All year long I do my best to limit my children’s candy intake. I practice being a loving mother and rarely buy candy. If my children come into good fortune and obtain candy, then they must eat it after dinner, and only one piece.
Then, comes that one holiday where children are showered with pounds and pounds of sugar.
I started off my parenting journey thinking I’d somehow keep my kids from getting candy. That was a joke, because what loving parents deprive children of excessive candy on Halloween? To make sure I stayed in control, I did my best the days following the dress-up holiday to limit one piece of candy a day. That worked for two years, because my munchkins clued in that there was plenty more where that came from. That began the incessant begging of candy.
“Mommy, can I have a piece of candy?”
“No, it’s not even eight o’clock in the morning.”
“WHHHHYYYY??? PLEASE ??? JUST OOOOOOONNNE???”
Thus are our days following Halloween.
Except, this year, I’ve gotten smarter than my third grader. I realized my children fiend candy, like a drug addict craves his next hit. My kids will do anything for their next hit. So, I’ve decided to use this currency to get what I want from my children. I’m capitalizing on my children’s weak spot to create order in our household. I figure the candy will run out about the time I can start using Santa as currency.
Now, my children don’t fight me with eating their dinner. They’ll eat whatever I place in front of them, just to be able to get their little chewy nugget. I take away my kids’ coveted sugar high when they misbehave or hit a sibling. I throw a piece of candy away if I find trash on the floor, and I offer extra pieces for good behavior.
I was shocked when I realized it works. I found an M&M’s packaged ripped into shreds on Hunter’s floor. When I asked her what that meant, she said a piece of candy goes in the trash. So with much fanfare, I took one of her Butterfingers (because who really eats Butterfingers?), and tossed it in the trash. Hunter wailed in her bed for ten minutes, as she morned the loss of her Butterfinger. I haven’t seen trash on the floor since.
Then, once the house is quiet, I eat a piece (or two). You know, as a reward for all the extra whining I have to endure.
Tell me how you manage or enable your children’s candy addiction? Share your story here or on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter using #GoodEnoughMom. Be sure to stop by and say hi!
Next week’s prompt is
I forgive you. Love, Me
Forgiving yourself for all the mistakes you make is one of the hardest things you will do. To let yourself mess up and then move on, without punishing yourself is hard, but to truly understand freedom to love and be loved, one must practice forgiving yourself for messing up, for being imperfect, and for falling short.
Haha, this post made me laugh! And gave me some great ideas! My 3 year old has been begging for candy every day! Before breakfast! I can so relate (and I too usually sneak a couple prices while my kids are napping 😉
Glad to know my kids aren’t the only ones! 🙂
You are a far better mom than me. I just leave it out and when it is gone, it is gone! I eat most of it anyway….Bad Mommy! However, I do like your ideas, I just might go home and put the candy dish away and make them earn their treats. Thanks for sharing your ideas!
I like your idea, too, because then the agony of begging for candy all. day. long. never happens. lol
We use candy as currency too. We have a candy bowl in our house where we stock pile all the stuff Reagan gets. There have been 2 occasions in the last 3 years where we actually have dumped the entire bowl in the trash due to misbehavior. Only 2 because it really works with our daughter. I don’t think she really believed we would do it the first time but we did. We also started juicing a year ago and to get her to drink the beet/kale juice was no easy task so we gave her a laffy taffy chaser after the juice but after the first few months she drank the juice without the candy chaser and still does most days with little complaining. I am not as good at limiting the candy intake as you are though. I know she eats too much some days:)
The whole bowl!! I bet it did work! You are my hero.