How to stop the lunchbox police!

supermonkey

I think my children eat well - they dont live off bad snacks like crisps etc and we dont have unhealthy meals.

however, what are we expected to put in kids lunch boxes? We do:
Sandwiches
Fruit (eg bannana, grapes, apple, raisens etc)
Yogurt
Then maybe fruit loaf, occasionally cake, jelly etc.

There are other things we've tried, but they don't get eaten!

meritaten

Nicki wrote: »

If you read my post meritaten, you will see that I said that one of my children has severe autism and has a very limited range of foods she will eat. However that is not an excuse to feed her chocolate and crisps (both of which surprisingly she will eat) for her meals, rather than something more nutritious from the limited range she will eat.

I am sorry I do think it is bad parenting to fill your kid with crap. If the only nutritious thing your child will eat is a plain ham sandwich, then by all means send them to school with as much of that as will meet their appetite. Or find something with some nutritional value which meets their faddiness, even if it is unconventional or not perfect, eg peanut butter on celery. But to send a child in with chocolate and crisps for their meal is worse for them than sending them with nothing at all in my view. At least a hungry child, just might out of sheer desperation, try something with some vitamins and minerals in it if offered. A child stuffed with sugar and fat will not, will derive no nutritional benefits either, and is also ironically likely to be starving hungry by hometime again anyway due to peak and trough of insulin which the sugar rush will cause, more so than if they had eaten nothing at all at lunchtime.

A child who is faddy, and will ONLY eat sweets and crisps, became that way because the parent introduced sweets and crisps into their diet before a sufficiently wide range of foods were tolerated. And given that it took many years to expand my own child's diet to an acceptable level, I do know and understand how difficult this can be, but it would have been irresponsible to give up the attempt and settle for junk, and had I done so, she would definitely not eat as many things as she now does.

So, its still my fault as a bad parent then? I introduced sweets and crisps too early? What a judgemental thing to say to me!

Nicki - Read my last post again! my DS1 isnt autistic! Aspergers or ADHD! he just had issues with FOOD! particularly food that wasnt prepared by ME!
he wouldnt eat bread in ANY shape or form - so to suggest a ham sandwich?????????????????
YOU dont know HIS food issues - tried pitta bread, crackers - he would have none of it. but, for some reason he liked Ryvita - dry! so he had one slice, but yes, after some time I did send him with things he would eat!

I didnt send him with just chocolate and crisps........where did you get that impression from?

the cold foods he would eat were - pasty (home made), Tart - but only Apple and again only homemade. rubbish snacks like skips or quavers.
The only fruit he ate were strawberries - ok in the summer but I couldnt afford them in winter as twenty years ago the price was sky high. and the kind of pot desserts I think of as junk! but other parents still send them into schools and they are deemed acceptable.
I didnt give up trying to get him to eat healthily - I didnt need to - he ate healthily at home - given his food issues!
The lunchbox was an ongoing battle with him for his school years - I HAD to give him something he could eat and would include something healthy - it was usually returned uneaten!

I have the greatest sympathy with the people who post about the lunchbox Nazis, because I KNOW that putting together a healthy lunchbox for some kids is difficult enough without schools imposing rules!
Call me a bad parent if you like - I did my best and thats all anyone can do!

and for the poster who asked if DS1 was the same today - He has improved quite a bit - still wont eat brown bread but will NOW eat white! Will not eat green veg apart from runner beans. will eat curry but only MY recipe.
I had to make his partner a cookbook of his favourite (only?) recipes and when I counted them there were fifty meals - a great improvement from his childhood when he would eat about twenty!
It took me YEARS to expand his diet - so it reallly annoys me that people criticise my parenting! they have no BLOODY idea what hell I went through bringing up my kids!

Nicki

I didn't suggest YOUR son have a ham sandwich, I gave it as an example of something which a child might get fixated on.

My point is if you know your child may well not eat the healthy stuff in the lunchbox, why give them the opt out of the junk if they don't feel inclined to eat the healthier stuff.

