The incredibly fussy eaters thread

[boschy]

Following on from the thread on AIBU, this is the place for those with incredibly fussy/food phobic kids! If you are fed up with the "eat what they're given or let them starve" brigade, this is the place for you.

(If you ARE one of the 'eat or starve' brigade, please look away now - this thread is not for you, unless of course you've just had the Damascene conversion having discovered that your child is not the great eater you always thought he/she would be, down to your incredible parenting skills and totally relaxed attitude to food.)

My fussy eater is DD1, now 15. All was fine til she hit 12 months - easy to wean, I Annabel-Karmel-ed frantically etc etc.

But overnight she just. stopped. eating. And when she started again she knew exactly what she would and wouldn't eat. We had the tears and tantrums (from me) til I realised it was going nowhere. So 14 years later, here we are.

Her current repertoire is, in no particular order: macaroni cheese (no crispy top). garlic bread. breaded chicken products. chips. pizza with tomato sauce, no cheese. cold chicken (from a packet, not off the roast). spaghetti hoops in tomato sauce. Heinz tomato soup. Milano salami. pistachio nuts. crisps. any sort of bread as long as it doesnt have bits in. wraps. bananas. Innocent fruit smoothies (hurrah!). occasional off-piste forays into things like turkey schnitzel - successful; burgers/lasagne/bolognese - not successful.

She's bored with not being able to eat what everyone else does, but cant bring herself to try. I just try to keep going with the idea that she can try whatever she likes whenever she likes, and that she will grow out of it.

This is a really interesting and helpful thread. Thanks for starting it boschy.
My DD is a couple of weeks short of her second birthday and not a very adventurous eater to say the least. But although she refuses all veg (although will sometimes eat them in soup form with cream cheese on bread dunked in) she eats most fruit in most forms and generally has a pretty healthy diet, even if I find it a bit frustratingly limited at times.

Reading this has been very timely - DH and I are already learning that we need to try and stay relaxed about the issue and I'm still optimistic that my toddler will grow into a wider range of foods if we don't make the whole thing too much of an issue. I don't think she's food phobic like some of the DC mentioned on here and hopefully the tips and thoughts I've picked up from here will help us keep mealtimes zen.

Good luck everyone

so i had better work on my Zen....

the problem is when you have to feed everyone else. i suppose i have just turned a blind eye to her filling up on bread and puddings...if i do soups she dips the bread in it, yesterday for whatever reason she wouldnt even do that.

funny - she was a brilliant eater when she was a baby, i used to make stuff and freeze it, and then at about 18 months she just started refusing.

DS has asperger syndrome and even he eats more than DD...thats saying something!

tonight i did mince and potatoes and she reckoned she would have eaten that but of course she was staying at her friends....

chicken dinner tomorrow. she will eat something of that, i will just try not to get stressed at what she leaves.

Just checking in-still struggling! How can one DS stuff down literally EVERYTHING he finds, and the other require me to 'operate' on his chicken cordon bleu thing to remove all traces of ham and cheese?

If your elder child is fussy, did your younger ones pick up on it and copy? I don't want my DS2 to go the same way as DS1. I'm so scared I'll fuck it up again. TBH I really do know deep down that none of this is my fault, but I wish I had got better advice sooner.

For a while, DS would only eat peeled fish fingers. Not a lump of fish in a stick shape, it had to have been a fish finger. He has recently eaten some of a fish finger with the batter on, so I think it was worth all the times peeling them just to keep them in his diet.

My eldest is the properly fussy one - sensory issues surrounding food. DD1 is also fussy and I know that one is just me giving in too much. But she just is completely different around food. She has quite a limited diet by her choice at the moment, but will try things from mine and DH's plate. I'm not worried about her. Once she is over the terrible 2's I know that she'll have a better diet. She'll be pursuaded by peer pressure, she'll try things because she is curious. All the "Eat or starve" type methods would work with her!

I don't have DC2 yet but I'm hoping against hope I get an 'eat anything' one because that would be a real treat. Mind you, DS generally sleeps like a dream at night so the trade-off might be a terrible sleeper in DC2!

DS has refused his one and own accepted veg - sweet potato, for the past two teas and really faffs around at mealtimes. Trying to stay calm, as we moved house last week so he is a bit unsettled generally.

