To just feed her pizza?

I used to be really strict and my kids ate everything except one of my children. If she eats pizza and hardly eats anything else then it is good that it is a higher calorie food. You say she eats peanut butter sandwiches, carrots and yoghurt? Carry on with that.

Keep offering her different types of food as she may surprise you. My fussy eater hates fish but loves calamari and the prawns on sushi. The only other sushi she will eat is cucumber but she loves the nori sheets.

She was a bit fussy with vegetables when she was younger but loved mushrooms and Brussel sprouts.

She will have lentil soup but not beans or chickpeas.

She only likes plain pasta except for homemade spaghetti carbonara.

So what I’m trying to say is that the likes and dislikes don’t necessarily follow so it is good to try them with different things.

She will also eat curry if a friend’s mum makes it but not the one I make. She prefers ready made lasagne to mine but has recently started eating it (she’s 13).

Im also not convinced that it is all about the flavour and textures. I did sometimes use vegetarian meats and she got wind of it so she now checks my packaging.

Does she like fruit?

My ds has autism.

He would eat well when younger but ate less and less.

He makes me laugh because he's so serious about his rules around food. No wet and dry food on same plate. No hot and cold food on the same plate.

He will also eat roast dinners like he's been starved for a week 🤣 Oh - and that can be dosed in gravy and the wet food rule isn't applied!

Have you tried the plates which have sections to keep foods separate?

But I never made a fuss if he decided he couldn't tolerate a food. One day about your DDs age he suddenly hated sausages.

He hated them for 13 years until my dad was cooking them on a BBQ and he wanted one "because he loves sausages"

I was always told it's better to eat something than nothing.

Apart from his rules around what can and can't be on a plate he's now much better at eating foods and although the range is limited he eats all food groups and a variety. We just get around the foods issue by using as many bowls and plates as required (and he's 18 now 🤦🏼‍♀️🤣)

My son is diagnosed autistic and he eats a highly restrictive diet. I totally empathise it's so stressful.

My son eats sausages or the cheese and chorizo off a homemade tortilla pizza every day. Then fruit. That's it.

Its really hard to find feeding courses that are designed for neurodiverse kids.

I try not to stress and just keep offering safe foods. Try to have similar things to offer.

It's probably been mentioned but have you tried to bribe her?.
She must try something 3 times, 3 little taste and get computer time or something sweet?

It's annoying because she currently gets free school dinners so the cost is a pain but we ended up having to do this with our son too because school dinners were causing him so much stress.

Totally feel your pain, same here! Mine both qualify for free school meals but need lunchboxes :-)

My DD's only two protein sources are peanut butter (eaten from a metal teaspoon, don't offer it on a plastic spoon or you'll regret it) and sausage rolls. Peanut butter was obviously completely banned at nursery, but so was pork! They bent the rules on the sausage rolls for her though :-)

It's such a relief to read lots of posts on your thread from people who correctly understand the issue and say not to push it ... including from an EP and someone who works with kids who need peg feeding... Sometimes in the past on MN I've read "fussy eater" threads where it seems likely to me the DC is autistic, but my blood runs cold when I hear the poor parent subjected to stern opinions about how to cure it. It's great to read a clued-up thread :-)

Could work, depending on the reasons behind the restrictive diet… for me when I was little, though, I would've found that so upsetting because I'd have really wanted the reward but also known it was impossible for me to do the thing required. Lots of stress and upset and feeling hard-done-by Extra stress at dinnertime isn't great.

Like, "Look, little Suzie, look what I've got, a brand new Barbie for your collection with a special dress, the one you've been asking for, and you can have it if you solve these quadratic equations then stab yourself through the hand with a compass! I'll put her here just out of reach until you're done" — it's not gonna go well.

But like I say it depends on the reasons behind it.

I ate next to nothing starting around 2 1/2. I ate everything apparently as a baby and then gradually refused foods until there was a small list left. I was made to have school dinners and ate nothing most of the time which meant I was hungry. I gradually increased my food intake when the pressure was off at secondary when I had packed lunches and now I’m much better still on the fussy side though. It was as like as soon as the pressure was off and I wasn’t being forced or hungry, I tried different things. I’d check how much she is actually eating and if it’s not much send her with a packed lunch.

My niece is exactly the same (autism and ADHD). Food touching other food is a total no. She only likes certain things (but the list is getting longer as she gets older, now 12). I’d Focus on getting calories down her, try to expand the range one food at a time but don’t make it all a battle.

Sorry I haven't read the full thread - do you suspect autism/ ASD?

