to hate having to decide what the bin eats every day

[3kidsinsane]

I have 3 kids and it drives me nuts having to come up with things to eat that suit everyone for dinner every night. Guaranteed somebody doesn't like it. I feel that the bin is the best fed in our house. DD2 has texture, colour and shape issues with food (if they are "wrong" then it's in the bin) If I get it wrong once then that's the food off the safe list because she doesn't trust it anymore. The other 2 aren't too bad but have phases. I can't remember the last time we had something like a roast dinner where everyone was happy

Our DS has a sensory processing disorder! We went through the baige phase as we called it. I would make him chicken nuggets, sausage, pizza, fish fingers on rotation then put a side bowl of what we are having near him with a small amount he could try if he wanted. He now eats most things but still doesn't like sauces very much for example he will eat a full roast Sunday dinner but the gravy has to be on a side dish for dipping, bolognaise has to be dished up with a slotted spoon so he gets mince with pasta and very little sauce, same with korma.

We went for an Indian meal the other day he had half a tandoori chicken, nan bread, chicken out of my tikka and lamb out the other half's but it all had to be meat coated in sauce not a proper curry.

Would this be an option for you? Me and DH have the left over the next day for lunch to save wasting food.

[quote Unsure33]@CeceJoyce

I don’t think people are denying the food issues but we should be asking ourselves why surely ?

What would have happened during rationing ?

And if it was not a problem then , why is it a problem now ?[/quote]
Taking your comment in good faith, I have sometimes wondered what would happen to my DS in the past.
Before formula, he would have died after birth, he wouldn't latch.

After, he may have survived if safe foods were readily available. If rationing was mostly non safe foods, he would simply die of malnutrition. Same if we had to become refugees or something.

So, there you go. Kids like mine would just die.

@OkOkWhatsNext

Just here for solidarity. My three don’t have actual food issues, just general annoying fussiness and never liking the same thing. It’s all very well suggesting either just give them the food and if they eat it, they eat it, if not they go hungry…or even to say try x,y,z, try different toppings, serving it in this way….but when you spend hours of your extremely busy life thinking about meals, buying food, making it..and then no matter what the meal is there’s always one crying because they don’t like it, or declaring it disgusting, or spending an hour over one plate because they are slowly forcing it down one grain of rice at a time, hoping you’ll say oh just give up then…it’s very disheartening and makes it feel like all that effort was wasted and yes, it just ends up in the bin. It’s why I dont enjoy eating meals with the kids mostly because I find the whole process stressful, there’s never a meal that everyone just enjoys!

I could have written this myself and amongst people I know IRL it's not that unusual to cook 2-3 different meals every night!! Not saying it's right but it does happen. We rarely eat the same meal as a family of 5 because there is literally nothing all 5 like other than maybe pizza and tbh I don't like pizza that much.

Tonight I will cook salmon for DS1 and DS2 - but one will have it in a wrap and the other with pasta - and noodles with Quorn mince and a bit of a sauce for DD who is vegetarian. Then DH and I will have something completely different.

It's a nightmare! They just all like and hate different things.

@BonnesVacances

DD has AFRID and we were recommended this book by the health professionals we've worked with as it's the one they use. Some good practical things in there you can do. It's not going to go away by itself unfortunately and they don't "grow out of it".

Food Refusal and Avoidant Eating in Children, including those with Autism Spectrum Conditions: A Practical Guide for Parents and Professionals
[[https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1785923188/ref=cm]]swwemrrmtdpp2ZSAAHGX4YY0WTH1G2C0?encoding=UTF8&psc=1

Thanks for the suggestion. I have just ordered. :)

@Anjelika And who's doing all the cooking? I empathise but if I'd tried any of this when I was a child my mother would have pointed to the fruit bowl or said eat what you can of the dinner she'd made. The thought of people making different dishes every night to cater to everyone is remarkable!

I have a child with additional needs, although not around food, and I totally get how once something upsets then it becomes a major issue, and can take months or years to undo their fixation on it - it can be exhausting. Its absolutely nothing like a NT child being a bit fussy, you can't just chivvy them through it. Just a thought (& apologies if it's already been mentioned upthread), but could you separately bulk cook and freeze portions of meals that suit each child (or yourself/OH) then you can just reheat things when needed to take some of the strain off trying to make different things for everyone?

how do you get into them deciding lasagna has to be a perfect square?

Do you are saying its the OPS fault by the sounds of it.

I have one of these!

Totally feel your pain. We have a minimum of 2 food options as DD2 won't eat 99% of the food options. Plus we are vegetarian.

Can't go out to eat unless there is pizza/pasta option.