Still LOVING this thread, btw!

So relieved to have found this thread...DS1 is 9 and was fine with food until he was about 2 and half, then he just stopped wanting to try anything new, went off of a lot of foods he used to enjoy and has been an incredibly fussy eater ever since. Things he'll eat are:

Toast
Dry cereal
Ham or chicken sandwiches (no butter)
Plain boiled chicken
Fish fingers
Plain pasta (very occasionally he'll put ketchup on it but never anything else)
Potato waffles and smiley faces
Baked beans
Spaghetti hoops (has to be hoops!)
Apple
Pear
Raw carrot
Peas
Cucumber
Sweetcorn
Ready salted crisps
Dry cream crackers

Over the last few months he's asked to try brocolli, minced beef, and oven chips but he doesn't want them very often.

He'll drink milk, water, and sometimes a tiny glass of lemonade.

We avoid eating with MIL, we've explained that DS really cannot face trying new foods but she believes that if we just give him what we have he'll eat it in the end. Meals with her always end with her tutting and sighing and poor DS getting stressed and not wanting anything so we've stopped having her round to dinner. She complains about this every time we speak to her but frankly I don't care, she knows the situation and if she would just keep quiet about DS' food she'd be more than welcome to come for dinner but it never happens!

I could really do with some advice on this issue. DS1 is 4.4 and until the age of 3 ate a wide range of foods. He now has a very restricted range of foods that he will eat. We eat as a family and I find it very difficult as I don't have the time or energy to cook separate meals. I generally say that if he doesn't want what we have then he can have bread and butter and fruit but I do worry that he isn't getting enough vitamins and minerals and his poo certainly isn't normal. I'm not really sure how do deal with this. I think part of it may be related to the fact that he was abused and his abuser forced him to put slugs in his mouth but I don't know how to help him get over his fear of trying food that he previously loved. Mealtimes are really stressful as DH is very hard on him about the fact that he won't try things even though he says he wants to try them.

I haven't read the whole thread yet, but please let me join the ever-increasing list...My DS is 4, and eats the same old same old every day, very beige dinners.

Weetabix with honey on. (Do not let any milk remain visible)
Toast. Usually brown bread, as that's what I have and buy
Chocolate spread.
Strawberry jam (Sandwiches will only be eaten if they're jam or chocolate spread)
Boiled egg. only boiled
Fish fingers
Chicken nuggets.
Chips.
Smiley faces, potato waffles - although he prefers chips
Ravioli (in cans)
The little "sausages" in beans and sausage tins, or spaghetti and sausage tins. (Not real sausages.)
Garlic bread.
Ice-cream
Chocolate.
Nutrigrain bars, the Apple and Blackberry (although he seems to have stopped eating them )
Innocent smoothies,
Strawberry yoghurts
Chocolate custard (those little pots)
Jelly
chocolate bourbon biscuits
Chocolate cake
Some cake,
Water
juice in a carton

Crikey, that list is longer than I thought! Far far far too much chocolately stuff...In fact, so much of it is fatty, processed crap
Never tried him on Marmite, we don't have it in the house. I don't think he'd go for it as it's "new". At least I can take him places as long as they have fish fingers and chips or chicken nuggets and chips. I did go through a "You Will Eat the Same as Everyone Else or Go Hungry Regime", mainly because he was starting school and I was desperate for him to eat the really good school meals.
He went hungry. I cracked before he did, so I now just give him what he asks for.

Recently they got mixed up in the dining hall at school and he got someone else's lunch (they had the same lunchbox, names on the bottom). I was told when I collected him that he had cried and didn't eat any of his lunch. He said he didn't like it. No, because he doesn't eat grapes, tuna sandwiches or the unopened bag of chocolate animal biscuits. (He might have liked them, if he had tried them) I felt so sorry for him, he must have been so confused as to why I'd given him those things. He used to open the box in the car on the way and check for ages after that.
Sorry for really long post, it's so hard and I feel like I've such a long, long way to go...

woah clyde SLUGS??? totally agree with what fio says, your poor DS. and he definitely doesnt need DH doing the Victorian paterfamilias bit.

