Most people who aren't familiar with this new parenting paradigm would never believe that if a child has the freedom to have as much candy as they want, that they wouldn't eat it all in one sitting.
Our children do not have an affinity with candy. They know that they can have it whenever they want. Some may think that this means our kids eat candy all day long. It is quite on the contrary. As an adult, do you eat candy all day long because you have the freedom to do so? I'm guessing not. It is no different for children who have the freedom to choose what to put in their bodies.
When a child has the true freedom to eat candy when they want, they find a balance with it, much like an adult would. It may be hard to believe, but it is true.
Our kids each have candy available to them whenever they want it, and because they know we trust them, and that they won't have it taken away, they are so balanced with their consumption. They might have a piece or two a day. There is no power over the candy. They do not view it any differently than they would any other food option.
Here is a picture that I took of Dakota's candy this morning. She has it in a bag in her room. She was sorting through it this morning when I became inspired to share this aspect of our lives.
Trust your kids. Know that they will make good choices for themselves. Know that freedom to choose changes everything.
5 comments:
I love this post. It's so obvious really that a child given the freedom to eat what they want is not going to eat sweets/chocolate for every meal any more than an adult would. It took me ages to figure out how simple it is but I trusted my son and like me he wants a variety of food including sweets sometimes.
Yup, great post, Dayna. I don't limit my dd, either, and she often goes into the fridge herself and gets stuff. It's so cute.
Great post! My daughter doesn't like candy. This totally amazes people. So, having no limits around candy is kid of a moot point. We have no limits on lots of things, one of them being TV. People are often surprised when she walks up and turns the TV off to go play. It's true, when you don't set a limit the thing isn't such a big deal.
Is there a certain age, to start with? We started free TV and Computer. But we didn't dare candy (because we are very "misbehaved" when it comes to that).
my 9yr old still has a majority of his Halloween candy stash in a treasure chest in his room ;) The other night I made a fire in our fire pit to roast marshmallows and commented that we didn't have any chocolate to make s'mores, and he ran and grabbed a couple of bars from his stash for us all to enjoy!!
Limits are just so....limiting!!
Peace & Abundance, Cid
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