KIDs and Eating

Have you ever thought, as a parent, that the relationship between you, food, and your child are all so intertwined that it can impact your child's relationship with food for a long time?

As a therapist working with people who have eating disorders, I am particularly intrigued about the relationship between moms, kids and food. In the next few pages, I will share experiences from my years both as a parent and a therapist that will illustrate the importance of developing an emotionally healthy attitude toward food and eating and imparting that to your children.

There are many factors that contribute to the onset of an eating disorder. There are biological, sociological and psychological factors. I will be addressing in this article some of the psychological factors. I will address the other factors in the coming months.

A person's early relationship with food definitely plays a role in the evolution of an eating problem. Let me share an example from my practice to help illustrate my point. A thirty year old woman attends individual psychotherapy because she has bulimia and anorexia. She is raising and 8 year old daughter. She is trying to do the right thing and educate her daughter about healthy eating and serves only "healthy" foods but in that process, she controls her daughter's portion sizes and restricts sweets most of the time. This is a common scenario. As parents we can relate to some more of these types of scenarios; your child comes home from school starved and wants to eat something sweet or crunchy. You suggest fruit and the power struggle begins or it is Halloween time so the candy is abundant. You hide most of it giving your child a few pieces a day. And lastly, you, as a parent are health conscious, so you offer sweets only after your child eats all his or her dinner. The good news is that parents are really trying to be more aware and healthy with regards to their children—the bad news is the way parents are doing this might not be the best approach.

One of the most essential tasks you can teach your child with regards to food and eating is to eat when they are hungry and to stop when they are full and of course, to understand healthy food choices. If we as parents can accomplish this we will greatly minimize that our children will develop eating problems. In the next few paragraphs I will give an example from my practice to help understand my perspective. A client of mine, B, is in therapy for a 15 year history with bulimia. She has a seven year old daughter. The family is celebrating a special occasion so they are going out to dinner. When B tells her daughter, the first thing the girl says is, "can we have dessert tonight?" B responds by saying, "yes, of course, it is a special day." The family eats dinner at the restaurant and B orders an ice cream sundae at dessert time. She eats half of it and says to her mom, "this is so good. I am getting full." Her mom says, "Don't eat it all. You had enough." B's daughter pauses for a moment and continues to eat the rest. Her mom says, "I thought you were full." B's daughter replies, "I am but I have to eat it all because I love it and we never get to have ice cream."

The problem with this is that the daughter does not respond to and listen to her body's cues for fullness because ice cream is rarely allowed in her day to day life. Whenever she has the opportunity to eat it, she overindulges. I believe if B's daughter was not so restricted on ice cream she could have said she was full and not finish the rest because she knows she can have ice cream at home.

There are three areas of our child's development that we cannot control. Those three areas are sleeping, eating and toileting. We as parents can provide education and guidelines that help our child in those areas. We can work toward successful toilet training but no matter how hard we try we cannot make a child urinate or have a bowel movement if they are not ready. We can provide the right environment for sleep but we cannot control when a child falls asleep or wakes up. The same is true for food and eating. We cannot control what food a child likes or dislikes. We cannot control when a child is hungry or full. The more we try the more potential there is for trouble. If we as parents can accept some of these limitations—step out of any type of food and eating battles, we will greatly help our children develop a healthier emotional relationship with food.

I have a daughter who loves chocolate. She sometimes asks for it at 8:00 A.M. Instead of saying no way, no how you are having chocolate for breakfast, because I know that will cause a battle, I try to educate her by saying, "how about toast with some peanut butter and your chocolate because if you just have the chocolate, you will not have a lot of energy for school." There have been days, Halloween time, where she eats a lot of chocolate in the course of the day and she might say that her belly hurts. I use that as an opportunity to educate her and help her see her body's response to so much chocolate is not good. The goal is for her to understand that is she eats sweets all day she will have a stomach ache and not feel good. I want her to be able to listen to her body and know about healthy choices. The less we power struggle over food and eating, the better it will be for her. This is the most important piece of my article. If you are engaged in power struggles over eating with your child, take a moment to look at your own relationship with food and eating and do what you can to step out of the struggle—you will greatly benefit your child.