Woman Wonders If She’s Wrong For Secretly Feeding Her Neighbor’s 13-Year-Old Daughter Who Is Always Hungry And ‘Under Fed’

This is weird but I really am racking my brain on how I could be a bad person in this situation/if it would be bad to continue feeding this kid. There’s a 13 year old kid next door and she is lovely and I mean lovely kid. The kind of kid that would make me proud to call my own but unfortunately her parents don’t feel the same.

“Nina’s” parents have weird hang ups around food. They are big on exercising and “nutrition” I put that in quotation marks cause their nutritional advice is bullshit. They are gym/health influencers and are regularly recording things for their social media accounts in their backyard/gym. But I digress, Nina and I have kind of gotten close over the past 3-ish years. She is friendly with my daughters but she usually comes over to hang out with me or to eat since she is always and I mean always hungry.

Her parents just aren’t feeding her enough and the food they do provide is simply not enough. So Nina comes over to my house to mainly eat but also shower(her parents don’t believe in washing regularly) and rest. Well just before Christmas Nina had her weigh in and she had according to them “dramatically gained weight” for the 2nd time( they are literally exaggerating the weight gain and are acting like it’s a horrific thing to gain weight ). They put Nina under a lot of pressure and she cracked,she told them that she would eat at my house.

Well Nina’s parents lost their shit and they came to give me a talking to. My husband had to calm them down and tell them I wouldn’t be feeding Nina anymore.

But I don’t think I should stop. If a kid is hungry shouldn’t they be fed? Shouldn’t that kid be allowed to just rest and not constantly be doing a million sports and exercises before they can just be allowed to unwind? Like the worst this kid is doing is watching a bit tv, eating and just resting when she should be having fun but this is fun to her. Not having to constantly perform and being able to eat a meal without it being meticulously weighted,plated,pictured/recorded and calorie counted.

Edit: I have contacted social services. They never did anything.

Answering questions- I am not feeding her junk but actual healthy meals like rice,vegetables,pasta,curry, grilled chicken,stews,fish,salads etc just regular lunches and dinners. She eats at my house up to 3 times a week(but sometimes less and sometimes more) and my daughters often bring her snacks when they spend time with her. There are no allergies or health related issues as to why they are restricting her food intake other then a fear of her being overweight.

Nina is about 5ft and her latest weigh in she was at 86lbs. So that means she gained about 6 or 8 lbs in past month. They weigh her every two weeks to once a month.

In regards to the bathing. Nina’s parents don’t believe in showering more then once a week (with occasional exceptions.

The first time Nina had a shower at my house was because she had her period and it lasted only 2 days and she wanted to shower but her dad said to wait until her washday. Nina talked to my daughter about how icky she felt and my daughter let her take a bath. I came home to my daughter doing laundry while Nina had a shower. So I did her laundry. She went home clean,with clean clothing and so she was able to hang out the next day without feeling embarrassed around the other kids.

Since then if her washday is too far apart she just comes over and showers.

2nd edit: Some of you have suggested I contact her school. Stupidly I didn’t realize that was an option.The school has a councillor and I will speak to them on Monday. And yes I actually have been unofficially documenting their behavior but I will get everything together this weekend and call cps again and will continue as some of you have said “You may need to squeaky wheel this shit”. Thanks

3rd and last:

I really think that some of you are wilfully trying to misunderstand the situation. I am not shoving food down Nina’s throat. It’s not normal for my kids to constantly be asking me to make extra food so they can sneak it to their friend.

I have spoken to Nina’s mother and she said that they had her on diets and other things because she was worried about Nina getting fat. It’s not normal or healthy to have regular weigh ins for kids and to then be upset if they aren’t hitting “perfect weight” is fucking madness. During this time I also started talking to my daughters about what was going on at Nina’s house since she wasn’t yet forthcoming. My girls said that her parents were weird about food and gave very small portions and that Nina had to ask permission to eat or drink or even open up new foods as well as the excessive exercising. This is when I started to worry and called cps. After my first call nothing happened and I called again and asked for information and of course they didn’t give me any.

Nina is always hungry,always tired and often looks very pale. So yes I fucking fed her when she came over and yes I let her come over to take a shower. It’s not normal for a kid to ask their friends to sneak/bring over food.’