Gave my Sister hard time about outside food, now she doesn't visit. - Page 2

[Koalamom]

Originally Posted by WuWei

Could you meet somewhere and both bring your own food? Maybe bring safe snacky foods or a safe pizza for everyone to share? Or eat before meeting up, so the kids are not hungry and bring some special snacks for the kids?

Pat

The last time they came over I made GF blueberry muffins and chocolate chunks. They turned their noses up at it. I do really need to figure out more snacky foods that are like the real thing.

Is there GF, DF, EF, SF junk food?

Originally Posted by AllyRae

Your sister might think it's unfair that she can't bring the things that her kids eat and it's a hassle for her to hear them saying they are hungry the whole time. So for her, maybe she'd rather miss the visit than listen to her kids say they are hungry because they can't have the food they like.
Good point as I know what hungry children are like- not fun at all. I just want to be there for her since her DH is in the military and away for a long time. I don't want to be another stressful thing in her life.
I guess I personally would either find allergen-friendly versions of what the kids *do* eat, meet on neutral ground, or apologize to your sister and work on a way that your children and hers can both eat their foods in your house (maybe keep a room open for the allergen foods to remain in and keep your daughter out, or even teach your daughter "no no, that will hurt your belly". All of my food allergic children were told that even before they were a year old and they are pretty good at following that (the 1 year old doesn't fully understand, but I'll just remove her from the area and get her a snack she does like and she's usually cool with that. )

My dd is 3 and she is really good about knowing that something will give her rashes, but my 9 month old has no idea. I so hoped that he would be allergy free, but he takes after his sister.

[dannic]

Social eating is so hard with kids...hugs.

I get that your sis would want to have something on hand to feed her kids, but if you had food, it's not like they're starving or anything.

I don't think it's unreasonable to ask someone not to bring something into your home that your child has the potential to react to. Our home is a GF home. No if's and's or buts. I get extremely uptight in food get togethers where gluten is present and while we do occasionally go to those types of functions, I refuse to have to feel that way at home. I would totally be stressed and freaking out inside if someone fed their kids pizza in my home. Kids touching pizza touching doors touching toys....dd reacting for two weeks.

That said, I have never had anyone express anything but support whe nI've mentioned that to them.

I don't think your child has to be ana to have food complications that you'd want to avoid. What parent wants their child to suffer?

That said, I would still try to work something out with her--a common ground as mamafish mentioned...GL,,it's a tough situation.

[Multimomma]

I understand being in the middle. I have kids with allergies, and kids with no allergies, so our house is a house divided! One thing we have done is guaranteed safe GF/CF spaces. Kids only eat at the table, and they must wash their hands AFTER eating, as well as before. it's ridiculous that anyone walks around eating, it's messy, and a choke hazard if they are young enough to make that big of a mess while eating.

In our kitchen, we have one countertop that is free-for-all, the rest must be GF, there is NO food prep of other kinds there. anything that is red is known to be only for GFCF, and green is only for corn free foods. One half of our table is GF only (which was hard because we've never had assigned seats before, but as we had more kids with allergies, we had to do something! LOL)

I think you have the right to limit food, but while it's easier to say NO outside food, you can set up a safe eating environment that allows for other things. But your sister must be willing to reinforce the rules: eating at the table, food prep in the alloted area, handwashing immediately.

And just stick with reminding your kids that X food has allergen, how about a yummy Y instead? It's important that they learn that they can't have whatever is available. We learned that lesson at a very miserable thanksgiving dinner when my first allergenic child was two. He just grabbed something because he was used to our house, where everything is prepared safe. It looked the same, smelled the same, and no one knew until he was wheezing and red faced that he'd eaten it. By the time he was three, he was able to order his own safe foods at restaurants, or at least vet the dishes. It's hard, but you'll do great, no matter what you choose for your family!

[mamafish9]

I think that sometimes in families, the issue on the table isn't the real issue. It sounds like she doesn't take the relationship between food and health seriously, but that wouldn't be an issue if she honored your right to make different choices than she has, and respect those choices. My sisters parent differently than I do. With one sister, it's no problem - we respect our different choices, and try to accommodate each other. With the other sister, she sees the differences as a judgement on her - so it's much harder to find common ground. I think the posters in this thread have offered some great ways to create common ground - but there has to be willingness on both sides. Sounds like the next step for you is to figure out if that willingness is there.