At Kitch’N Giggles, we are all about teaching healthy eating habits. That means teaching kids how to enjoy healthy foods, without making ourselves, the grown-ups, crazy. As we all know, it can be exhausting to continually encourage our kids to try new foods, help with dinner prep or take a trip to the grocery store. But sometimes, in a moment of weakness, we may resort to unhelpful or even hurtful tactics.
This past week, the New York Times published an excellent post about teaching healthy eating habits without food shaming. Food shaming is when someone criticizes another person’s (or a kid’s) food choice. As parents, we are most likely doing this in order to correct poor food choices our kids made, but even our best intentions may do more harm than good. We took this sage advice on how to raise children with a healthy relationship to food and turned it into an infographic, which you can check out below.
The main idea is to focus more on how we’re eating that on what we’re eating. So here’s a quick summary on how you’re teaching healthy eating habits without even knowing it.
Do as I do – You want your kids to eat salad? Then make sure they see you eating salad. You do not want to shame anyone into eating salad by saying that salad makes you good, skinny, beautiful. So instead of talking about healthy foods, make sure you’re eating them.
Eat at a table – Eating together as a family is important. If you want your child to learn what healthy eating looks like, then you need to show them. Which means you have to sit down and eat together, preferably at the table so they can really see what you’re doing. It doesn’t mean you can’t have the occasional pizza in front of the TV, but in order to make sure your kids learn to eat a variety of foods, they need to see you do it first.
Have your cake – Is dessert reserved only for those who eat dinner? It’s a hard one to get over, but dessert should be treated like chop liver! When we put dessert on a pedestal by treating it as a reward, we’re sending the message that dessert is special. And needs to be earned. But everyone should enjoy their dessert (and salad), no strings attached.
Love your food – It’s really easy to focus on what your kids is not eating. Or how many cookies they snuck before dinner. Instead of complaining about their poor eating habits, teach your kids why food is important. Let them know that carrots help your eyes, and protein helps them grow. Yogurt makes their bones strong and pasta has many important vitamins.
Focus on how you Feel – We can all get caught up in how we look. Can’t eat that bread because I want to fit into my old dress. But what really matters is how food makes us feel. Eating a well balanced diet makes you feel more energetic, while eating only coke and fries makes you feel tired and slow. Because healthy and skinny are not the same.
Do what works for you – Yes, social media is full of healthy, kid-friendly recipes. But I don’t always have the time (or the will) to make that. Sometimes it’s a pizza (in front of the TV!). The key is to find what works for your family and then do it consistently. Maybe that’s cooking together one night a week. Or adding one vegetable to every meal. Because the most important person making the calls here is you. So do what fits best for yourself.