DD1 is on a making her own pizza kick at the moment. this involves smearing tomato sauce onto a pizza base maybe drizzling some olive oil and bunging it in the oven, but hey its cooking right?! I used to get the bog standard Sainsbo fresh pizza bases but had to get the more upmarket 'hand stretched italian' version the other day. they look much more rustic, and a different colour. so she was initially very very suspicious - but turns out they are in fact 'much nicer, please dont buy the other ones again'. I am quite cheered by that.

Clydesdale - oh your poor DS, how awful. I agree talking to your doc and getting him some help might be the way forward as that experience would be enough to give anyone a complex about putting anything new in their mouths. Your DH really needs to back off and give him some support. Will he accept any kind of vitamin drops or vitamin chewy sweets - they are not a cure-all of course, but at least might make you feel a little better? If you list the foods he eats for us it might help to reassure you his diet is just restricted, not necessarily (completely) unhealthy.

Fog Welcome - our DSs have very similar diets although mine is only 2.5 so yet to have the nightmare of school dinners!

Fog My DS also loves chocolate. His favourite "meal" is a nutella sandwich, chocolate mousse and chocolate nesquik. He's had nutella sandwiches every day for lunch since he's been at school. After reading this thread, I bought some marmite to see if he'd try it. Not a chance! It's in the cupboard next to the peanut butter that he also won't try.

Clydesdale I don't blame your son for sticking to a limited number of foods. What a horrible experience for him. I was also going to suggest a psych referral, multivitamins and a quiet word with your DH to stop being an arse.

Boschy that's great that your DD1 is doing some cooking - and eating. DS loves the cooking bit but stalls at the eating. It is also good that she tried the different base. Shame she prefers the expensive ones but I would guess they are healthier.

Is anyone else's fussy eater short? I was in DS's classroom yesterday and saw that he is the shortest in the class. Now it could be genetic (I'm only 4'11") but I'm slightly concerned that it is due to his diet. He doesn't really eat any protein apart from milk. Someone tell me that their fussy one is 6'2" to stop me worrying.

I am SO glad to find this thread, have read through the whole thing and been close to tears at some points with the relief that other people are going through the same as us!

DD1 is almost 5 and has always had issues with food. She was born with a condition called torticollis which basically means that a muscle in her neck would spasm and leave her head turned to one side and leaning towards her shoulder, which made giving her milk as a baby difficult when it was bad. Weaning was a nightmare and she really struggled with moving onto lumpy food, possibly becaus of her neck, although this was resolved by physio when she was about 15 months. When she was about 18 months old she was very poorly with a twisted bowel and from then on her relationship with food got worse and worse. She has never eaten any fruit or vegetables at all, although she will have smoothies.

She eats the following:
Bagel with peanut butter
Peanut butter sandwiches (with the crusts cut off)
Mashed potato (if it has lots of butter on top)
Jacket potato with butter and grated cheese so long as the skin has been removed
Chicken nuggets
Chips
Fishfingers (reluctantly)
Sausages (also reluctantly)
Most bread products, especially croissants, baguette and her new favourite ciabatta
Plain chicken
Roast potatoes
Yorkshire puddings
Sausage rolls (picks off the pastry and leaves the sausage!)
Cheese and tomato pizza
Garlic bread
Cheese and potato pie (puff pastry with small chunks of potato and grated cheese - I have now started to add cheese sauce as well and she doesn't seem to have noticed!)

She is incredibly slow at eating, fidgets and makes any excuse she can think of to get down during the meal and gets distracted incredibly easily into her own little dream world, to the extent that she will even play with her knife and fork pretending they are people and making up stories.

Starting school has been very difficult to say the least and her teacher has raised concerns that her eating is affecting her concentration.

Can I ask those of you who have achieved a "zen" attitude towards your childrens eating, how do mealtimes go in your house? Do you still have to persuade them to eat or do you literally just leave them to it? I am a lot calmer now than I have been at various points during this "journey" but I still feel that we have to talk almost every mouthful into her sometimes.

aargh. DD has declared she no longer likes toast or yoghurt. we're back on the ella's kitchen ate 1 pouches (thank god for them or she'd get no vitamin C at all)

the manager at nursery keeps reminding me her (now 6ft + 20 something sports scientist rugby fanatic son) ate nothing at all but spaghetti hoops from aged 2-4. This story (lord knows if it's true but I pray that it is) keeps me going....

