Am I storing up problems by letting him eat whatever he wants?

[foggytea]

Hi. First post and already regretting how exposed this feels, but here goes.

I have a DS who turned 4 in November. He’s my youngest. I also have two older children and they were never like this with food, which is why I’m questioning myself so much.

Some days he eats constantly and asks for food non stop. Other days he barely eats anything at all and refuses most of what I offer. On the days he wants specific things, I usually just give in and give him exactly what he’s asked for. I know how that sounds written down.

He’s always been very strong willed. If he wants something and doesn’t get it, he has full on meltdowns. Crying, shouting, throwing himself on the floor, screaming for the food he’s asked for. If I try to redirect or offer something else, he will flat out refuse to eat anything at all. He will happily go hungry rather than eat something he hasn’t chosen.

When he was a baby he had breathing issues and was on nebulisers on and off until he was about 3. He’s fine now, but I think food became the one area he had some say in very early on, and I’ve never really reset that dynamic.

He refuses all vegetables. I mean all of them. Won’t touch them. If they’re on his plate he pushes them off or says yuck and won’t eat anything else on the plate either. Fruit is hit and miss. He’ll eat grapes sometimes, maybe banana, but most fruit gets refused. If I offer him food instead of him asking for it, he usually says no and then later has a meltdown because he’s hungry but still won’t accept what’s on offer.

He’s not potty trained yet and yes I know at 4 that’s late, we are trying.

He is on the chubby side. Solid, chunky, whatever word fits. Not enormous, but definitely bigger than my older two were at this age.

I wrote down what he’s eaten the last few days and it looks dreadful. But it’s also realistic.

Food log:

Monday:
Breakfast: large bowl of chocolate hoops with full fat milk. Offered porridge first which he refused.
Mid morning: bottle of warm milk
Snack: pack of pom bears
Lunch: offered chicken and veg wraps, refused completely. Ended up with white bread cheese sandwich with butter and a yoghurt tube
Snack: two chocolate digestive biscuits after asking repeatedly
Dinner: fish fingers x3, oven chips. Beans were on the plate but untouched.
After bath: bottle of milk and a chocolate mousse

Tuesday:
Breakfast: refused cereal and porridge. Eventually had two slices of white toast with Nutella
Snack: apple slices offered, ate a couple then refused the rest
Lunch: offered pasta with hidden veg, refused. Had chicken nuggets x4 and smiley faces
Snack: small bag of ready salted Walkers
Dinner: offered bolognese, refused. Had plain pasta with a bit of butter, a few mouthfuls only
Later: meltdown because he was hungry but refused sandwiches and fruit. Eventually had one slice of toast with butter
Before bed: bottle of milk

Wednesday:
Breakfast: bowl of honey cornflakes with milk
Snack: strawberry yoghurt
Lunch: ham sandwich, cheese string. Cucumber offered and refused
Snack: small chocolate bar
Dinner: sausage and mash. Carrots offered, untouched
Pudding: vanilla ice cream
Later: bottle of milk while watching TV

Thursday:
Breakfast: refused breakfast
Mid morning: bottle of milk
Snack: two rich tea biscuits
Lunch: nuggets again (I know), handful of grapes which he did eat after initially saying no
Snack: pack of pom bears
Dinner: frozen pepperoni pizza, ate two slices. Salad offered and ignored
Later: asked for cereal so had a small bowl of chocolate cereal

Today so far:
Breakfast: one slice of toast with butter
Snack: yoghurt pouch
Lunch: offered jacket potato with cheese and sweetcorn, refused. Ended up with half a ham sandwich
Snack: small bag of cheese and onion Walkers after a meltdown because I said no at first

Seeing it written down makes me feel awful. It’s beige, processed, sugary, and very much driven by what he demands rather than what I offer. I do offer other foods first most of the time, but he just refuses and then escalates until I give in or he eats nothing.

