Your kids' food choices start with your food choices, and perhaps even more important, how you choose them.
You want to make choices that give your children the food they need to be healthy. But don't sacrifice a healthy future for the sake of getting "healthy" food into their stomachs. Building a healthy future for your kids in their relationships with food means several things: developing your own healthy relationship with food (and body image), avoiding tearing down a child based on his or her appearance, and having good habits around food that normalize healthy eating.
Children Learn Food Choices From Your Food Choices
Your example is the biggest influence on your children. If your attitudes about food are restrictive, fearful, dismissive, or apathetic, chances are that your kids are going to adopt similar tendencies. The trick is to be willing to have someone help you examine your attitudes -- because it's likely that you don't know what you're communicating.
Your Body Image Affects Children's Food Choices
Your kids don't just watch what you eat. They watch how you act and they listen to what you say. If you communicate that you don't like your body -- essentially, that your body somehow brings you shame -- your children will pick up on it.
How do children learn that you don't like your body?
- Saying, "Oh, I shouldn't eat that."
- Avoiding activities that you like to do and reveal more of your body (like swimming)
- Dieting, which says it all
- Wearing clothes that are the wrong size for you
- Exercising for the purpose of looking better or burning calories (or increasing exercise before a big public event)
- Labeling foods as "good" or "bad," "safe" or "unsafe," and so on
- Neglecting self-care (i.e., grooming)
- Missing meals
- Avoiding normal hugs when the child reaches puberty
Example: How working on your body for others (not yourself) can backfire
How You See Your Children's Bodies Affects Their Food Choices
Sticks and stones break bones, and words and actions break hopeful children. You have power in what you say and do to bring shame to your kids. For example:
- Saying, "You should lose weight," or, "I'll give you $100 for every pound you lose" (which sounds far-fetched, but isn't)
- Buying clothing that is the wrong size for them (if you saw the movie "Spanglish," you know how this can look)
- Giving preferential treatment to your slimmer children
- Name-calling: It's obvious, but it happens far too often
How abuse and trauma contribute to eating problems
How one woman responded to pressure as a kid
Improving Your Kids' Relationships With Food
So if you aren't doing the above behaviors anymore, what do you do? You may seem to be at a loss for words, but you can be active in supporting your kids.
- Actively enjoy foods of all kinds. Name what's good about them even as you're eating them -- the freshness of homemade bread, the brilliant color of a ripe apple, and the richness and texture of your favorite chocolate dessert. If you can't enjoy the food at all, then (perhaps even out loud) ask yourself why you're eating it.
- Prepare foods in ways that make them more enjoyable. You've tried for years to get your son to eat raw carrots because so many nutrients are lost in cooking. He won't buckle. Steam the carrots and add some seasoning. You might enjoy them more, too.
- Have regular mealtimes for kids (and for you). It's likely that you'll provide a wider variety of foods, which helps to diversify their eating. Plus, it normalizes the experience of sitting down with the purpose of eating. If they see you eating a forkful of peas or a bite of chicken casserole, they're more likely to do the same.
- Support fitness at any weight or body size. The real key is how your kids feel physically. And "fat" is not a feeling! If they feel good, stay active, sleep normally, and have good physical checkups, you're a lucky parent.
- Engage in exercise with them when possible. Encourage exercise as a way to feeling better as opposed to looking better. Feeling good can make eating less intimidating.
- Step in when they ridicule a person because of his or her appearance. It's natural for us to prefer certain kinds of physical appearances, but shame around appearance is toxic. And contagious.
- Stock up on healthy foods to make them accessible to kids -- rather than demanding that kids eat them. Include these foods in meals.
- Encourage eating in the kitchen or dining and room and away from television screens. Fewer distractions mean that kids can better respond to their own bodies' hunger and fullness.
Mindful, sensual eating helps the body tell you what you need
A different guide to healthy eating
Give Yourself a Break!
Parenting is an enormous challenge, and there will be failures. That's natural. When your kids see you lapse into a judgmental place or avoiding certain foods because they're "fattening" or "carb-heavy," acknowledge what has occurred and talk about it with them. It's much easier to look up to a person who admits fault. Your goal is to help build your child's relationship with food while enjoying your own. You may find that your own honesty and humility in the process builds your child's relationship with you.
Sources:
Levine, Michael and Linda Smolak. Ten things parents can do to prevent eating disorders. Accessed 30 November 2007.
Mazzeo, Suzanne E.; Mitchell, Karen S.; Gerke, Clarice K.; Bulik, Cynthia M. Parental feeding style and eating attitudes: Influences on children's eating behavior. Current Nutrition & Food Science 2 (2006): 275-295.
Natenshon, Abigail. Could you be fostering an eating disorder in your child? EmpoweredParents.com. Accessed 30 November 2007.
Your role in eating disorder prevention. Accessed 30 November 2007.[/link]