Ohh, how did I not see this thread before? These are my people!

So, DS is 3 and a half, and he will only eat:

Pasta (fusilli or penne only) with pesto or pasta sauce. But he prefers pesto. And with grated cheese on top. (most dinners. His dad is odd and a bit aspergers, and will only ever feed him this meal when he's there half the week)
Lumps of cheese.
Peanut butter sandwiches (he has this almost every day for lunch)
Toast with butter
Chips
Potato waffles
Yoghurts
Most fruit juices
Baked beans, very reluctantly and with me helping him
Cooked frozen peas, as above.
Most horrible cereal, plus readybrek (almost every day for breakfast)
Raisins
Bananas if in a good mood, but will usually eat half and give up.

Ummm... that's about it. That's all he will eat, excluding cakes, biscuits and ice cream/sweets/chocolate which he would live on if allowed.

The other day my mum got him to eat some sweetcorn and I could hardly believe it. He used to eat Quorn sausages and burgers but has stopped and will only eat a few mouthfuls very reluctantly and then give up. We're a vegetarian household and don't eat eggs really, they don't agree with him. I constantly stress about how shit his diet is and it's got to the point where I don't even bother to offer him new tastes of things because I assume he will say no :( Which is daft, I should keep breezy and upbeat and interested in food. But I've sort of given up.

I end up making two separate meals unless it's pasta, because he desn't like rice, pizza or spicy food, which are involved in lots of what I eat.

Just thought I'd say hello, anyway :)

Hi, everybody, good evening

camdancer I am scared to give him chocolate spread sandwiches for lunch as I feel embarrassed enough that he has strawberry jam every day. How I wish he'd have cheese. Or tuna. Or ham. Or egg - I've tried him with egg sandwiches but no way. Boiled, it must be. In that eggcup. Or this one. With toast, with butter, mummy, and strawberry [jam] and marmalade....(forgot marmalade on the list)

I feel a bit jealous of those whose DC will eat some fruit and veg. Because he won't touch red meat, vegetables, pulses, apricots and suchlike, I worry about his iron levels. He doesn't eat sweets, so he doesn't like vitamin chewy things either (not that they've got iron in). He went off weetabix for a while which was scary (long live fortified things), since he won't eat the nutrigrain bars any more

He has made a bit of progress today - he ate some baked beans!
He last ate some on his birthday last August at the softplay centre (and we were surprised and delighted then too). He had "finished" his dinner, having left the beans, and wanted an ice-cream. I said he could have one if he ate these three beans, poised on a spoon....DH encouraged him to have just those few so he did! And he thought they were actually nice! So DH fed him a few more teaspoonfuls, and he got his ice-cream. Baby steps...

camdancer

Sorry, meant to say before. It may well be genetic, as my DS is quite a sturdy tall chap for his age. I think 110 cm last time we measured him (for a winter coat). He's definitely not the smallest in the class, although most likely the youngest.

Actually, I'm expecting the Reception Year Measuring/Weighing thing to say he's overweight, as he is quite...chunky

Oh happy days!!! A thread full of people who understand! My DD is 16 months and eats yoghurt, banana puree, mango puree & peach puree but only if it is mixed with banana. She weaned beautifully until getting serious ill and everything went pearshaped after that. Most days she will not eat at all, then will have two "meals" a day for a week or so then boycott grub for weeks! I think it def started off as sensory/oral aversion but over time has partly turned into behavioral habit but also still slightly sensory as she is funny about holding many finger foods and will not even consider eating them. We are waiting for a referral to SALT-has anyone else had this and found it any use? I'm skeptical...

Hi Guys my DD is 3 and won't eat any meat, fruit (apart for apples) vegetables. All she will eat is:
Toast
Crackers
Cheese
Pesto Pasta
Pizza
So things are quite bad. I feel like everyone judges me because of it, like I have done something to cause this. She cried last night when I tried to entice her to eat a piece of banana and now she's started nursery she doesn't eat at all when she's there. Very worrying and no one seems to be able to help!