He’s very active, always running about, but he is still chubbier than his peers. I don’t want to create food issues or make him feel controlled, but I also feel like I’ve lost control completely and I’m parenting from fear of a meltdown.

Am I being unreasonable to let this continue? Do I need to ride out the meltdowns and stop giving in even if he refuses to eat?

Please be honest but not cruel. This is my first thread and I’m already bracing myself

Oh annabel karmel chicken and apple balls! You don t taste the apple - but they are tasty, and healthier and beige lol. (I always cooke sours in the oven)

I have never had junk food in the house at all so its never been an issue. Why would anyone buy chocolate hoops? When DS was small the only things in the fridge were a block of cheese, proper butter, milk and ingredients for cooking.
There were no crisps, no sugary cereal, no chocolates, no biscuits, nothing. There was a fruit bowl.
Also why is he still drinking out of bottles? He is 4 years old.
Once you start having junk in the house and they get used to it its already too late.

Why is he on bottles at 4yo? That’s filling him up.
also he is fussy but learnt to control you.
let him tantrum, let him go hungry and he will learn that he eats real food or go hungry.

Sorry OP, that sounds really hard. I think food issues can be such a tricky one to solve because you want to strike a balance between giving them healthy options and not giving them a complex about food.

I also imagine his early medical difficulties meant that stressing about healthy food was far from a priority, and that's totally understandable.

I would speak to your GP or HV for help in the first instance, but I must admit I find the NHS less than stellar on dietary issues. They may be able to offer some help however.

I think if I were you I would try a slow and steady approach to introducing changes. Perhaps to begin with make no changes to meals, but only offer fruit or veg based snacks. That way it's low stakes if he refuses to eat because he'll be fine if he misses a snack. Hold firm through tantrums - at the moment he does them because he knows they work, and he may hold out with trying them for a long time, but if you don't give in no matter how furious he is, he will eventually drop the tactic. Endless patience is needed! It's very hard - make sure you're looking after yourself too.

You can then start making gradual changes to meals too. Put a vegetable on his plate every single day, not touching anything on the plate, and not telling him he has to eat it. Just acclimatise him to it being there. If he refuses other food just reiterate he only has to eat what he wants from his plate, but that there is nothing else. Make sure there is at least one safe food on every plate too. I thought this advice was mad when I first read it but I tried it with my picky son and he now eats peppers, carrots and cucumbers because of it.

Finally, I would try and find recipes which are healthier versions of things he likes. If he likes custard try the low fat kind and see if you can add a tiny bit of banana, gradually increasing the amount. Here is a recipe for chocolate mousse made with avocado which you might manage to get him to eat: https://www.theguardian.com/food/2025/jan/04/save-overripe-avocado-turn-into-chocolate-mousse-recipe-zero-waste-cooking-tom-hunt
If he likes potato croquettes see if he'll eat a homemade kind with extra veggies and less salt.

I would go cold turkey on the bottles of milk, because bottles can be very damaging to the teeth and he may just be filling up on those. Give him milk with one or two meals in a cup, but not outside meal times. You can switch to semi skimmed milk too at four, if you'd like a way to reduce his overall calorie consumption.

Best of luck with it all OP.

You could also make your own pizza? You can chop veg small or blend to add to the sauce?
also savoury veg muffins - little muffins with veg and cheese added - you could add veg that you can grate so you don’t really notice it when eating - grate carrot and courgette for example and grated cheese.
home made fish fingers too.
also when we made breadcrumbs for making our own nuggets etc maybe used seeded bread, or oatmeal bread etc.
anyway will share if I can think of more but these were all beige foods our DC liked while still being fussy and were better options that we felt satisfied his diet was more varied, less artificial and less sugar etc.

Can’t really advise as DD stopped eating at 2, and when she restarted had and still has a crap diet. But…
I would cut the bottles. There is no need. Offer a glass/cup of milk if need be. Cut the sweet snacks, again, no actual need.

