Food wasting despite much debate...HELP! - Page 2

[D_McG]

See this whole 'tiny portion' thing would drive me even more nuts. Then you're getting up 3 times to refil the same snack container? I think a normal sized snack with basic expectations is fine. Sometimes I think we overthink all this kind of thing.

[mamazee]

I only do tiny portions while they're going through a phase like this.  It isn't continual.  I think refilling cups a few times is easier than fighting over wasted food.

[coffeegirl]

Originally Posted by D_McG 

See this whole 'tiny portion' thing would drive me even more nuts. Then you're getting up 3 times to refil the same snack container? I think a normal sized snack with basic expectations is fine. Sometimes I think we overthink all this kind of thing.

Yeah, but that's only if they're eating the initial small portion. In which case....that's not the problem that the OP is having, or that I had with my niece. With my case, I'd always pur her, say, a normal child's portion of cereal and she'd take a bite or two and abandon it. Now, I just give her a tiny bit of the cereal and only once has she eaten it and asked for more. Actually, she didn't even ask for more cereal, she wanted more of the cranberries that are in the cereal lol.
 

[wishfulmom]

I agree with alot of the previous posts on handling the snacking requests.  I just wanted to add, yogurt and apples are two foods that fill me up quite quickly.  So 3 spoons of yogurt after 2 bites of apples along with pasta (Dry--Eww!  but that's just my opinion ) could really fill me up. 

[habitat]

Just an idea - Could you give her a muffin tin full of snacks, and have her graze on it all day? It could be an easy way to give her some control, so as to cut out the battle.

There would be one spot for pasta, one spot for an apple, one spot for a banana, etc...  If she asks for another snack, you cold put just the tiniest bit of it in her tray at a time. 

If you want to, you can even cover it somehow or get her one with a lid (like this one), and put it in the fridge in-between snack times, lunch, etc. There's no waste because it's all hers and each snack will just be refilled when a spot is empty, but not before. If, at the end of the day, something in the tray is getting old, you can either eat it or use it to cook. 

To her, the "taste test" is just that - a test. And she REALLY wants to pass. I know it feels like you're giving her an opportunity to decline, but to her, she's just trying to get to the actual experiment, but feels like she needs to get past this obstacle first. If you just give her a teeny bit, without asking her to try it first, she'll likely only ask for more if she really wants it.

ETA - Like you, I do believe that food battles can be traumatic. You don't have to let your experience get in the way of hers. Stopping the cycle of abuse is really hard, but so totally worth it! Sometimes it helps me if I say out loud, "Baby, I don't think it's a big deal that you didn't eat all of that. I can save it to make you a fruit pop/soup/something another time, and I think getting upset about food is silly". Then I've made myself accountable to the child, and told her that it's okay.  I think the challenging (but often times fun) part is to figure out how to creatively use things that would otherwise get wasted.

And a thought on germs - I know it seems kind of icky that she spit in the yogurt, but you two are sharing pathogens all day. As long as it's all in the spirit of play (and only saliva, obviously), I would try not to make her self conscious about the gross-factor of figuring out her food. 

Edited by habitat - 3/20/11 at 4:15pm

[habitat]

Here's a short article by Dr Sears on the subject. I'm not an uber-crazy Dr Sears follower, by any means, but I do like this article. Maybe it will help?

[*LoveBugMama*]

I really, really agree with what Habitat wrote. Very, very good advice! 

A snacktray saved my life when LoveBug was little.  He was a grazer, and he ate very small portions at a time. And like the OP`s child, he frequently changed his mind in the middle of a snack. With a snacktray (with several small "spots"), life got so much easier. I filled the tray with small amounts of different things, and he ate what he wanted. At the end of the day, I could see what was left, and see if something maybe was not touched at all. (And then I would not give him that thing the next day, but maybe fill an extra spot with something he had eaten all of yesterday. ) He is now almost 10 YO, and we still eat like this for lunch. (The days he is not at school.) 

There was a GREAT thread here at MDC about what food to put in snacktrays, and I got soo many great ideas from that thread.  I`ll see if I can find it.

[*LoveBugMama*]

Here`s a link to the snack-thread. Best. thread.ever. 

http://www.mothering.com/community/forum/thread/257621/need-more-ideas-for-my-toddlers-snack-tray/220

[habitat]

Originally Posted by *LoveBugMama* 

Here`s a link to the snack-thread. Best. thread.ever. 

http://www.mothering.com/community/forum/thread/257621/need-more-ideas-for-my-toddlers-snack-tray/220

Woah, LoveBugMama, thanks for that post! I'm going to save it to send to my clients who need snack ideas. Amazing!

