Why Can't My Child Stop Eating? by Debbie Danowski

Why Can't My Child Stop Eating? by Debbie Danowski

Author:Debbie Danowski [Danowski, Debbie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781937612283
Publisher: Central Recovery Press, LLC


CHAPTER FIVE

CHANGING THE PATTERNS

SO, THIS IS IT. THE CHAPTER YOU’VE been waiting for—the one that will tell you exactly how to go about helping your child to live a healthier life. Before plunging in, you need to remember that not all of the methods presented here will work for every family. Since people and lifestyles are quite different, you will need to decide what methods will be successful with your family. Though this may sound easy, you may face some difficulty in making these determinations. Since, as a member of American society, you have become accustomed to many of the activities that regularly associate food with emotions, you may find yourself resisting all of the methods presented here. This is where your biggest challenge will come—being able to put aside the food denial that is so prevalent in our society in order to determine what is best for you and your family.

The majority of Americans go through life simply maintaining the status quo that they became accustomed to in childhood. This, in part, helps to explain the growing obesity rate among children. Adults learn certain habits and practices from their parents and then pass them on to their children. For instance, passing down certain recipes, holiday-eating traditions, eating habits (such as eating while watching television, only eating in the kitchen, taking food from others’ plates, etc.), and taste preferences are all practices that are usually continued from generation to generation without conscious consideration.

What you are being asked to do in this chapter is to become conscious of, and possibly change, habits and practices that were ingrained into your family well before you were even born. This being so, it is easy to see why your resistance to these suggestions might be strong. So what can you do to get past this resistance? First, read each suggestion carefully before going on to the next. If you rush through or skip around this chapter, you may not retain all of the information you need to make an informed decision.

When you do find yourself becoming resistant to one or more of the suggestions presented in this chapter, try to think about where this resistance comes from. If, for example, you read about finding different ways to celebrate holidays rather than baking cookies and you find yourself resisting this, take a second to think about why. What do you associate with baking these cookies? What are you afraid of if you don’t bake for the holiday? In your mind, what will happen if there aren’t any cookies? What emotions do you associate with this activity? You may want to make a list of the memories you have of baking cookies with your family as a child.

Now, try to figure out if your resistance to taking the advice presented in this chapter is due to a genuine belief that the suggestion mentioned is wrong for your family or rather to a fear of losing the feelings associated with the activity. For example, a child who



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