finish your plate mentality

stephysd

Me and my husband go back and forth on this so much. We were both raised in 'finish your plate' households, and he would like for our sons to be raised the same way. I disagree as if they kids is full why should they be forced to eat all their food. The other problem we struggle with is that my husband dishes the food for the boys. He gives them adult portion sizes, and does not understand that they need such a smaller amount then we do. I am trying to drill into his head that forcing the kids to eat is teaching them unhealthly eating practices. We stop eating when we are full and they should be allowed to do the same. Our ways of combating this also includes letting them dish up their own food. They have to take a little bit of everything, and if they go back for seconds they also have to have second small serving of vegetables. If they do not finish their plate, it goes in the fridge and when they get hunger they have to finish it. At bedtime, we usually have a snack as a family of either popcorn or icecream with fresh fruit.

DesdemonaRose

There was a study I read online a while ago that found kids who were told to "finish their plates" were more likely to be overweight as adults. The theory was that you ruin the person's ability to listen to hunger/full ques and therefore they overeat when they are older. Here are a couple of articles. The second one deals with a few topics, but it does mention the forced eating:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/23/clean-your-plate-parents_n_3141473.html

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130208110043.htm

quiltlovinlisa

We do child size portions for the little kids (which is anywhere from a tablespoon to a third of a cup depending on the age of the kid) and then our rule is, if you want seconds on favorites, you finish what's on your plate or if we have a dessert (once or twice a month we might have a treat for a family night) you must finish your dinner. This puts portion controls automatically on breads and meats, and with several children that would eat nothing but, it's really encouraged them to try other foods out.

However, we leave it up the kids. The only exception is vegetables. We allow kids to freely eat as many veggies as they want during meals.

evileen99

Yes, it's a bad culture. You said yourself that she complains about it (does she say she's not hungry/feels full?) and that she's gained weight. You could screw up her body's ability to determine satiety by forcing her to eat when she's full or not hungry. It's already made her gain weight; why would you want to saddle her with a life of dieting by forcing her to clean her plate?

latoldy

I was brought up not only to have to finish my plate but that if I did I could have desert as a reward. Here I am a zillion years later and still struggle with forgetting to eat just until I am full. We always use small plates for our meals and measure and weigh portions....but guess what, I still forget almost daily to stop when I have had enough. One trick that should help adults that have this problem is to eat slower. It takes a minimum of 20 minutes for your brain to get the message that you are full. Quite often when I am finished dinner, I am still hungry. I leave the table and stop eating but; within 30 minutes after eating I feel stuffed. This is a hard habit to break so my advice is serve your kiddies small portions and as long as they take a bite or two of everything, let them off the hook. By serving them smaller portions, you won't waste so much food and they can always ask for seconds. For heaven's sake...do not offer them desert as the reward for eating or good behavior.