I have an autistic child who is like this - it is a serious issue - I totally understand the stress. yes, feed her what she wants - but it's absolutely vital you keep putting other food in front of her.

If you restrict what she sees on the table it will make things worse.

Don't force her to eat, don't get stressed in front of her, don't make a drama, don't beg plead or bribe - but do keep presenting a variety of foods - while ensuring there are some she eats.

I think your other child's autism could be something here.

I say this as I was the same when younger, my older sibling has ASD and was a picky eater and I got it from him.

I'm now totally fine with food (bar still not liking toppings on my pizza!) he is not, but it was definitely a learned behaviour from eating around him and mimicking his food aversions.

Sorry haven’t had time to read the whole thread but the Tesco own brand childrens pizzas (chilled) have hidden veg in the sauce and base I think. Just in case it helps 😊

My DD eats a quite restricted diet and has a horror of foods touching each other. I have loads of little bowls. The stuff she will eat is served up on a plate. Things I’d like her to try are in the little bowls. Sometimes she tries them, sometimes not.

I have also found that putting food out on the table in big serving bowls for everyone rather than plating it up is more useful at getting her to eat, as she can regulate how much food she has on her plate.

Good luck, OP. It’s emotionally hard work. Give her what she needs to be fed.

My daughter has always been extremely restricted in what she will eat. Nursing strikes from 8 weeks, weaning was a nightmare, dropping centiles. Things that helped:

• focusing on weight gain rather than nutrition.

• multivitamin and laxatives

• praising her for what she does eat rather than focusing on what she doesn't
• accepting she will have less nutritious/varied meals when away from home (eg she has pasta and tomato sauce every day at school, nothing else), and making sure she has her better safe foods when at home.

Oh, and seeing a counsellor really helped with the anxiety. It didn’t get her to immediately expand her repertoire, but it did help reduce stress levels around food and mealtimes.

someone asked upthread about multivitamins. We tried a lot of things, but eventually ended up with the haliborange liquid. It took a long time to get her to accept the flavour and not gag it back up (likewise the laxative powders as her food list doesn’t give her enough fibre) but we said that multivitamin and laxatives were non-negotiable and she couldn’t cope with a tablet or gummy so it was the only option. Getting her to tolerate them also helped when she had to have antibiotics or other medicines so it was worth the trauma.

My son was a terrible eater from round about when he started school. He went from eating really well to just a very small list of foods he would eat- mainly pasta with a shop bought sauce, pizza, nuggets, chips, sausage - that was about it! We went though everything to get him to try other foods - including tantrums . He would go all day without eating rather than eat the food I put in front of him. In the end we just generally stuck to giving him his “safe” foods but persevered with putting food on his plate I knew he wouldn’t eat. He still won’t touch vegetables age nearly 15 but I still put them on his plate every day! However he is eating so much better. He even ate a curry the other day - I never would’ve thought I’d see the day he ate curry! He’s healthy - BMI in normal range - he’s trying new foods now and seems to have hollow legs. There’s some good advice on here from mums who have been through the same.

Classic ASD my sons on the spectrum and just started a specialist provision school. Sounds like also ARFID to me. My son is 12 and like this. At the moment his had pasta and ketchup everyday for past 3 to 4 months unless mcdonalds. Before that it was mash potatoes for a few months which had followed pizza. You give her what ever she will eat. If that's pizza go for it. Anything is better than nothing.

I have a child like this he’s 4 and recently diagnosed adhd, for him it’s the textures and also the habit of always wanting the same thing for weeks at a time , the only thing he would eat for the last 3 months even with the support of camhs and a dietician was wheetabix , crackers and cheese tangerines, raisins or yoghurts. You have my sympathies it’s so hard and frustrating

My sons autistic, at that age I think he ate tinned meatballs , quavers, toast and bananas

He's much better now and has been for a few years (he's year 5) we kept him on school dinners, even though in the bigging he'd just ate the fruit and bread. Don't make food a battle, offer other things with the pizza

And whatever you do don't mess with it or add other things to the pizza sauce , if she's anything like my ds she will smell it before it even gets to her mouth 🤣

That's a great point @Ionacat. Thanks x

I was a very picky eater when I was younger. My mum talked with our doctor and he said that it was better that I ate what I liked then not eating at all. The important thing is not trying to force her or making it into a fight to try to get her to eat more. It will only make it worse. I had alot of pasta, meatballs and sausages. It was a very bland diet but it didn't harm me. I still have things I won't eat, but my diet evolved over time and I have a much more versatile diet now. Personally I would give her what she likes for now and then try some more things over time.

Looks like a massive improvement OP - what was the "magic ingredient" in the change so to speak?