Food can be joy; it can be celebration, nourishment, happy memories, comfort, fuel. But it can also be scary and stressful and a source of extreme tension. Babies are born intuitively knowing what, how much and when they want to eat, but somewhere along the way they lose that intuition.
This might be through adults enforcing arbitrary rules around food (often from a place of good intention – I know, I’ve done it myself), external pressure from society telling them what and how much they should eat in order to look a certain way, or ideas around what is or isn’t healthy. Either way, they lose it.
Remember, a bad mealtime does not make you a bad parent, so if things don’t go well today then start again tomorrow. Be as gentle on yourself with this stuff as you are on your kids – food is joy and connection and fuel and celebration. This is your chance to take the happy bits of food and lose the negativity.
Warning Words: Here’s a list of words to watch out for when talking about food and eating with kids and teenagers. Avoid all the words in both of these columns if you can:
Bad Good
Sinful Sin-free
Cheat Strict
Unhealthy Healthy
High-calorie Low-calorie
Dirty Clean
Naughty Nice
Treat Being good
Guilty pleasure Guilt-free
Use basic descriptors instead – a fruit smoothie is just a fruit smoothie, not a ‘healthy, guilt-free, good’ fruit smoothie. And a biscuit is just a biscuit, not a ‘treat’ or ‘guilty pleasure’.
The power of the family meal: It doesn’t need to be a long, drawn-out dinner. Twenty to thirty minutes together a week, and it could be for breakfast or lunch, not necessarily an evening meal. It does need to be together though, and away from the TV. Evidence shows that eating while watching TV isn’t just bad for conversation, it can even inhibit digestion and lead us to lose connection with our appetite because we’re distracted from the process of eating.
Self-service: Giving young children the chance to serve themselves is a great way to let them take control over how much they eat and what is on their plate. If you’re serving up yourself then try offering smaller portions and giving the chance for kids to have more if they want it, instead of overloading their plate.
Release the pressure: Once you’re at the table, lose the pressure. Avoid food bargaining, encouragement, bribery or threats. Remember, it’s your job to provide the food but it’s your child’s job to decide whether to eat it. Because this stuff dies hard, here are some phrases to watch out for: ‘Eat it all up or you won’t have pudding.’ ‘Clear your plate.’ ‘Just three [or however many] more mouthfuls.’ ‘Well done for eating those peas!’
If you’re with other family members, such as grandparents, talk to them beforehand about your approach and explain why you’re doing it so your kids don’t encounter food policing else- where.
Edited extract from Body Happy Kids by Molly Forbes, out now. Published by Vermilion London. Even very young children will benefit from exploring food – touching it, smelling it and getting used to how it feels.