Should a child ask for food or just take it?

Gillyx

I always had to ask growing up, I don't see it as a problem. My OH will eat 4 slices of toast of an evening, I'll be in bed completely unaware and he toddles off to work in the morning and when I go to make my toddlers breakfast there is no bread. That drives me absolutely bonkers. We don't have a corner shop, it's about a mile away so not ideal to be walking when you have a hungry child.

My child is only 26 months old, but I don't allow him to help himself, mainly because he frequently asks for food and has one bite and doesn't want it, we had a week of one bite from apples and pears, so I tend to gauge with him if he's actually hungry or if he's seen it out so thinks he wants it.

That being said when he's older I'd probably see fruit as fair game and he could help himself providing he left enough in the bowl for any packed lunches.

deva

We have a rule that our daughter (9) asks for any food except fruit or carrots which she can eat til the cows come home. I think it's important for them to learn that they can get a sweet taste without sweets/chocolate etc. but also that snacking can be a bad habit to get into if not healthy.

Buttonmoons

My 7 year old usually asks, not that I'd mind if she helped herself to food - she does if I'm in the bath or having a nap etc etc and she is "STARVING" usually she just makes herself a little bowl of cereal or takes an apple, we do have a fair cupboard of junk food - biscuits and crisps and whatnot, but she's usually good about those and will ask first if she can have a packet of mini cookies or whatever.

Works for me and her.

MidLifeCrisis_3

The apples along with other fruit were meant for packed lunches for the week and if I buy more it just goes off and I don't have time to pop to the shops whenever. Duchy you've also hit the nail on the head, it's about what he might do one day when he's a teenager... and Gillyx yes my OH does similar with stuff and it frustrates the hell out of me

~Chameleon~

duchy wrote: »

I do think there is a massive difference between taking a piece of fruit from a bowl on display and foraging in cupboards. In this case I'm not seeing the child did the latter just that the OP seems to think he might .......one day........maybe.
Posted with you OP...... What I do (and I imagine most people are the same) is fruit bowl is open season...... stuff in cupboards or fridge need to ask first out of courtesy. At ten I think children are more than capable of understanding the difference (actually even at five I'd think most children are).

Completely agree. A fruit bowl on display is for helping yourself to as far as I'm concerned. The same goes for the biscuit tin I used to keep when the children were younger. I'd bake a couple of batches of biscuits per week and when they were gone they were gone. Fruit, biscuits and squash/juice were standard snacks the children could help themselves to after school or at weekends.

(ETA: with the biscuits they soon learned to share equally and self-regulate how many they ate to ensure there were enough to last the week. If they argued over them or ate them all too quickly then there wouldn't be anymore until the following week :rotfl: )

If they wanted something more substantial such as a sandwich or cake, or more junky food such as crisps or chocolate then they were taught to ask first in case it was too close to a meal time or I thought it inappropriate to be eating junk at that particular time. It always worked for us and was how I was brought up too. It would drive me mad if children had to ask for every single morsel of food/drink that passed their lips!

loracan1

I don't think helping himself to fruit is an issue - the fact that he's taken one after you've asked him twice to check first is something I'd be a bit annoyed at.

Georgiegirl256

Growing up I never had to ask, if I wanted something to eat then I could just take it without asking. Sometimes I'd hear the cry of 'you'll be having your tea soon, don't eat too much you'll spoil your appetite!' from my Mam, but I guess I was brought up to have a healthy respect for food meaning that I wouldn't stuff myself silly with snacks, but would know it was ok if I wanted to have an apple for example, or even a biscuit or two.

Is this just something you've started to say to your son in the last few days/weeks? If so, he's going to be mightily confused about what's going on? He can't even take an apple because 'you might need it for something'. Such as what?

ETA: I knew if anything in the cupboards or fridge wasn't meant to be touched because it was for someone else though. For instance, the lucazade that was in the fridge was my Dad's for when he went fell walking.

poet123

Mine never had to ask, if it was there, it was there to eat. I am speaking of snacks/fruit here. The only rule we had was if there are six of anything (as there were six of us living in the house) you eat just one and ask after that.

If food in the fridge was something which was for a "family" meal obviously, I wouldn't have expected them to cook it and wolf it down. Otherwise, things like burgers, sausages, bacon, could be defrosted and cooked as and when. If I had things in the fridge which were earmarked for something I would say x is for work or whatever and no one would touch it.

Each to their own, but I wouldn't have wanted my kids to have to ask for food if they were hungry and certainly not for fruit which was in a fruit bowl.

Morglin

When my kids were at home, they just helped themselves to any fruit that was in the bowl, and I replenished it when needed.

The same with biscuits, snacks etc.,

Never occurred to me that they should ask first, to be honest.

Lin

MidLifeCrisis_3

So basically as long as it's fruit or they're sensible it's a green light. Problem is usually if I buy fruit unless for packed lunches it gets left to go off, so perhaps I will just have to start restocking it more regularly.

It was more with him taking the apple to school that he left his yogurt to eat that in it's place so I had to throw it out after being in a hot classroom all day - I didn't mention the apple I just told him I was annoyed he hadn't eaten the yogurt. What I don't want is other food being left or whole packets of biscuits disappearing, but we want to be fair with him.