What happens when a food your kid isn’t allowed to have at home shows up in someone else’s lunchbox?
Maybe it’s Oreos. Maybe it’s chips, candy, or chocolate. Your kid sees another child eating it, immediately wants it, and suddenly you’re wondering if life would just be easier if they weren’t exposed to it in the first place.
As a Registered Dietitian, Certified Intuitive Eating Counselor, and mom to two littles, I want to offer a different perspective.
Because there might be a reason that food feels like such a big freaking deal.
How food restriction can create urgency around eating
When certain foods are highly restricted or completely off-limits, they can become more desirable. And when a child finally has access to that food, there may be a much greater sense of urgency around eating it.
One of my favorite ways to explain this is with a bow and arrow. 🏹
Imagine picking up a bow and pulling the arrow backward while saying:
No Oreos. No Oreos. No Oreos. No Oreos.
The further you pull that arrow back, the further it can fly in the opposite direction when you finally let go.
Adults who have dieted probably recognize this feeling. You restrict, restrict, restrict until eventually it becomes, screw this diet, and suddenly you feel completely out of control around the exact foods you were trying so hard not to eat.
Kids aren’t immune to that experience.
If Oreos are never allowed at home, seeing another kid eating them at school can feel like a REALLY big deal. Your child may become fixated on them. They may feel upset that they can’t have them. They may eat as many as possible when they’re at a friend’s house because they know they won’t have access to them once they get home.
That doesn’t mean there’s anything inherently special about an Oreo. Part of what makes the Oreo so appealing is the restriction surrounding it.
Permission doesn’t mean unlimited access
Allowing access to a food doesn’t mean you need to offer Oreos at every meal or give your child unlimited access to every food in the house.
Parents still provide structure.
You decide what foods are available, when meals and snacks happen, and what options you’re providing. Allowing your child to build a more neutral relationship with sweets can exist alongside that structure.
The goal isn’t to remove your role as a parent. It’s to consider whether rigid restriction may actually be creating more urgency around the foods you’re hoping your child will eat less often.
Research has found associations between restrictive feeding practices and eating behaviors such as eating in the absence of hunger, while restriction and dieting are also important factors to consider when we talk about disordered eating and binge eating. This doesn’t mean that restricting Oreos automatically causes an eating disorder. Food and eating disorders are far more complex than that.
But it does give us a reason to think carefully about the messages kids receive around food.
Making sweets less exciting by making them less forbidden
Imagine your child sees Oreos somewhat regularly.
Sometimes they’re packed with lunch. Sometimes they’re offered alongside an afternoon snack. Sometimes they’re available with a meal.
Over time, an Oreo can become exactly what it is: a food they enjoy.
It doesn’t have to be the forbidden food they need to eat as much of as possible before someone takes it away.
This is something we talk about a lot within intuitive eating: permission can reduce urgency.
When kids trust that a food will be available again, they don’t have the same reason to approach it with a better eat as much as I can right now mentality.
Will your kid sometimes eat a bunch of Oreos? Yep.
They are a kid learning how food feels in their body. They’re going to experiment. They’re going to eat past fullness sometimes. They’re going to have days when they’re more interested in sweets and days when they’re less interested.
That’s part of learning.
And our job isn’t to make sure our children always eat the “perfect” amount of every food. It’s to give them opportunities to develop trust in their bodies and a relationship with food that isn’t rooted in fear, guilt, shame, or scarcity.
So if another kid’s Oreo is causing chaos at the lunch table, banning Oreos from everybody else’s lunchbox probably isn’t where I’d start.
I’d get curious about why that Oreo feels so powerful in the first place.
◑ ◉ ◐
Navigating sweets, food restriction, picky eating, and all of the nutrition noise parents hear can be freaking confusing. If you want individualized support, the Find Food Freedom® team includes weight-inclusive dietitians who work with children and families to build supportive, flexible relationships with food.
Check your insurance benefits to see whether nutrition counseling may be covered at little to no cost to you.
