For those not familiar with the concept, or the name, demand feeding means that you make all foods equally accessible to your kid, give them what they ask for when they ask for it. The theory is that humans are born knowing when to eat ond how much. If you encourage them to listen to their body’s cues, they will end up with a much more healthy relationship with food.
Is anyone else using this approach with their kids, and how is it going?
BabyFantsyPants has past the two year mark now, and it seems to be working well for us. She asks for fruits, vegetables and protein far more than she asks for chocolate or candy. She loves whole wheat breads, and dislikes white bread. When she asks for chocolate, we give her a square of toblerone, and often find most of it sitting on the table later, abandoned. She less picky about her food, and eats healthier than most of her friends the same age, and we never have a struggle over food.
Still, the whole thing seems so counterintuitive to me, and the idea that a two year old knows everything they need to about nutrition is a bit scary, but certainly the tightly regulated way I was raised didn’t give me a very good understanding of the proper role of food.
So, stories, questions, skepticism, derision, share it all. let’s talk…
Heh, just realized the title is badly written. Sounds like strangers might be sneaking into your house and feeding your kids. Shoulda been, “Paretnt, are you self-demand-feeding your kids?”. Ah well.
For the record, I don’t have kids and I’m not demanding to feed anyone else’s.
I just find this concept really interesting (never heard of it before) and have few questions. Do you introduce your daughter to new foods, or does she ask to try new things, say, if you’re eating them? Do you stop doing this at some point? Do you have concerns about her learning to eat at regular meal times? (Granted, this isn’t always a big deal. I’m thinking more of in the school environment when she’ll have a set lunch time.) Again, very interesting! I’m thinking this might work for my niece.
Good heavens no. While I understand the concept, and don’t necessarily disagree with it to an extent, in our household we use this approach for light snacks only.
Mealtimes serve an important social function as well, and I think our kids need that structure in their lives.
For the record, they’re twins, 29 months old. We also have a six-month old.
Is that what they’re calling it these days? I call it, "I’m a tired, middle-aged working mom of a little kid and the world isn’t going to end if I don’t micromanage his diet.
Well, babies tend to self-select a pretty good variety, but as soon as they taste sweets and snacks, that all gets blown away and they eschew all but those.
We give her the option of eating anything we eat. This is how she gets introduced to new things.
We’re not concerned about here learning to eat at mealtimes. She typically does eat a decent sized dinner when we do, but we don’t avoid feeding her leading up to it. The trick is to teach her to listen to her own cues about when to eat. School may be a little tricky. The plan is to send her to school with decent snacks. She will probably be starting out at a montessori school, and the local one is known to be pretty accommodating.
Common sense seems to dictate that that is what would happen, but it has certainly not been the case in our experience. The theory goes that once the kid knows they can have as much as they want, whenever they want, they don’t want it as much.
well, I wasn’t aware of it as a named method. What you describe is pretty much how I feed my kids, just as a reaction to the way I was raised w/ food (which had something to do w/ my early 20s bulimia).
Results…
one very picky eater who is practically a vegetarian but willingly eats whole wheat bread and crackers, lots of fruit but NO vegetables (except the very occasional carrot), and is indifferent to cake and cookies but loves candy, but is very discriminating about which candy (reese’s pieces please)
one much more broad eater who loves meat, eats almost no candy, but loves soda, esp. w/ caffeine
Both very active, and apparently very healthy
Conclusions…
I didn’t know there was a name for this, but I guess I do it, in a slightly modified way. My three-and-a-half-year-old picks out his own snacks, but we don’t usually have much candy or sweet stuff around the house anyway.
This kid will push away a half-finished bowl of ice cream. He’ll hand me a half-eaten lollipop when he’s had enough. So I let him control his own portions, too.
He can try anything he wants. One night we went out to eat, and he wanted my Cajun blackened tilapia and very spicy Cajun rice. He loved it. He wanted to try my super-hot salsa on tortilla chips, and loved it. He’s a very adventurous eater, so I’ve not had to push him to try anything. It’s just there, and he goes for it.
He selects a good variety usually, but he’s been known to go on an applesauce binge, eating nothing else for a couple of days. Last week it was raw broccoli and ranch dressing. Once it was cheese and crackers (for two solid weeks!). It all seems to even out in the end. His tastes are so eclectic that it works for him. I think with a picky eater, it might be more problematic.
I do maintain regular meal times for him, but I usually offer some leeway in what he gets. He can pick from among a selection if I happen to be fixing his meal separately, like when the SO is working late. (He can have chicken or fish, for example, and green beans or broccoli or Brussels sprouts, perhaps.) Otherwise, for meals he usually wants whatever I’m having, and he eats anything pretty readily. Sometimes he wants Pop-Tarts for breakfast, and then he’s usually munching on raw carrots by 10 a.m.
