Duane and Melanie are trapped in daily food battles with their four-year-old, Mathius, over whether or not he has eaten enough growing foods to have a sweet dessert. Dinnertime is consumed by Mathius’s constantly announcing that he’s ready for dessert while his parents demand that he take “one more bite.” He nibbles at a piece of food and insists that this qualifies. Duane and Melanie find themselves debating whether this meets their criteria. They eventually get worn down and give in, albeit with a good dose of annoyance at Mathius for manipulating them and putting them in this position of having to cave on limits they think are important in order to keep the peace at mealtime.

Battles like this over dessert are a perennial problem for many families. Like Duane and Melanie, the major pitfall that perpetuates this dynamic is parents trying to change their child’s behavior—to get him to agree to eat more growing foods so they don’t have to deal with the inevitable battle over dessert. Further, their interpretation that their child’s behavior is manipulative—that he is forcing them to give him what he desires—leads to anger and frustration which only fuel the power struggle and interfere in parents’ ability to think clearly about the situation and make a better plan.

Once you accept that you can’t make your child change his behavior, and that he is just being strategic to get his way (which is working) you are positioned to set and enforce limits you actually have the power to control. You can’t make your child eat more growing foods, but you can limit sweets, even if he doesn’t like it. Remember, just because your child doesn’t like a limit doesn’t mean it’s not good for him.

The Plan

Daniela and Marcel are very keen on making dinner time family time. But their almost four-year-old, Reuben, resists sitting at the table for more than a few minutes. He keeps getting up to play. Daniela and Marcel try negotiation/bribery: “If you sit for five minutes and eat six bites of chicken and three of broccoli, you can have extra dessert”; threats: “No books before bed if you don’t sit down and eat”; and logic: “You are going to be hungry if you don’t eat enough.”

None of these tactics is working, so Marcel and Daniela have started to allow Reuben to bring a tablet to the table and play games, despite the fact that they had sworn never to allow any screens during mealtimes. (Marcel wonders, “How is it that my three-year-old is extorting me??”) At the same time, they feel very sad about the fact that a fair share of the precious time they have with Reuben at the end of the day is spent with him diverted by a screen, but they feel helpless to effect a change. Without the incentive of the tablet, they don’t see how they can get Reuben to stay at the table for longer than two or three minutes. Even then, he is so distracted by the screen that he still doesn’t eat, provoking further power struggles. Daniela and Marcel are at a loss as to how to turn this mealtime situation around to create the kind of experience they feel would be healthy and loving for Reuben, and for them.

Why children draw parents into food battles