General question re: treats for kids

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phil1147

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hi, can someone please shed a light for me and my girlfriend about feeding treats or snacks to kids. We have a new born baby, well shes 3 months old now. My girlfriend (GF) already has a child from a previous relationship and i think she gives him too many treats for a 5 year old. He also gets treats when he goes to his grandmothers house. I mean a lot of treats, ie, sweets, crisps etc.

I personally think the whole treats for kids thing is a bit of a disgrace, ppl think there being really nice to the kid and they love the sweets but are not seeing the bigger picture, ie, the health issues and spoiling them etc.

i do think it might be nice to give a small bar of chocolate or maybe an ice cream if were out doing something, but not at every chance.

another question is what age is old enough for a child to be getting sweets or treats. i personally think its around 3 or 4 years old, after they get the taste of proper food first.... please throw your ideas in the air, me and my partner would love to hear them.

by the way i only put this thread up because we've been arguing about this for a good while now.
 
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Congratulations on the baby, I hope you are getting some sleep.

I have a 10 month old and my family are already trying to slip her things like bisbuits and ice cream. Personally I think treats should be for special occasions like birthday parties etc. We used to get a treat on a sunday after mass if we were quiet. The word treat should be key, I have a friend whose son asks for a treat every day and gets it, personally I don't see how that is a treat. I think if you want to give children something nice you can give them to a yogurt or some fruit or stewed fruit and custard etc as dessert if they finish dinner. Healthy but sweet at the same time.
 
One treat of the healthy option per day and sweets treat on possibly Sunday.

Hate to see parents going into the garage to get petrol and automatically asking what everyone wants from the sweet/chocolate counter, dreadful habit to get into both healthwise and financially.
 
Have to agree with you that treats should be that, not everyday. However any changes in a five year old will have to be done gradually. Introduce fruit and make up little packs of dried fruit like sultanas and raisins instead of sweets at every turn. Then one needs to decide how much stuff like fizzy drinks and biscuits comes into the house on the weekly shop and when its's gone, well it's gone. Maybe concentrate on dental health and the pain of getting fillings when talking to the gf and simply distraction and gradual reduction of stocks of the stuff with the child. I think it's unrealistic to think that one could not give sweets etc until a child was four or five. But if the sweets etc are given after meals and teeth have to be washed,that's a good start. The danger in forbidding all is that like all forbidden fruit , it becomes more attractive.
 
I used to give my kids whatever they wanted, especially my daughter as she was a very fussy eater, At 15/16 months old she was having that sunshine banana breakfast where you mix with milk, for lunch i was lucky to get 2 bites of bread and butter into her so it was usually a bag of snacks, and for dinner she would have a jar of baby food. Not much i know so i used to give her chocolate and sweets on a daily basic just to get something into her. Over night she just totally changed and started eating everything she could get her hands on.
Anyway to make a long story short ( i have a habit of rambling on ) my son at 6 years old got his first filling i was mortified, even though my kids brush their teeth twice a day i was obviously giving them too many sweets, crisps, fizzy drink ect, dentist not impressed when i told him how many sweets they had each week. If they asked for something i would give it to them as a sort of reward for eating their meals, "finish all your dinner and you can have afters" and on many occassion in the car stopping at a garage ( like someone has already mentioned ) saying i would get them, sweets, crisps, drink just to get them to shut up and stop arguing for 5 mins.

The shame and embarrassment i felt from knowing my son had a great big black horrible looking filling in his mouth was enough for me too change the way i approached the "treats".

Now treats are fruit, cheese strings, yogurts ect ect It took a few looks of "what do you mean i cant have that chocolate bar" and a few heated words at the check out when for the 100th time i said no but it finally sunk in.

Now i walk into a shop and my kids will ask if they can have grapes, oranges, watermelons, my daughter actually asked me for a bag of mushrooms once lol They still chance their arm every now and again, and once a week they are allowed to go to the shop and get 1 thing of what ever they want ( apart from those stupid push-pop things and all the other 20 different products which are all the same, which i didn't allow them to have in the first place, €1.50 for a bit of sugar and dye.....go get a bag of buttons)

The only exceptions are at parties, i cant stop them having a party bag when every other kid has one, at christmas and when we are on our summer holidays.