Endless arguments between me and DH as we have different approaches to it. I just need to get food into her as she's thin as a rake. DH has less tolerance and more of 'eat it or stay hungry' position. If she doesn't eat she won't sleep which is only worse for her (and my) health. It's endless..

I'm not sure if this will help or not.

My DS1 is a young adult now, he has no diagnosis but we were told that we could pursue one but it would be borderline. He was similarly difficult to feed, from babyhood onwards really.

The good news is that his diet is much more varied as an adult but the foods (mainly vegetables, certain things touching, anything "damaged") that he was particularly averse to are still an issue but we've managed to move on with many others and many "new" foods and some things are now fine to touch.

For example, he wouldn't eat chips or potatoes. He would eat crisps, so we moved onto very crispy thin chips or slices of potato, to gradually thicker chips, then very small roast potatoes to increasingly more potatoey chips and cooked potatoes and now he'll even eat mash and potatoes in virtually any form. Same for chicken nuggets up to chicken which he'll eat in all forms including on the bone and also just tried random stuff, most of which has worked but some that hasn't. He wont eat veg but will eat pretty much all fruit and he'll have beans, mushrooms, onions and cooked tomatoes as long as they don't have lumps and he'll have carrot in bolognaise if it's grated and he does know it's there, so not hidden.

His turning point was when we stopped tricking him into eating as a toddler and he went a couple of days with just milk and snacks (like cheese strings) and when his back was turned, he's gotten a spoon and tucked into DHs beans on toast which had added tabasco, soy sauce and HP sauce. He just prefers spicy or strong flavoured food. So, for a while we had a child that wouldn't eat chips but would sit and eat a tin of peppered mackerel!

I guess what we did was find flavours he liked and added them to different foods e.g. like teriaki, so now have that with salmon as well as chicken and so on. Except he still won't touch the vegetables no matter what we smother them in!

@VladmirsPoutine the cooking is shared equally between me and DH. I try to make things as easy as possible so for example tuna pasta for 2 of the DCs and pasta with the sauce but no tuna for vege DD.

@3kidsinsane

I have 3 kids and it drives me nuts having to come up with things to eat that suit everyone for dinner every night. Guaranteed somebody doesn't like it. I feel that the bin is the best fed in our house. DD2 has texture, colour and shape issues with food (if they are "wrong" then it's in the bin) If I get it wrong once then that's the food off the safe list because she doesn't trust it anymore. The other 2 aren't too bad but have phases. I can't remember the last time we had something like a roast dinner where everyone was happy

Serve them a meal, they either eat it or they don't, that is their choice.

I have ARFID and I’ve have been known to go a week without eating food because there genuinely wasn’t anything I could eat

I physically cannot bring myself to eat food I can’t eat. It’s all very well for people to say “they either eat it or not. They will eat when they are hungry”. No we won’t. We would rather not eat at all and maybe get ill than have to eat food

I wonder how many people living below the poverty line experience these issues with food?

Solid Starts Instagram account has completely changed our lives, not to be dramatic. My daughter refused literally everything, through their advice she is eating all sorts. She ate bamboo and bean sprouts last night.

The basic advice is that at every meal you serve two safe foods and then other foods they don’t like (ours were chicken, peas, sweet corn and pasta usually). They get to pick how much they eat but you pick what is on the menu. They don’t get food outside of set meal times and snack times. It can take up to twenty times for a child to like a food so you just keep offering. It’s genuinely reversed my daughters picky eating. Up until a few weeks ago she’d never eaten a cake before because it wasn’t a food she would try. Last week she ate a whole cupcake for the first time.

If you go on the Instagram theirs are two reels called Picky Eating and Our Story, definitely worth a look. They are all qualified health professionals.

I can empathise. I have one like this. He has coeliac disease so associates new food with serious risk of pain. He will happily starve himself and in fact has - yes, I have had a diagnosed malnourished child as a result so to those posters saying “eat it or go hungry” you have literally no idea and do come across as very ignorant.

Things like coeliac disease are worth looking into too.

[quote Unsure33]@CeceJoyce

I don’t think people are denying the food issues but we should be asking ourselves why surely ?

What would have happened during rationing ?

And if it was not a problem then , why is it a problem now ?[/quote]
Because of where I'm from I lived through rationing. I didn't eat much (issues with recognising hunger ) even as a baby. Once I went into solids I was fussy as fuck. Skipped many meals, but like I said I didn't feel hungry so that wasn't an issue. Once I was 8/9 I was able to cook basic safe foods for myself. Pasta,eggs,chips or bread with whatever . As long as we had potatoes in I was ok.