So based, on your post above, what would have been the problem with sending him in every day with 2 homemade pasties, rather than one pasty and one bag of crisps or a cake? The bag of crisps or cake offer him nothing nutritionally and there is a reasonable chance he would eat them first and only half or none of the pasty. Whereas if they weren't in the box in the first place, his only choice would be to eat as much pasty as he wanted to sate his hunger, with the nutritional benefit that brings

Why the obsession with treats and variety in a lunchbox for a child who has limited foods they will eat? I can understand it for a child who eats a wide range of foods as they will get bored by just one option. But if you only like one food anyway, you are less likely to be bored surely. Similarly, a child who will eat a wide range of decent foods will benefit from variety as it brings a range of vitamins and minerals, but what benefit does a picky child get if the variety is between quavers or skips?

meritaten

Nicki - You dont know the circumstances - and you are very judgemental.
I spent two weeks out of every month in hospital with my dairy allergic child who was a severe asthmatic. if it wasnt for pre-packed foods - even if they were junk- DS1 would have refused to take anything my OH or DD prepared.
My family circumstances were very difficult from the time DS2 was about three and had life-threatening asthma attacks. at least once a month and would be in hospital from three days to two weeks.
I tried to come home every evening while other family members visited him to spend time with DD and with DS1 - between hearing about their day, preparing their evening meal and getting them off to bed I had to put on a wash - and 1001 other things!
tbh - as long as they both had something to eat - DD would have school dinners - embarrassingly I sometimes forgot to pay - but the school was good and she never went without her dinner - I just got billed for it............but DS1 was the nightmare ........I had a stock of pasties in the freezer when I had time to do it. My Oh would make him a lunchbox, but unless it was all in packets he wouldnt eat it! total nightmare. DS1 is still a faddy eater - his partner complains about it - but he is still better than he was!
until you have lived my life Nicki - dont judge me.

Nicki

These circumstances are not however the circumstances of most parents who send their children to school with poor packed lunches.

Furthermore our lives are not so dissimilar as you think. I have a child with autism and uncontrolled epilepsy and also spend a lot of time in hospital with her. And another child who had a severe dairy intolerance resulting in him spending a lot of time in hospital as a baby and being failure to thrive until he was 6 months old.

You take offence at an opinion on what constitutes a healthy approach to packing a lunchbox for a child, and regard it as a personal attack, based on facts which are until now unknown to everyone reading this thread other than yourself. But it is a fact that many parents send their children to school with rubbish in their pack ups with none of the factors in their life which you describe. I may well be one of the Nazis you describe because as a parent helper on school trips, I have more than once seen children aged 8 and under with packed lunches which consist only of chocolate and crisps, and on those occasions I have always made sure they are provided with a school packed lunch, which the child has always eaten with enjoyment. And as I said earlier, my mother who was a school meals inspector would come home every day with tales of children being sent to school with nothing but a packet of Jammy Dodgers, or a Mars Bar and can of coke.

The fact of the matter is that there are some parents out there who are too lazy to put together a nutritious meal for their children, and there are also parents who do not understand what constitutes a balanced diet, and who would for example equate a Mars Bar with a packet of nuts in terms of nutrition based on fat content alone. Schools don't ban certain foods or confiscate them from lunch boxes just to pee parents off. They do it because they have the best interests of the children in mind. It is a shame that the children's own parents don't too, particularly the one on this thread who would feed their child double the amount of a confiscated food on their return from school just to get their own back on someone who wouldn't even know they had done it, and s*d any issues that causes their child with food as an adult. Sheesh! I can't believe you think any public figure, much less one who champions healthy eating, would support attitudes like that.

peachyprice

Nicki wrote: »

My point is if you know your child may well not eat the healthy stuff in the lunchbox, why give them the opt out of the junk if they don't feel inclined to eat the healthier stuff.

Because they won't eat ANYTHING if you only include the 'healthy' stuff, and a constantly hungry child IMO in not a healthy child.

I have three children, one eats everything under the sun.

One is dyspraxic and has severe food phobias and WILL NOT eat certain foods. If he is forced he will put it in his mouth then throw up.

The third is stick thin, dances three times a week, goes to brownies etc etc, but she eats like a sparrow, she has smaller portions than a five year old. I get calories in her anyway I can, if that means her packed lunch is 'less than healthy' so what, she NEEDS the calories.

