In any event, here are some things that really resonated with me that might be helpful to you.
Identify Distortions "Children are such good regulators that they intuitively eat more or less depending on their growth rate, activity and the amount of calories in the food. They make up for errors in regulation. If they overeat for whatever reason - they are offered exceptionally tasty food, or they are overly hungry - they compensate for that overeating by not getting hungry as soon or by eating less the next time."
We all have this ability.
If a childs weight is off track, she asks "what is undermining this child's ability to grow in a way that is right for her?"
If your weight is off, what is undermining your ability to grow or live that is right for you? (I highlighted activity above, because when you're more active, you naturally are more hungry and that's o.k.. Eat to contentment and no more.)
Ellyn says its feeding dynamics, not food selection. Kids and us know how much to eat and whether we're going to eat, so we need to trust the kids to do their part and we need to trust ourselves that we know how much to eat to be satisfied and whether we're going to eat.
Restrained Feeding Gosh, I really don't like this word restrained.
I dislike the word because it means someone is trying to tell another person how much to eat and whether to eat and that's a violation of trust according to Ellyn. That's the individuals role to decide how much to eat and whether to eat.
The parents role is to decide what gets served, when it gets served and where the meal is served. We're responsible for consistently delivering meals at the same time every day so kids / us can predict and depend on those meals and self-regulate how much they / we eat and whether they / we eat. If we don't do our roles, they / we lose trust or overeat.
Worse. If we do our what, when and where, but take advantage of our role, by always serving healthy meals and not foods everyone likes (there has to be something for everyone at every meal and fun foods need to get served too, but not always), then we're undermining trust of the child and ourself.
Also, if we try to intentionally limit the amounts of food served, we're undermining trust of the child and ourself, which can lead to overeating later and becoming overweight.
Ellyn writes, "food restriction is only one of the circumstances that make children afraid of going hungry. Erratic and unpredictable feeding - being casual about providing family meals and structured snacks - mimic restrained feeding. It makes children gain too much weight for the same reasons. The child doesn't know for sure that she will get fed, and as a consequence, she becomes food-preoccupied and prone to overeat when she gets the chance. Sometimes there is plenty of money and no one taking time to provide food. Other times, there simply isn't enough money to buy food."
Wow! This totally brings me back to my roots and my heritage. There was always plenty of food to eat when I was growing up, and for the most part, regular meal times. However my dad growing up in Portugal as part of a family of 11 and then immigrating to the U.S., my grandfather living during the depression and my mom growing up in a house of 10, I'm sure there were food supply challenges that made it difficult to regulate eating because there wasn't always enough food, so there weren't always regular meals. How about you?
The research summation Ellyn shared, basically shows, parents who over controlled children's eating had kids who were poor at stopping eating when full, more likely to eat when not hungry and more likely to feel bad about eating.
Stress "Stress appears to make a child gain too much weight in a two-step process. First, restrained feeding or other poor feeding practices teach the child to eat for emotional reasons. Later on, the child experiences extreme stress and intuitively acts out by overeating and gaining weight."
Overeating for emotional reasons is a learned habit, when parents use food to deal with children's unpleasant feelings the parent can't manage. It is learned in the first 4 years of life!
Parents consider reading "How to talk so kids will listen and listen so kids will talk", so we can accept a child's feelings and apply appropriate solutions (tolerating, accepting, redirecting, ...). If we don't do our part, when kids grow up and face stress, they react by eating (mouth hungry vs. stomach hungry). Depending on the severity of stress and length of time under stress, the person can gain too much weight.
- Children who's eating has been restrained, when faced with stress overeat.
- Children who's eating has not been restrained, when faced with stress, eat less.
- Children of neglect tend to be fatter.
- Lack of structure stresses children. Parents wait for food requests and short order cook. Parents let children eat on the run as a trend and family meals are decreasing. This stresses children and leads to overeating.
You can substitute child for yourself and if you have experienced or experience these situations now, then you're undermining your own success around food.
You must as the adult and the eater: - schedule and plan your meals,
- decide what will be served and
- decide where you'll be sitting down to eat.
then you must trust yourself to know: - how much to eat
- and whether you're going to eat something served or eat at all
Powerful stuff. We're all the adults and the child. So with ourselves we have to play both roles and divide the responsibility, while trusting ourselves to do the right thing and not undermine ourselves with an agenda.
Gosh I hope I don't screw up this parenting thing.
Coach Mike
p.s. If you want nutrition help with your child see Vanessa, not me.
p.p.s. Saturday is the treadmill workout. You can learn more here.
p.p.p.s. Anyone else hungry?
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