summer camp

Jason is now officially in "summer camp" at his daycare. We spent almost 2 hours at a meeting about this a few weeks ago. The entire summer the kids will be going on field trips 3-4 times per week. They will be going to parks, to the zoo, to the community center to swim, to Paul Brown stadium... a LOT of places. The rules are very strict (understandibly in most cases). They have put a lot of measures in place to assure the safety of the kids.

On Tuesday, the very first trip was a trip to Dairy Queen for ice cream. Jason, however, did not eat his lunch that day, so they did not let him go. Can you imagine...? Being 6 years old and being left behind on a field trip? Apparently, the teachers told him that he had to eat or he couldn't go. This got Jason upset and he started crying and therefore refused to eat. The director, Elizabeth, made the final call that he could not go to Dairy Queen.

While it is very frustrating that Jason is a very picky eater, I absolutely do not think it is fair that he not be able to go on trips if he doesn't eat. I called Elizabeth and she explained that its very hot in the summer and for safety reasons, they can't take kids on trips on an empty stomach because they will be playing hard and eventually get sick because they are so hungry. HOWEVER.. this was a trip to Dairy Queen - they were going to EAT. Elizabeth said the rules are the same for all the trips. They can't change them depending on where they are going.

This is very concerning to me because with the menu they have, Jason will likely not eat most of the meals. Elizabeth was trying to accomodate by talking about us bringing in alternate foods however the only food Jason eats that doesn't have to be cooked up is peanut butter and jelly and he can't bring peanut butter to the school because of allergies. She said she would try to find things that they might be able to make for him. Regardless, I did NOT want the quality of Jason's entire summer to be dependent on what he eats for lunch. This will make his picky eating habits even worse. Just this morning he mentioned how excited he was to go on the trip today because he knew he could go because it was before lunch. Nope.. it was not going to be this way.

I contacted the Ohio Dept of Job and Family Services and learned that punishing children for failure to eat is against the license of Childtime. I did not file a report, but I was going to if Elizabeth was not receptive to this information. I also contacted the corporate office of Childtime because I wanted to let them know that this rule they had was illegal but they informed me that this was NOT their rule and that the individual centers put a lot of their own rules in place. They were going to contact Elizabeth's boss.

I talked to Elizabeth about this this morning and she looked up the license regulations and told me I was RIGHT. She said they would cease and desist this practice and apologize to Jason. Also, they will take him to Dairy Queen twice, the next time they go, because they will be going in shifts.

I am so glad I did this. Dr. Evans has told us many times that food battles are always losing battles and to not be negative or punish over food issues or Jason will have a negative and unhealthy relationship with food. Jason will now never have to panic every time lunch comes wondering if he will like it or not and then get all upset if he doesn't like the food knowing he can't go on any of the cool trips. How awful would that be for him??

Yep... I got this kids back. And proudly so! :)