[msmiranda]

I totally hear you, and I would have been upset too.  My parents were not at all controlling about food, so without that experience as a background, I would fall on the side of being a bit stricter.  Certainly a policy of finishing one snack before getting anything else is not cruel or overly controlling IMO.  The way I am trying to explain it to my kids (older one is 3.5 and still does not get it yet, but I will keep it up because it is what I truly believe) is that wasting food is morally wrong.  My perspective on it is that for most of human history, the biggest struggle in life was trying to find enough food.  Even now in times of relative abundance, there are many, many people in the world who do not have enough food to sustain themselves, and being afforded the unearned privilege of living in a time and place where food is actually too abundant gives us a moral obligation to recognize our privilege and not abuse it.  It bothers me in a very visceral way to waste food ... which is not to say that it doesn't still happen in our house -- it does, even as creative as I am about trying to use everything (though certainly we waste less than pretty much anyone I know).  But every time I throw away bread crust, I feel a little bit angry at the irrationality and selfishness of children who don't know how good they have it.  I find myself muttering under my breath, "nothing wrong with this child that a little poverty wouldn't cure."  Because I wonder, if food was scarce, would I get all the "but I don't like ______" crap I hear every day and have to throw away the edges of breads and waffles?  I kinda doubt it.

[habitat]

Originally Posted by msmiranda 

I totally hear you, and I would have been upset too.  My parents were not at all controlling about food, so without that experience as a background, I would fall on the side of being a bit stricter.  Certainly a policy of finishing one snack before getting anything else is not cruel or overly controlling IMO.  The way I am trying to explain it to my kids (older one is 3.5 and still does not get it yet, but I will keep it up because it is what I truly believe) is that wasting food is morally wrong.  My perspective on it is that for most of human history, the biggest struggle in life was trying to find enough food.  Even now in times of relative abundance, there are many, many people in the world who do not have enough food to sustain themselves, and being afforded the unearned privilege of living in a time and place where food is actually too abundant gives us a moral obligation to recognize our privilege and not abuse it.  It bothers me in a very visceral way to waste food ... which is not to say that it doesn't still happen in our house -- it does, even as creative as I am about trying to use everything (though certainly we waste less than pretty much anyone I know).  But every time I throw away bread crust, I feel a little bit angry at the irrationality and selfishness of children who don't know how good they have it.  I find myself muttering under my breath, "nothing wrong with this child that a little poverty wouldn't cure."  Because I wonder, if food was scarce, would I get all the "but I don't like ______" crap I hear every day and have to throw away the edges of breads and waffles?  I kinda doubt it.

But food isn't scarce for your children, and it shouldn't be. It's totally developmentally appropriate for children to be picky about what they eat. Children naturally adapt. If food were scarce, they would naturally adapt by eating crust. That is a gift of nature and a design of their bodies. But that would be a survival coping mechanism, and it's not really appropriate (or practical) to demand that a child practice survival coping mechanisms when their bodies don't need to. Because food is plentiful, children adapt by not eating everything they see or are served. They eat as much as their bodies need, and what their bodies need, because their bodies know what to eat, until food is pushed on them or taken away. Children who are coerced into eating everything that they're served often develop poor relationships with food.   The only way that you're going to get them to do it is either by withholding food, or by coercion. Neither of those things sound appealing to me, and for what? Eating all of one's food does not help hungry people at all. Actively engaging with the hungry in your neighborhood will help them, though, and that's not very hard. The leftover crust could easily feed birds or be composted, if you're that worried about it. 

 

Edited by habitat - 3/21/11 at 12:02pm

[D_McG]

Originally Posted by habitat 

But food isn't scarce for your children, and it shouldn't be. It's totally developmentally appropriate for children to be picky about what they eat. Children naturally adapt. If food were scarce, they would naturally adapt by eating crust. That is a gift of nature and a design of their bodies. But that would be a survival coping mechanism, and it's not really appropriate (or practical) to demand that a child practice survival coping mechanisms when their bodies don't need to. Because food is plentiful, children adapt by not eating everything they see or are served. They eat as much as their bodies need, and what their bodies need, because their bodies know what to eat, until food is pushed on them or taken away. Children who are coerced into eating everything that they're served often develop poor relationships with food.   The only way that you're going to get them to do it is either by withholding food, or by coercion. Neither of those things sound appealing to me, and for what? Eating all of one's food does not help hungry people at all. Actively engaging with the hungry in your neighborhood will help them, though, and that's not very hard. The leftover crust could easily feed birds or be composted, if you're that worried about it. 

I don't make my kids finish their food there and then. They can absolutely finish it later. But I'm not getting them 10 snacks a day just because they want to keep trying different things. Who has time or energy for that? or 3 snacks back to back because they change their mind.

[habitat]

Originally Posted by D_McG 


I don't make my kids finish their food there and then. They can absolutely finish it later. But I'm not getting them 10 snacks a day just because they want to keep trying different things. Who has time or energy for that? or 3 snacks back to back because they change their mind.
 

