Contents:
- Medical Video: Taking Care of Your Child's Gastrostomy Tube (G-Tube)
- Children eat continuously, what should parents do?
- 1. Always provide food at home
- 2. Give nutritious food and make it full for long
- 3. Teach children to be able to distinguish between true hunger and false ones
- 4. Balance with physical activity
Medical Video: Taking Care of Your Child's Gastrostomy Tube (G-Tube)
As the growth grows, children will need to eat more to support all their activities. Child's metabolism is also increasing in its first years so it becomes easily hungry. Plus, the size of a child's stomach is smaller so he can't stay full for a long time. Even so, letting children eat is also not good. Most long-term meals can lead to obesity in children.
You certainly cannot forbid children to eat. Then, what can parents do to put the brakes on the desire of children who want to continue eating?
Children eat continuously, what should parents do?
1. Always provide food at home
Children who want to eat continue may be frequent snacks carelessly to satisfy their hunger. To prevent this, it's a good idea to always be ready for food and snacks at home. Bring also provisions for him while at school.
This way, you can control what foods he eats and how many portions they are so they are not excessive. It is also important to develop children's habits to prefer to eat at home.
2. Give nutritious food and make it full for long
Seeing enthusiastic children to continue eating, don't let children buy sweets, donuts, or chips. You can use this opportunity to introduce healthy foods.
For example, toasted whole-grain bread with avocado slices, scrambled eggs with cheese, whole-grain cereal with milk, banana slices dipped in peanut butter, or roasted beans (almonds, cashews, etc.). You can also make fruit smoothies that are more filling than ordinary juices.
3. Teach children to be able to distinguish between true hunger and false ones
Sometimes, hunger is not necessarily because he is really hungry and needs to eat. This is called fake hunger (false hunger) Then follow what Dr. Joanna McMillan, reported on the Essentials Kids page, ask the child first what he feels when he asks to eat again.
When the child says "I'm hungry, ma'am" but only wants one food, like ice cream, even though you already offer other food. It is not hunger, only desire.
The solution, try to offer the child a drink of a glass of water or a grain of wheat crackers first and wait for up to 20 minutes. If afterwards he still feels hungry, this means he really needs to eat rice. If he is no longer fussy for food, the sign is that he is just cravings for ice cream.
4. Balance with physical activity
If the child is eating continuously because of hunger, don't forget to balance it by making it routinely move actively. Don't make it a habit to "bribe" a child with a gadget so that he is no longer fussy for food.
Invite children to play outside, for example by playing football or cycling with other children. You can also take him to swim or just take a walk to the zoo.
Regular physical activity helps children burn the calories they get after eating a lot so they do not continue to accumulate into fat that causes excess weight gain.
