Sneaking snacks? (Kind of long...)

[sarahsthreads]

So this isn't quite a baby food question, but something my 4.5 year old has been doing lately. We've always had a very lenient snack policy in our house, we're of the "if it's not forbidden it won't be abused" food philosophy, and it's worked pretty well so far. But lately DD1 has been sneaking food.

Two specific recent examples: I had a small box of donut holes on the table which DD1 had been told (and agreed enthusiastically) were for dessert. I had to go take care of something in another room for a few moments, came back and found DD1 hiding under the table with a donut hole stuffed in her mouth. My response was probably less than ideal - I didn't yell, but I told her she shouldn't have eaten it and that she wasn't going to have any more after dinner and put them way out of reach. Thinking about it more I probably should have said that it was too bad she decided to eat dessert before dinner because then we wouldn't all be able to have dessert together. Hindsight and all...

And another: dinner tonight was leftover pizza. DD1 is not a *huge* fan of pizza, but does eat it, and seemed OK with having a slice of olive pizza. She only picked off the olives and ate them, and ate the other veggies on her plate, and then asked for strawberries. But DH told her no, not until she ate more of her pizza (not sure I agree with that in the first place, but I was trying to get out to go to work and didn't want to undermine what he'd said) and when he had his back turned doing something with the baby, DD1 went to the fridge, grabbed a handful of berries, and turned away so she could eat them without him seeing. I only "caught" her because I was giving everyone goodbye kisses on my way out the door... I tried to make light of it and suggested that maybe she should go eat some more of her dinner like daddy had asked so she could have more strawberries after.

The very last thing in the world I want to do is make her think she has to hide while eating something, I don't want to have a not-quite-five year old with an eating disorder. I think there are really two issues here: her eating something that she thinks is forbidden - which is probably a bit more normal and why kids are always trying to get to the cookie jar on top of the fridge in comic strips - and her feeling like she needs to hide when she's eating something, which is the part that really concerns me. And I'm afraid if I make any sort of big deal out of it she'll just get sneakier...

So after all that, if you've read this far, is this normal behavior? How should I respond to it??

Thanks!
Sarah :)

[toby]

I am afraid that I don't have an answer for you, but am bumping it up in the hopes that someone will have an idea. I think that you are absolutely right to not make a big deal about it and also very smart to be asking for advice. If no one answers here, I would talk to your pediatrician to see if s/he has any suggestions.

[kcandz]

Yes I think it is relatively normal. My DC is older and has hid things or behaviors, not always food related but sometimes. I notice it is related to areas where I need to lighten up on as a parent. I don't think there are two issues, but one issue manifesting in two ways.

My advice is to take a very low key approach. First, as far as she is concerned, pretend the other incidents never happened. Put them in the past so she has a fresh start. Second, remove the idea of food as a currency. She is assigning higher value to the forbidden foods which makes her want them more. As you see, she did the same behavior twice, hid while eating both donut and strawberries, so it doesn't matter the food. Strawberries are healthy in my view, but they were assigned higher value because she had to eat something else to be able to have them, prompting the sneaking.

In our house, even at a year older than your DC, we are dealing with impulse control - I think developmentally kids are 6 or 7 before they have a better handle on it? We have more of a "life is short, eat dessert first" approach. This takes away the anxiety and desire about the other food and DC is then much more relaxed about eating in general. So if your pizza example was at our house, DC would have had the strawberries at the table, and probably would have gone back to the pizza after. Or not, but it is just one night and if DC gets hungry, DC knows to eat more healthy dinner.

We are still working on portion control and balancing meals. I have no advice there.

[sarahsthreads]

Yes I think it is relatively normal. My DC is older and has hid things or behaviors, not always food related but sometimes. I notice it is related to areas where I need to lighten up on as a parent. I don't think there are two issues, but one issue manifesting in two ways.

My advice is to take a very low key approach. First, as far as she is concerned, pretend the other incidents never happened. Put them in the past so she has a fresh start. Second, remove the idea of food as a currency. She is assigning higher value to the forbidden foods which makes her want them more. As you see, she did the same behavior twice, hid while eating both donut and strawberries, so it doesn't matter the food. Strawberries are healthy in my view, but they were assigned higher value because she had to eat something else to be able to have them, prompting the sneaking.

In our house, even at a year older than your DC, we are dealing with impulse control - I think developmentally kids are 6 or 7 before they have a better handle on it? We have more of a "life is short, eat dessert first" approach. This takes away the anxiety and desire about the other food and DC is then much more relaxed about eating in general. So if your pizza example was at our house, DC would have had the strawberries at the table, and probably would have gone back to the pizza after. Or not, but it is just one night and if DC gets hungry, DC knows to eat more healthy dinner.

We are still working on portion control and balancing meals. I have no advice there.

Yeah, all of this makes sense, and I would prefer to not even have the notion of "dessert" vs. "dinner". (Although I can't get my head around having cookies on the table with chicken - maybe if dessert were always fruit it would work, but sometimes it's really an honest-to-goodness dessert like ice cream.) I would have gone ahead and gotten out the strawberries myself, so I think I just need to sit down with DH and discuss that particular matter. I have noticed that if we don't clear away the dinner plates before we have dessert, sometimes DD1 will go back to eating whatever was left on her plate if she's still hungry after dessert.

As far as balancing meals, I think we do have a decent start on that - we talk about how some foods are "growing foods", and that our bodies need a variety of foods to get all of the things they need to keep working right. So after requesting a third piece of bread, if we remind DD1 that, yes, bread is pretty tasty, but her body might like some fish and salad too she's usually OK with that. But she's obviously still working on it too! (Heck, so am I!)

Thanks for all the good thoughts to ponder.
Sarah :)

[kcandz]

We do the "growing foods" thing too. I sometimes think we will never progress because it is almost every night moderating the behavior, but these more abstract lessons take so much time and repetition. Which is good for me to remember since I often feel like a broken record...

[bubbaray]

My DD#1 is pretty good with choosing healthy snacks. My DD#2, not so much -- I still lock the pantry b/c she will eat carbs until she's blue in the face. Its not that they are unhealthy, but she fills herself on them and then d/n want to eat meals.

[carolinamama]

I think kids that age have so little impulse control and sometimes want something so badly that they can't resist. Plus they are learning that you will not always allow it so they sneak it. They are not sneaking food to spite you, but because they almost can't help it. I am not giving kids a free pass when it comes to controlling their bodies, but I do think they are coming at it from a different place than you and I as adults.

I posted about my ds1 (age 3.75) sneaking foods a month or so ago. He was sneaking downstairs while I was dealing with ds2 and eating popsicles. While he has been exposed to plenty of sweets (and popsicles) it was the first time this year that we have really had popsicles in the house so it was a novelty. It stressed me out, but I decided to be completely relaxed about it after lots of thought and advice-seeking. I was so worried that this approach wouldn't work since it took more than a few days and I didn't want to keep all sweets out of the house. It's nice to be able to share a popsicle when friends come over to play.

Anyway, it all worked. We still have popsicles, in fact I have bought another box since then. And ds doesn't even think twice about them now. He eats them a few times a week on hot days but only after he asks. All his doing when he realized they were here to stay. Just a few minutes ago he was climbing in the pantry looking for a snack. He chose almonds and dried apricots all on his own.

You may have already dealt with this by now, but I just wanted to give you an example of how relaxing and taking the novelty out of foods worked for us.