There is no one size fits all when it comes to feeding our children. The majority of mothers who send their children with what you deem to be inappropriate food in their lunches are doing so with the best intentions for THEIR child. What concern it is to you or anyone else what those mothers are feeding their children? Why should those mother who do not fit in with the idyll be made to feel inadequate because a minority cannot feed their children properly out of pure laziness?

moomoomama27

peachyprice wrote: »

Because they won't eat ANYTHING if you only include the 'healthy' stuff, and a constantly hungry child IMO in not a healthy child.

I have three children, one eats everything under the sun.

One is dyspraxic and has severe food phobias and WILL NOT eat certain foods. If he is forced he will put it in his mouth then throw up.

The third is stick thin, dances three times a week, goes to brownies etc etc, but she eats like a sparrow, she has smaller portions than a five year old. I get calories in her anyway I can, if that means her packed lunch is 'less than healthy' so what, she NEEDS the calories.

There is no one size fits all when it comes to feeding our children. The majority of mothers who send their children with what you deem to be inappropriate food in their lunches are doing so with the best intentions for THEIR child. What concern it is to you or anyone else what those mothers are feeding their children? Why should those mother who do not fit in with the idyll be made to feel inadequate because a minority cannot feed their children properly out of pure laziness?

Totally agree!!

What has annoyed me reading through this, is that when one mentions the word cake, or crisps, people automatically jump to the conclusion that that's all they eat day in and day out! That parents (like me) who offer those foods are bad parents!

I agree Nicki, and I'm sorry because I'm sure you're lovely But you are coming across as very judgemental!

My middle child is a dream eater, she prefers salad anf fruits over pasties and cakes! I've bought them all up the same, with the same rules and theories about healthy eating, offering only healthy alternatives, yet still have one child who is such a stubborn eater that it frustrates me no end, so I really don't think it's fair to throw out a blanket statement of bad parenting!

As long as the majority of a childs diet is healthy and balanced, with plenty of exercise, I really fail to see the problem of including a few cake-y items etc in their diet as a whole.

There's one thing feeding your child rubbish from day 1 24/7 to parents who allow a few odd items of 'junk' every now and again!

moomoomama27

peachyprice wrote: »

There is no one size fits all when it comes to feeding our children. The majority of mothers who send their children with what you deem to be inappropriate food in their lunches are doing so with the best intentions for THEIR child.

I agree. Surely from an education standpoint, it would be better a child ate something than nothing?

With all the wil in the world, I say again, you can pack up as much healthy foods as you like, some kids will eat none of it. I work in a school, so I too have seen it all, and with the exception of sweets and fizzy drinks, to each their own, we only see a small snippet of a childs diet at school, not the rest of their diet, unless it poses a problem then I think schools (and helpers) have no right to be replacing/taking foods from a child, at least until they look at their own school menus and start removing the high fat/high sugar stodgy puddings, which children who take a packed lunch probably don't have for their evening meal?

peachyprice

And do you what conclusion I came to quite some time ago? Childhood is just too short to make a battle out of every mealtime.

My children are happy and healthy, I refuse to change that just because some people think they know my children better than me.

Nicki

moomoomama27 wrote: »

As long as the majority of a childs diet is healthy and balanced, with plenty of exercise, I really fail to see the problem of including a few cake-y items etc in their diet as a whole.

I agree with this. Nowhere have I said I don't and if you read my first post I said that my own kids get sweets twice a week.

My posts are all directed at the posters who have said they put cakes, chocolate and crisps in their children's packed lunches every day of the week because their children are fussy eaters and they want to make sure they eat sufficient quantity of food. And my point is that if they will eat some healthy food, such as a sandwich, then there is no need to bulk things out with the junk, because this makes it less likely that they will in fact eat the whole sandwich which they otherwise would, because they have the option to fill themselves up with the treat.

My supplementary point was that if the child won't eat a sandwich, then surely there are things which carry some nutritional benefit, even if not ideal, which the child will eat which can be offered instead of chocolate, be that a slice of cold pizza or quiche, a sausage roll, a peanut butter sandwich, etc, rather than chocolate and crisps which have virtually none at all.