My DD has been doing this for a few years now, and we are now to the point where she has basically taught her younger two brothers to do it. She is finally growing out of it, but being that her brothers are still at it. I have not dealt with the last of it yet. I am lucky on one aspect, when DD would lie, I could tell. She is very sensitive, if she is accused of doing something she didn't do, she will burst into tears. If she is accused of doing something and she did do it, well, she would just lie. She did most of her sneaking late at night or early in the morning, when DH and I would still be asleep. We finally bought Tot Lok, a magnetic locking system that you install on your cupboards and cabinets. It has a magnetic key that you use to open them. www.totsafe.com/proddetail.asp?prod=1502 They are very effective! Just remember where you put the key! We had gotten to the point where we were hiding it too! Luckily we owned our own fridge and installed a small pad lock on it. It was pretty bad! I had to even put one on the hall closet where we kept all the games! Not fun trying to clean up a half dozen games that are all mixed together!

We have moved into a new home about 8 months ago, and the kitchen has a door that locks. Granted the only one that sneaks into the kitchen is my youngest DS (5 now)! Although we now lock up the xbox and wii controlers in the kitchen, my middle DS (7) likes to get up really early just to play. We limit tv and video games and he doesn't like that much! We also have a pantry (not in the kitchen) that we had to keep locked. My kids like poptarts too, one of the most common things they would sneak into.

Good news! The kids were so used to the pantry being locked that they stopped trying and we haven't locked it in over two months! We do keep the door closed, so I think they just figure we locked it! They are still checking the kitchen door though.

Family and friends who came over to visit and saw that we had magnet locks, pad locks on closests and the fridge thought we were just lazy and that we weren't teaching our kids any rules. This really hurt, but after a while, I had to tell myself, that I was doing what I needed to do to keep my children safe and to keep my sanity! I am the one that has to live with the constant messes, not them. Putting a child in time out for something they did while I was sleeping was not effective. This worked for us!

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My daughter Grace will be 6 in 3 days.We started her treatment one year ago. In the beginning it was great. Finally it seemed like things were slipping in to place.Now, I feel like I may just lose my mind some days. She's always been sneaky but here lately she lies about everything. To top it off she has become increasingly destructive. If she isn't finding a pair of scissors I hid and cutting up her bedding, she's smearing toothpaste on the walls of her bedroom. She sneaks food....CONSTANTLY. I made the remark just last night to my husband about putting locks on the refrigrator and cabinets. I feel bad about it but like he said it's not that i'm denying her food, just not allowing her to sneak it behind our backs. We haven't done it yet but after reading here, it will be a project for the weekend. Here's to hoping for the best.

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My 7 year old is ALWAYS into the food. Always. I find breakfast bar wrappers on the floor and bowls of goldfish crackers in the bedroom and cups of milk all over the house. We have struck a deal as of late - just clean it up. She has lost so much weight since starting Ritalin that I simply cannot deny her food!! She'll eat for me at breakfast, never touches her lunch, snacks periodically throughtout the day, isn't hungry for dinner - but after 9pm she is ravenous. So I've given her free reign of the kitchen. Just as long as she cleans it up - takes her empty bowls to the sink, puts the wrappers into the garbage etc. I don't keep much candy around the house, so I never fear that she is just eating and eating jolly ranchers. But those pop tarts . . . !! She's getting better at cleaning up - hooray. I think it is important for me to not freak over food - there is so much pressure to be thin, lose weight, look like a super model - I don't need to be teaching my children that food is off limits.

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