’t want them eating the same junk as much as she does, you’re being set up. Anytime we repeatedly tell child no about something specific, we’re creating temptation. They’re more likely to binge once they’re allowed on r out of sight.

To me, being a nanny is about education and setting a good example. I model appropriate food choices and portion sizes. My charges play “guess how many vegetables are on my plate” and laugh themselves silly. For me, it’s not connected to weight at all, as my choices are healthy, but I’m very overweight. Since I typically eat all three meals with my charges, and they see that I don’t sack when they do, they can see that food choices don’t always correlate to weight, but do to energy and health.

[Anonymous]

Unless you are providing her lunch then she eats whatever she wants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is one of the (many) reasons I’m so picky about families. Child learn more from what we do than what we say (even at 8 and 10).

Your kids are feeling envious every. single. time. this happens. Because you (reasonably) don’t want them eating the same junk as much as she does, you’re being set up. Anytime we repeatedly tell child no about something specific, we’re creating temptation. They’re more likely to binge once they’re allowed on r out of sight.

To me, being a nanny is about education and setting a good example. I model appropriate food choices and portion sizes. My charges play “guess how many vegetables are on my plate” and laugh themselves silly. For me, it’s not connected to weight at all, as my choices are healthy, but I’m very overweight. Since I typically eat all three meals with my charges, and they see that I don’t sack when they do, they can see that food choices don’t always correlate to weight, but do to energy and health.

If only the rest of us were as wonderful and perfect as you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Unless you are providing her lunch then she eats whatever she wants.

OP here - I’d be happy to provide her lunch if she ate more or less what is available to the kids (and me, since I WFH these days), and it doesnt mean she eats the frozen junk food I let my kids have on occasion (nuggets, pizza, hot dogs)... how does that conversation go, though?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Years ago, I was hired as a Nanny for two small children.

I was required to bring in my own lunch and I usually would have a mustard + lunch meat sandwich, a small bag of potato chips, an apple, a cookie + a juice box.

The Mother would get annoyed w/me & tell me their family only ate organic food.
She would constantly tell her kids that I was eating junk.

Upon hire - she never disclosed to me that I only bring in healthy food.
Needless to say, my lunches became a huge bone of contention between us and I ended up quitting.
If she wanted me to only eat healthy lunches I feel she should have disclosed this to me upon hire or else let me eat whatever I made for the children’s lunches.

This doesn't ring true - all the bolded foods can be organic.

Sounds like the nanny wasn’t going to pay for organic.

There's no way someone can know by looking at the food whether or not it was organic - mustard, bread, meat, apple, cookie. The only things you'd know by looking are not organic are a juice box and bag of chips.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is one of the (many) reasons I’m so picky about families. Child learn more from what we do than what we say (even at 8 and 10).

Your kids are feeling envious every. single. time. this happens. Because you (reasonably) don’t want them eating the same junk as much as she does, you’re being set up. Anytime we repeatedly tell child no about something specific, we’re creating temptation. They’re more likely to binge once they’re allowed on r out of sight.

To me, being a nanny is about education and setting a good example. I model appropriate food choices and portion sizes. My charges play “guess how many vegetables are on my plate” and laugh themselves silly. For me, it’s not connected to weight at all, as my choices are healthy, but I’m very overweight. Since I typically eat all three meals with my charges, and they see that I don’t sack when they do, they can see that food choices don’t always correlate to weight, but do to energy and health.

If only the rest of us were as wonderful and perfect as you.

I’m far from perfect. I just think that we have no business presenting poor role models, when it’s easily avoidable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Years ago, I was hired as a Nanny for two small children.

I was required to bring in my own lunch and I usually would have a mustard + lunch meat sandwich, a small bag of potato chips, an apple, a cookie + a juice box.

The Mother would get annoyed w/me & tell me their family only ate organic food.
She would constantly tell her kids that I was eating junk.

Upon hire - she never disclosed to me that I only bring in healthy food.
Needless to say, my lunches became a huge bone of contention between us and I ended up quitting.
If she wanted me to only eat healthy lunches I feel she should have disclosed this to me upon hire or else let me eat whatever I made for the children’s lunches.

This doesn't ring true - all the bolded foods can be organic.

Sounds like the nanny wasn’t going to pay for organic.

There's no way someone can know by looking at the food whether or not it was organic - mustard, bread, meat, apple, cookie. The only things you'd know by looking are not organic are a juice box and bag of chips.

The Apple may have a regular tag, not an organic tag. The cookie could easily be recognized as one of the non-organic junk food types if it’s Oreo or similar.

Regardless, the lunch is junk. Bread isn’t exactly the pinnacle of health, lunch meat is atrocious, and nobody can say that juice boxes, chips or cookies are anything but treats. The only healthy portions of that lunch are the apple and mustard. Since she made a point of listing the mustard, but didn’t say anything about other things on the sandwich, I’m guessing there weren’t any vegetables like lettuce, peppers, cucumber or tomato.