I agree that making everything available and accessible seems to make sweets a “no big deal” food choice, at least in my experience. They aren’t special treats, just another food option, so there’s no special significance attached to them.
I don’t have kids, but I would say that this pretty much seems to be the way I was raised. If i wanted food, I asked for it, and usually got it. Once I was old enough (i.e., could reach the shelves with food) I jsut got it for myself. The only time food was off limits usually was an hour before and an hour after dinner. Since an hour before, I would “spoil my supper”, accordign to my mother, and an hour after, if I was hungry, it was my fault for not eating enough at dinner.
I’d say it worked just fine for me. Hell, if anything it worked too well, I was quite the scawny kid. I ate a good mix. Sometimes, I wanted chips, other times, I wanted some carrots. My mom thought I was odd beacuse I was the only ten year-old she knew that would regulary fix himself a salad.
I would say there’s no harm in trying this method. If you see it doesn’t work (the kid asks for too many unhealty snakcs) then it’s time to make a more structured feeding system.
We do this somewhat. My nearly two year old daughter likes vegetables and other healthy foods. Her favorite foods are probabyly broccoli and chocolate, in that order. We do limit her to one glass of juice a day, one meal of mercury laden seafood a week, and meat products with nitrates to twice a week, but those are limits we abide by too. Sometimes we will put a curb on sweets if she did not eat dinner or seems to be going overboard, but not often. She knows there is chocolate and where it is and how to ask for it. She does not continually demand it even though, or maybe because, we will give it to her.
Better than mine, who would demand nothing but suckers and popsickles. At least you can claim Spongebob Squarepants cereal has been fortified, and chicken mcnuggets had nutritional value in a previous life.
I just usually give my son what we’re eating and he can pick and choose among that as to what and how much he wants. If he doesn’t like that I’ll offer leftovers from the night before. He likes his brocolli more then the ice cream I find.
I’ll probably continue as is. He seems to be doing just fine. Definitely not going to do the ‘clean plate club’ thing though, it took me years to get over that one.
I don’t know how true this is. I’ve some good friends with three kids (just about ready to turn 6, 4, and 1) and the mother rarely feeds them candy and soda. On the occasions that they are offered junk food, they tend to prefer fruit and juice if given a choice.
Having given up on soft drinks and cut down my consumption of candy and highly sugared foods I have to say that I now find cola downright nasty and most candy (candy bars, Hershey’s chocolate and the like) kind of repulsive. I’ll hit up the snacks machine at work for a Snickers every once in a while when I need some blood sugar and forgot to pack a lunch, but it leaves me with kind of a yucky aftertaste. I’ll still eat good chocolate, but only an ounce or two, and I’ll have a frozen custard whenever I’m back in Dairyland for a visit, but I suspect a lot of the child obesity/junk food problem is created by acclimating children by feeding them the stuff in commonly in the first place. This is certainly the case with bears, who, when given two piles of food (fruits and berries, or junk) will eat the natural stuff, but will forage in garbage pails for candy 'cause it’s easier or the natural supply of food is low.
But I am not a parent, am not around children regularly, don’t make dietary decisions for them, and therefore speak with about as much authority on the topic as a mouse at a cat-belling party, so YMMMDV.
I let mine “graze” at certain times. They never start by making healthy choices. My kids have never asked for broccoli (which they like) - and will only ask for bananas and apples after the requests for candy/gum/ice cream/suckers/twinkies/and fruit snacks have been denied.
I have let them choose their dinner quite often, they eat either peanut butter sandwiches or buttered noodles or mac n cheese if they pick. The Christmas holidays are pretty much a free for all.
Now, its feasible that if I let them have as much candy as they wanted, after about two days they’d be begging for broccoli (hasn’t happened at Christmas which runs about a week around our house), but I have my doubts - and with cavity girl, it isn’t a risk I’m willing to take.
When I choose for them, they will both eat salads (particularly ceasar salads) and are surprisingly good vegetable eaters. If I set out carrots to snack on, they will get eaten. My daughter is partial to ham, but will eat chicken. They both love tofu. She eats a lot of fruit. My son consumes a wide variety of foods with no complaint.
My family is pre-disposed to diabetes…I’m not letting my kids develop habits of pop with dinner because they want it.
Like Dangerosa, I don’t dare try it for too long. On the occassions where my son gets free rein of what to eat (a small snack before bedtime, or while on vacation), he’ll invaribly go for the fried sugary unhealthy stuff.