Try and cook some of the processed versions yourself if you can, and build on the stuff he already eats. This will take a long time.
Try a varied array of fruit. Some with veg, put them on his plate (not touching) , if he eats/tries them great, if not , he doesn’t. DD still abhors most veg, but they’re there.

There’s a lot of chocolate and sweet stuff here.

change up the cereal and stop with the chocolate hoops and honey nut cornflakes. Get plain cornflakes and you can always let him squirt some runny honey on them (which he’ll love doing) and you don’t have the added artificial sugars.

With yogurts try and use plain Greek yoghurt and add in your own bits instead of buying flavoured yoghurts.

Stop giving him pudding when he hasn’t eaten his dinner.

Change your bread from white to at least a 50/50 loaf and then try to get onto brown.

pre chop carrot, pepper, cucumber, celery sticks and keep them in the fridge, if veg and fruit are pre cut it makes them more appealing to children. Try keeping a small plate on view at all times and he may start wondering over to the table to take one. This sort of stuff is great with cut up brown pitta sticks and hummus.

Gettinf kids involved in food is key. Try making your own pizzas with plain bases, pittas or wrap. Add tomato paste mixed with water to make it smoother or use blitzed canned tomatoes and then add your own toppings.

But a tub of nutritional yeast which is found in all supermarkets and add that to as many dishes as you can.

Oh this reminds me I have over ripe avocado and just said to DH last night I heard we can make chocolate dessert with it and would need to find a recipe so thanks for this!

I was advised a couple of things.

I used to put out bowls of cut up ‘healthier’ things “to be going on with”” ie while they were waiting for something beige to appear. It’s surprising how long it can take to rustle up toast if you want to. Often by then, my Dc had managed to consume some veg/fruit.

I stopped thinking in terms of meals. but instead thought of protein, veg/fruit and carbs. Mealtimes were more of a buffet spread (small assorted bowls).

But my two main tips are to actually put the food in front of him, instead of asking what he wants, but don’t make a big deal out of him eating it.

I suppose it’s on the same basis as an adult getting grapes out instead of crisps - and once you start, you realise that you are actually really enjoying the grapes.

Get rid of the addictive sugary and salty processed foods. If they're not in the house, you can't cave in when he has a meltdown. His taste buds will start to enjoy 'real' food once they forget the sugar and salt overload.
Make sure any snacks are nutritious - cheese cubes with apple or raisins, cherry tomatoes, tuna mayo with cucumber sticks. He might leave the apple/tomatoes/cucumber - but he might not. Small wins are good.
You can disguise veg in sauces - carrots in Bolognese and casseroles, cauli in bechamel sauce, etc.

My eldest dd had a poor appetite and was very dainty. I let her appetite lead me and there were fewer snack/processed foods available. Some days she would literally eat half a slice of toast but then she would have a week of eating more than me - vegetables and all.
She eats very healthily now as an adult and is in great shape.
I do think the sugar/dopamine hits affect behaviour- not in a good way.
I would lean towards watching ‘food education’ videos (YouTube) and reading books.
Remove the processed foods as much as possible and sugary snacks entirely. Don’t be afraid if he misses meals.
The sugar hangover following a sugar hit can make your ds feel dreadful but he won’t have the understanding to know why this is. He will want to feel better and a sugar hit is a quick fix for him.

You need to stop buying crap and feeding him crap!
he’s obviously not going to make sensible decisions about food.
he knows if he kicks off he gets chocolate cereal.

Sorry @foggytea ^ this.

why are you offering those sugar laden cereals? Why are there even crisps and chocolate biscuits in the house? Look at the food log as if it’s for someone else and be honest.

he’s craving sugar because he’s pumped full of it, and if it’s not pure sugar, it’s pointless carbs and fat.

i agree that there appears to be an underlying issue here too that merits investigation, but you need to get his diet under control. If he gets upset, let him. Some of this may be SEN, but some of it definitely is that you’re letting him get whatever he wants

I’m an adult. 3 fish fingers is plenty for me, it’s too much for a child.