I totally get the energy aspect, but plenty of busy moms use snack tins. I've even seen childcare centers use them. They're actually easier. They don't take more than 5 minutes, and your'e done for the day!

[mamazee]

I honestly don't think it's fair to put this kind of emotional pressure and project those kinds of issues on young children.  Poverty is not the fault of children, and they are just kids going through life in a normal way, learning about what they like and don't, and learning about hunger cues and their bodies.  They aren't doing anything immoral.  We can try to reduce waste as the adults, but they are just children and guilt tripping them isn't IMO fair.  There are other ways to teach about people who are hungry.  In our house, we keep a can my older dd decorated on the table, and every time we eat we put money into the can to feed another person, and then we alternate between giving the money collected to a local food pantry and an international hunger organization.
 

Originally Posted by msmiranda 

I totally hear you, and I would have been upset too.  My parents were not at all controlling about food, so without that experience as a background, I would fall on the side of being a bit stricter.  Certainly a policy of finishing one snack before getting anything else is not cruel or overly controlling IMO.  The way I am trying to explain it to my kids (older one is 3.5 and still does not get it yet, but I will keep it up because it is what I truly believe) is that wasting food is morally wrong.  My perspective on it is that for most of human history, the biggest struggle in life was trying to find enough food.  Even now in times of relative abundance, there are many, many people in the world who do not have enough food to sustain themselves, and being afforded the unearned privilege of living in a time and place where food is actually too abundant gives us a moral obligation to recognize our privilege and not abuse it.  It bothers me in a very visceral way to waste food ... which is not to say that it doesn't still happen in our house -- it does, even as creative as I am about trying to use everything (though certainly we waste less than pretty much anyone I know).  But every time I throw away bread crust, I feel a little bit angry at the irrationality and selfishness of children who don't know how good they have it.  I find myself muttering under my breath, "nothing wrong with this child that a little poverty wouldn't cure."  Because I wonder, if food was scarce, would I get all the "but I don't like ______" crap I hear every day and have to throw away the edges of breads and waffles?  I kinda doubt it.

[cristeen]

I agree that to some extent its normal and to some extent may be attention seeking. But i do undersrand your frustration.

However, the thing that jumps out at me when looking at her day's food is that she's carb loading. Her day seemed to consist of mainly grains and fruit. I know those are the easy things to feed, and more likely to be eaten (i struggle w this too), but fat and protein are going to trigger satiety, whereas grains and fruits may just be leaving her feeling like she hasn't eaten 30 mins later. If you try starting her day w eggs in whatever form she'll eat, even if she has toast on the side, does she still need 3 snacks to get to lunchtime? My kiddo is significantly younger, but i've noticed that if i serve him his egg and wait for him to eat it before giving him fruit or pancakes, he'll self regulate much better than if i put all 3 in front of him at once (the eggs dont get eaten and he gorges on the pancakes). You might try changing things up and seeing if she asks for fewer snacks. Offering her snacks like a hard cooked/deviled egg or cheese first, before the fruit may also help. If i eat a piece of fruit for snack without cheese or nuts, i'll be snacking all day. But if i grab some cheese or an egg, i can often make it to the next meal.

Just some other things to think about.

[msmiranda]

Originally Posted by mamazee 

I honestly don't think it's fair to put this kind of emotional pressure and project those kinds of issues on young children.  Poverty is not the fault of children, and they are just kids going through life in a normal way, learning about what they like and don't, and learning about hunger cues and their bodies.  They aren't doing anything immoral.  We can try to reduce waste as the adults, but they are just children and guilt tripping them isn't IMO fair.  There are other ways to teach about people who are hungry.  In our house, we keep a can my older dd decorated on the table, and every time we eat we put money into the can to feed another person, and then we alternate between giving the money collected to a local food pantry and an international hunger organization.
 

Well, it's not as though I say to them exactly what I said in my post.  And I don't "guilt trip" them -- believe me, they show no signs of guilt.  There is some food waste around here pretty much every day and I certainly don't bitch about it every time it happens! (Except just a little in my head).  But I do remind them (well really just the older one right now) that it is important to eat what you ask for and that it is wasteful to throw food away ... not really the bread crust anymore, that happens every day and I cut crusts off preemptively because it actually means LESS waste than if I leave it on.  And I don't allow him to ask for something, have me fix it, and then change his mind.  At that point he doesn't get anything else until he eats what he asked for (which he almost always does after pouting for a few minutes). Occasionally I do mention that there are children in the world who don't have enough food, but obviously given my kids' ages they are not old enough yet to really grasp what that means.  As they get older, however, they will definitely be learning about the privileged life we have and that many others do not have what we do.  I consider that part of teaching good values.