See i told you i rambled on, so much for a short post......

Last thing... (promise) my son still has that 1 filling in his mouth a reminder to me i think, thats why it's waiting so long before it falls out, ( 9 years old and has only lost 5 teeth!!! ) but it's still the only one that he has.
 
From both a general health and dental health perspective, a treat should be a treat and not a commonplace thing. Its extremely bad to see kids stuffing their faces with treats and not being interested in a balanced dinner.

Id agree with other posters, healthy treats during the week, packaged treats on a sunday or special occasion only. Id also have no problems telling any adult who comes into contact with the child 'no sweets please, we are interested in our childs health and eating that rubbish is going to cause problems down the line'.

Fizzy drinks I never even saw until I was a teenager and as a result have zero interest in as an adult. Better to instill good eating habits in kids from an early age, make them less inclined to become fast food and treat junkies when they get older.
 
If at all possible try and substitute treats of junk food with treats such as a dvd or a game of some sort - something non edible. I think so many children grow up and then when they are upset or feel like a perk me up they reach for the biscuits.
 
Our boys ( 3 & 4.5 ) get either biscuits or share a packet of hula hoops in the evening if they've been good..chocolate/sweets only rarely.
Major thing is to get as much of a variety of tastes into the toddler when going onto solids rather than relying on powdered milks and jarred baby foods - this worked a treat for us!
They're both A1 eaters of their dinners and dairy products and only drink milk,water or diluted juice (no fizzys).
Best of luck..
 
My eldest didn't get anything sweet apart from fruit until she was 4 and went to school. She is now 16 and can take or leave junk food, prefers savory to sweet and will try anything. My other 2 were much more under the influence of family and have much more limited palates although as there is never any junk food in our house they have to make an effort to get it. For the sake of your childs teeth, health and future stick to your guns. Even if just in your house she doesn't get treats hopefully she will follow your lead. Don't let her get a taste for junk or she will never appreciate proper food.
 
I sometimes chop a mango and a couple of pears into cubes and give them to the kids as a treat when they are watching TV. They prefer that to chocolate (what said they all eat everything including sushi, salads, spicy foods and, their absolute favourite, olives stuffed with almonds.
They do get treats the odd time, both chocolate and crisps, but never when they are hungry.
 
Our kids (6 and 9) get a small treat after dinner, e.g. biscuit, treat sized bar etc. No fizzy drinks unless at parties, but in fairness when they do go to parties I let them have what they want. Our younger child got sweets at a much younger age than her older sibling, but I think that's a given for a 2nd child.
 
I have twins (boy and girl) who are now nearly 12 but 8 years ago my then near 4 year old son had some bad teeth at back of his mouth!

No, they didn't get much sweets/chocolate, odd bag of Snax only because they were both and still are brilliant healthy eaters. They eat cabbage, carrots, parsnips, turnips and most veg going. They eat all fruit. They are slowly being introduced to foods which most of their friends wouldn't even think about and great fish eaters and now eat prawns. Big deal you may say but they are brilliant (not looking for pat on the back or anything like that guys)

But anyway, I took my son to the dentist and nearly fell off the chair when I was told that as my son ate so much FRUIT the natural sugar in the fruit was rotting his teeth!

He was always a big grubber and not heavy in weight but he would and still does eat twice what his twin sister eats. The dentist managed to do some temp fillings to hold the shape of his teeth for his adult teeth to follow on.

Imagine being told your child eats too much fruit!
 
thanks everyone who responded, we read thru them all last night, had another argument but at least my girlfriend has a better understanding about other peoples views. Not that its gonna make much of a difference but at least the idea is there. Treats for kids isnt too bad once its a treat and not an everyday occurance.
 
my little girl eats all her dinners, three to four portions of fruit/ veg a day, drinks a lot of water and generally eats very healthy and well.
however we got into a habit of giving her more sweets than recommended and when we realised it - we stopped immediately. she wasnt (obviously) very happy but got over it very quickly.
i grew up with a special sweet day and so did my friends, cousins etc. so i introduced that to her, too. every friday she is allowed to have her choci bar and a bag of crisps. it introduces the weekend and she understands now, that friday is the magic day :D ill let my friends know this, too so there is no cross-over during the week.
 
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