This is just like my family, I also have DD2 age 10 with a severely restricted diet, DS is heading that way after eating really well as a baby and DD1 eats most things but there's a few of DD2/DS's favourites that she won't eat. Also I have IBS and have to avoid gluten and various other things. It is exhausting. DH does cook sometimes, which helps. As does pizza Fridays and buying the same 4 frozen foods for DD2 every week which she eats on repeat (chicken burgers, chicken nuggets, toad in the hole, battered fish). DS doesn't yet have a safe list though so one day he'll eat something and the next week it will be rejected. Yesterday he only ate baked beans for dinner. Sometimes he eats nothing and then has some cereal before bed. He's not underweight but I just worry about nutrition (and the amount of food that goes in the bin).

2 things OP - try to get her checked for ARFID and (from professional advice gathered related to ARFID) never, ever refer to foods as "safe" it implies that there are unsafe foods and is likely to make the situation worse

@Joystir59

How can a human being have such issues with food to the point of starving? Surely if they were just presented with simple foods placed on the table to choose from at each meal time they'd choose something and eat it rather than starve to death? I mean, how do you get into them deciding lasagna has to be a perfect square?

Because westernised children are pandered to the point of ridiculousness. Only in countries where children are this spoilt do you get parents insisting that little Johnny couldn’t possibly eat anything other than yellow chicken nuggets with a tail, because he’d simply starve himself until he collapsed with hunger 🙄 I lived on the outskirts of udon Thani in Thailand for 14 years. It’s hardly a third world country, there’s a good education/healthcare and standard of living. But the whole attitude to children there is like living on another planet. A regular (very nutritious) breakfast for the kids would be whatever insects they found fried in a net that was placed under a spot light that was left on through the night (obviously for that reason). The rest of the meals pretty much consisted on stir fried veg and whatever meat happened to be available at the time, mostly rat during monsoon season. I never came across a single child that whinged and emotionally blackmailed their parents into providing other food, which they then still didn’t eat! Every child there just eats without complaint, it’s food, not poison. I find it so hard to bite my tongue on threads like these where parents are berated for making their children choke down the majority of normal, every day foods because it’s apparently cruel 🙄

Speaking up in defence of picky kids. I wouldn't have eaten any of that as a child but as an adult, I will eat a much broader variety of things. I've just had fricassee of chicken in tarragon sauce for lunch, I wouldn't have touched that as a child. Definitely get a multivitamin in them if you can. Remember that their determination is stronger than yours, because you've got all of adult life to think about. I cook plain food at home, serve up for my child, add more sauce or gravy for me and leave my husband to add as much extra seasoning to his as he wishes. You'll find a way, but might need to adapt.

Just wanted to say thanks for this thread there has been some seriously good advice and interesting posts. My DD is 7 and is a horrendous eater - last night she had plain pasta and Yorkshire puddings for tea. A few of her foods that were I suppose her 'safe' foods she's recently decided she couldn't eat anymore. She's losing weight and I have a paediatricians appt for her on Thursday. It's so so hard

You have created this ridiculous situation.you cook a healthy meal and if someone does not like it,there is bread and butter in the kitchen.dont make a big deal of your evening meals.you started this and you can end this.I call it western civilation neurosis!!

@Winniemarysarah what happens with children with autism etc in that community, and I am not just talking about food issues?

@Winniemarysarah

Do you believe depression doesn’t exist in the western world? Cos you know people have it so much harder elsewhere.

No?

Eating disorders such as ARFID is a medical problem not just pickiness

Because westernised children are pandered to the point of ridiculousness. Only in countries where children are this spoilt do you get parents insisting that little Johnny couldn’t possibly eat anything other than yellow chicken nuggets with a tail, because he’d simply starve himself until he collapsed with hunger 🙄 I lived on the outskirts of udon Thani in Thailand for 14 years. It’s hardly a third world country, there’s a good education/healthcare and standard of living. But the whole attitude to children there is like living on another planet. A regular (very nutritious) breakfast for the kids would be whatever insects they found fried in a net that was placed under a spot light that was left on through the night (obviously for that reason). The rest of the meals pretty much consisted on stir fried veg and whatever meat happened to be available at the time, mostly rat during monsoon season. I never came across a single child that whinged and emotionally blackmailed their parents into providing other food, which they then still didn’t eat! Every child there just eats without complaint, it’s food, not poison. I find it so hard to bite my tongue on threads like these where parents are berated for making their children choke down the majority of normal, every day foods because it’s apparently cruel 🙄

This, this, this.
The very very rare situation of a child so severely autistic he would starve himself is likely not the reason for all thos fussy children threads. I would get rid of all the processed crap (chicken nuggets etc) and cook decent food. If they dont like it they can go to bed hungry. Not having dinner for 6 days is not starving yourself 🙄