There are lots of gentle ways of getting rid of bottles.
You can start watering them down, with either water or by moving to semi then skimmed milk.
Or reduce them by an Oz a week.
He will feel less satisfied by them so maybe offer apple slices with them.
I know many other posters will tell you to go cold turkey but you don’t sound like you are in the right headspace to be tough with him.

Never ceases to amaze me that young children are even aware of the existence of dog shit beige UPF foodstuffs as well as crisps and chocolate.
That it would even have crossed my kids minds that there was an alternative to vegetables, fruit, meat, fish, rice, pasta, pulses etc on a day to day basis baffles me.
Why do parents buy and introduce this crap and at such a young age and then wonder why the kids won’t eat real food.
You reap what you sow.
Im trying to imagine what my ex PILs from Spain and dSIL from the Caribbean and my Indian friends would make of that diet plan.
maybe it’s a cultural thing but it baffles me.

Given that you are having potty training issues and meltdowns as well as food issues, I would suggest getting in touch with the Health Visitor service for professional advice.

There is a possibility that you've got some wider developmental/neurodiversity issues going on. If you do, then some of the suggestions on this thread, like hiding veg in recipes and replacing all the sugary snacks with grapes and carrot sticks, are pretty unlikely to work and may make things worse. You risk tipping him into full on food refusal without some proper support.

I do agree with pp though that you need to work on getting rid of all those bottles of milk. They will be making him feel full.

You have my sympathy as it’s so stressful and makes you feel like such a failure as a parent. My DD was a difficult eater at that age, and the best advice I got from here was to not let meals be a battleground, though I found it hard to follow at times. I’d always says that I’d never be one of those mums who cooked separate meals but there I was preparing a plate of beige oven food while we had something ‘exotic’ like a stir fry 🙄

I eventually learned to let things go and make life easier for myself. For example, DD went though phases of only wanting sandwiches at lunch, so rather than offering other things, having a battle, then agreeing to a sandwich, I’d just start with a sandwich and a choice of fillings. If your DS only eats sandwiches for lunch as your daily menu suggests, don’t add extra stress there. We also had more processed food than I liked. DD is slender so I was always concerned about getting calories into her, and she takes a multivitamin too.

DD has gradually grown out of her fussy eating and will eat most things now at age 10. We just kept offering what we were having and she started saying yes. I honestly never felt we’d get to this stage!

Edit: if there are wider issues as other people have suggested, these suggestions might not be helpful at all - this is just what worked for us.

I agree. A four year old shouldn’t even be aware that crap non-food exists.

Other than the food issues, meltdowns/ tantrums and delayed potty training, have you noticed any other developmental delays, op? What's speech like, for example?

This was exactly my thought. Plus no potty training? Multiple bottles at 4!?!?

OP you are the parent and the reason you are in this place is because you are completely giving in to a child because it’s easier rather than putting clear boundaries in place for his benefit.

No bottles
No nutella
No sugary cereals
No crisps
No chocolate bars
No white bread
No chocolate digestives
No chocolate mousse

He’s throwing tantrums because if he does you will give in. It’s a learned behaviour to get what he wants. And it works so why wouldnt he do it?

Use the new year as a reset. Explain healthy eating and don’t give in. By not having those things in the house it helps too.

Completely true.
Teens are a nightmare for sourcing and buying crap once they are getting pocket money/part time jobs but small children are totally within their parents control food wise.
Its even offering rubbish to a little one that baffles me
Why would you feed a child smiley faces and processed nuggets rather than than an actual boiled /roasted/mashed potato and some real meat or fish ? mind blowing 🤯

A 4 year old should not even know any of those things exist

Well in my case , it was because DD would not eat anything. At all. We had to reintroduce frikking toast ! So we kept buying anything and everything until we actually found something she ate. She was about 3 and a half when she “accepted” pancakes and we were already more than a year in.

Bottles at 4? I'd stop that