Since I dont have kids yet I want to talk quickly about a situation Ive seen multiple times at my friends house.
As an example I will use a child of theirs. The child is a girl, she is 8 years old.
She hasn’t grown much and up to this age she was very delicate and skinny. Its early and that doesnt necesarily mean anything yet.
This past year she has started to pick up in weight.
Thats all nice and good but what Im getting to is the eating habits of the child and how the parents react to them.
All the little girl wants to eat is fries, pizza, bread, potatoes, candy and yes she does like some fruit.
With that goes soda and a lot of sweet drinks.
What I see is that the parents know she is not eating right. They know she should eat vegetables and other better, more nutritional things, drink less soda etc.
They try to ask the girl to eat the right things but whenever that happens the girl gets sad, cries or something similar.
As soon as that happens the parents quickly give up and give the kid whatever she wants.
I see this many times, and wonder why do they do that.
I mean, when you are a parent are you really that tired all of the time that you dont put forth the effort ?
Maybe its that you as a parent feel sorry for the crying child, try to understand it and just give in because you love the child and dont want to be the bad guy.
But wouldnt it be that if you love the child you make it understand what is the right thing to do ? Shouldnt you be teaching the kid the right, healthy habits instead of just the easy way out and that crying will get you what you want ?
In my opinion what the parents are doing almost every single time this situation happens is very wrong.
In my view, I wouldnt scream, I wouldnt fight or beat the child, no way.
But I would first try to explain exactly and show examples of why the child should listen to me and what the consequences would be if they continue on the path they are on.
It might seem too serious but why ? Yes its a child but why not try to talk with it in a smart, intelligent way and actually teach it something ?
If that would not work, my second option would be to take away whatever the child likes a lot. Any kind of games, tablets, tv, computer, whatever.
Basicaly the strategy would be that if they dont eat the healthy stuff that I want them to eat and will not listen to me, well no problem. But until that changes and the child does what I want (and I dont want anything bad) those things that the girl likes I would just take away.
Those would be the consequences of not eating right and not being smart about their own health.
You might say the kid is 8 years old man. Yes the kid is 8 years old, but we the people are craetures of habit. If we do not create those good, positive habits in ourselves and our kids very early it will only get much tougher to do so later in life.
The older a person gets, the more set in their ways they are. Body remembers and it gets use to things.
You have to teach your kids from a very early age to do the right things for themselves. If you wont, you will only set them up for disaster later.
Diabetes, heart failure and many more health issues many times can be avoided.
Help your child avoid them especially already in the beginning when it doesn’t know any better.
Be a good parent, not a good friend to your kids.
Most importantly set an example yourself. Eat healthy in front of your kids.