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The nanny state is alive and well.

I am really looking forward to this programme having had twins (2yrs) who both have completely different feeding habits even though I have done the same with both of them, one of them simply will not touch fruit or vegetables and seems to crave carbohydrate rich foods and the other wolfs down berries and broccoli. Why Saffie are you so quick to demean something before you have even watched it? Surely teaching and helping parents with guidance about good eating habits and educating those watching is a postive thing? Nanny State? Do you have children or know anyone who has had a real battle to get their child to eat well or healthily?

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Just looking at the programme now and the amount of saturated fat that one toddler is ingesting daily is truly dreadful. Small children are reliant on their parents and carers to look after them properly and feed them a reasonable diet. Rich, fatty, sugary food is ok for a treat now and again but not on a daily basis.

Were those three examples really representative of young parents today? Heaven help us if they are! Michael's parents were at least aiming to give him healthy food and I do remember my children reacting in the same way to my home cooked healthy food! If only we could have had a psychologist like Cath Dendy and a home visit from someone like Lucy then maybe my sons would eat less fast food than they do now - in their thirties!!

It's all very well saffiewalks trotting out the old nanny state cliche but it's that same 'nanny' state that will be expected to treat the rotting teeth, obesity, diabetes, anaemia,(in a two year old for heaven's sake!) resulting from this malnutrition. Even rickets was mentioned. I think that any guidance that parents can be given is to be welcomed.

i think fast foods are really dangerous to the children

Rahul

Even though there might a lot to be said about patronizing I definitely agree that it is a good idea to offer professional advice and guidance to parents on how to feed their children well. Especially if it involves such great ideas and techniques as mentioned and shown above by Lucy Thomas and Dr. Catherine Dendy.
As I have worked as an Au Pair for quite some time I was sadly able to witness several occasions where parents meant it well but could have used some advice. For example: taking my host children to the playground I always made sure to have some healthy snacks like cut up carrots and cucumbers or raisins with me as well as a bottle of water. A lot of times I would see families arrive with their already slightly obese children and the first thing the mothers would do after their children skipped off was to get bags of crisps and bottles of soft drinks out. The natural result was that the children stopped running around the very minute they sat eyes on the delicious temptations, sat down next to their mothers and spent the better half of the remaining time with munching away on crisps. And while it might be arguable whether or not it is true that part of the malnutrition problem is that fast food is more affordable than healthy food for a growing percentage of people, I do think that some good advice on a balanced diet would be very helpful for any kind of income group. Not to talk about higher taxes on fast food. I suppose that would make the choice between fast food and healthy food at least worth a second thought. But that's a different story...

I think that schools also should give more attention to eating and the effects of bad food for your health. Areas as: That breakfast is the most important meal, so never skip it. The effects of fast food (obesity and heart disease) would be good subjects for school.
Nancy

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Just wanted to say hi to all the people who attended the food forum in Oxford a while back. I thought we were going to be setting up an email list so we could all contact each other but haven't heard anything. Is anyone up for that?

Has anyone had any successes? I've been feeling a bit overwhelmed by it all and not really knowing how to get started - not so good at breaking things down into manageable chunks. However my husband decided to just get stuck in and got her playing with peas and crushing them between her teeth. My mum has also got her to lick and eat some potato which is good. I've stayed out of both of those because she tends to dig her heels in more for me than anyone else! Although she did lick a bit of banana for me this morning! We have been doing this at mealtimes, which I know is against Lucy and Catherine's recommendations but because of time constraints, it's the only time we can realistically do it. We've stressed to her that we don't expect her to eat it and if she's resistant we haven't pushed and it seems to be allowing a very small amount of progress to be made! Just have to keep it up!

I really like your site. Lots of common sense suggestions when taking your child out.
Please feel free to visit my site www.fringematters.com

It is so right that you shouldn't force a child to eat what they don't like. Infants have taste buds just like us adults so we should appreciate that they have opinions like us. My daughter used to be so fussy about eating, but I figured out a few tactics that were quite effective. One being able to provide sudden distractions - while distracted I would spoon feed her. When I put the spoon to her mouth she would naturally open her mouth and receive the food while her attention is focused elsewhere momentarily.

Another contribution to her being more receptive to food was that I was given a Baby Spoon Trainer by a friend. My daughter seemed quite curious about having the spoon secured to her hand and enjoyed toying with the food. With a bit of guidance (helping her through the physical motion of feeding) she spoon fed herself at her own will.

I'm certain these methods might not work for every child but it worked for my daughter. It is import to let your child develop it's own sense of what he or she thinks and likes.

Thanks, Liz