Ds (6) refusing all fruit and veg. What do I do?

[cupcake78]

It's not due to a genuine dislike as he eats it at school and for others. At home he is beyond difficult to feed and I've had enough!

I'm making weaning meals for dd and then meals for dh and I. I'm sick of cooking and come the new year dh and I will be watching what we eat! Dd is on a dairy free diet.

Ds is another matter all together. Tonight I have left him at the table with a plate containing a very small amount of stir fry veg, one strip of pepper a mange tout and some cabbage. I have told him until he eats it he stays there.

I think I need a firm approach to this as it's not fear of food it's just he's being picky.

I also have food issues by being forced to eat something I didn't like as a child.
I remember the sheer torture of being made to eat something against my will and not being allowed to leave the table until I did. Luckily ( or so I thought) I learned how to gobble everything down then quietly go to the toilet and throw it all up again.. THis became a habit- and although I never was truly anorexic ( I always thought I was a little too skinny) whenever I became anxious or nervous I would vomit. This continued until my 20s- going out for a meal with a new boyfriend was a nightmare, being in a tense situation would always see me throwing up in restaurant toilets after a nice meal.

I have seen my mother trying the same tactics on my own children when my back is turned and I go mad at her.

Please don't turn mealtimes into a battleground.
Food should be fun, not a power struggle.

I c

Oops.

I can't believe the poster earlier who said let him gag! Really?! How horrid. Children won't starve themselves but it's really horrible to be made to eat any food you really don't want to.

I will still gag on mashed potato as an adult for this reason. Just the look of it makes me feel physically ill.

I grew up in a poor family with barely enough to eat for the 5 of us. We had to eat what we were given or go hungry. Not one of us has food issues. We just learned to tolerate foods we didn't like.

IMO disliking standard foods like fruit and veg is learned behaviour, probably from school. I also believe that children should not be allowed to get away with rejecting an entire food group, especially the one which is the one they ought to be eating most of. Eating only white carbs and protein is really unhealthy.

In your situation OP, I would introduce the rule we did with ours when they went through the same phase at roughly the same age- give them a starter of "crudités" like they do in France; eg grated carrot salad, cucumber, tomato salad. Give it to them first while they're still hungry. Expect them to eat it. Absolutely no pudding if no veg eaten. Fruit only for puddings. There is no earthly reason for children to have any other kind of pudding for nutritional reasons except maybe plain yoghurt.

Fairylea- I think it's horrible too feeding a child and letting them gag. The thought of it makes me feel sick.

All you people claiming to have gagged on perfectly normal foodstuffs have clearly never been hungry. Lucky you.

Quite the opposite- I was very undernourished as child after I learned how to throw up my food. My mother forcing me to eat to the point of feeling sick overcame my hunger I can assure you.

Remove all emotion. Put food in front of everyone, including him.Everyone eats, chats, normal family meal time. Plates are taken away. Meal over.

If he's hungry later, offer plain brown bread and butter, an apple and a glass of milk. Don't engage about food at all. And remember, it's a phase. Like all things it will pass. Honestly. I absolutely promise.

So because children are starving in Africa we should basically expect our dc to eat everything put in front of them even if they gag or whatever because they should be grateful we have food?

Yeah ok.

So as an adult even if the thought of a rare steak (for example) makes me feel ill I should shut the fuck up and eat it anyway and think of the poor African children?

Have we not moved on from the 1980's? That line is what the dinner ladies used to say to me as I sat there struggling not to vomit with anxiety at having to try to eat a school dinner I really didn't like and felt anxious about. It was torture. Still makes me shiver now.

(Sorry I'm spouting about the idea that because someone's never been hungry they don't have the right to refuse food).

Fairylea- I sympathise, my anxiety over food caused a referral to my GP as a child because of my weight gain and regular illness, but in turn caused my mother to become even more insistant for me to eat. It was a real vicious circle. Things back in the 60s were not really understood and caused me a great deal of distress.

cupcake - at least your DS eats fruit and veg at school. I'm struggling with my DS2, who won't eat any fruit and veg at all. I have resorted to disguising fruit and veg in his food, eg pasta sauce with blended veg.

My NY resolution is to try various tactics to get him to eat more. One of them is similar to duchesse's method of having a first course of salad. I saw a nutritionist who said that we should all have a tiny portion of fruit/veg to eat before our main meal, eg a slice of carrot. Anyone who doesn't eat it, doesn't get dinner.

In addition to this tactic and the disguising fruit and veg tactic, I am also planning on doing indoor gardening with him (have ordered an indoor kit to grow our own carrots and peas) and am doing more cooking with him. He is keen to make apple pie and I hope that he may try an apple whilst making it.

Apart from the microscopic portion of veg on his plate before his main meal, everything I'm doing is (hopefully) going to be relaxed and fun. Having experienced the misery of being forced to eat food as a child, I certainly don't want to inflict that on him.

Place marking for tips. I have realised my DD is the same.

I don't believe coercing children to eat is right, a little reminder perhaps, but the minute things become an issue is the time to back off.
I had a very reluctant eater with my first, but never wanted to push as my own mother did.
Helping to choose, plan, shop for, help cook and serve family meals really helped.
Mealtimes need to be fun happy family times- not a battle ground.

"I saw a nutritionist who said that we should all have a tiny portion of fruit/veg to eat before our main meal, eg a slice of carrot. Anyone who doesn't eat it, doesn't get dinner."

The nutritionist is talking bollocks. Food on the table. Everyone eats-or not. Plates cleared. No emotion, coercion or pressure. Just cheerful normality.

Hmmm.
So, in your house, dd has special food because she is weaning. dd has special food because she is dairy free. You and your dh will soon be on a special diet because you are watching what you eat....

Is he thinking that he can make some special demands for his diet?

Anyway, I would stop all talk of anyone having any special foods or diets, just serve up what is served up, and make sure he has plenty of bread and butter so he isn't hungry if he doesn't eat everything on offer. Then remove all pressure to eat, certainly stop forcing him to sit at the table until he has eaten it,. Sometimes have a pudding, but not always, so that sweet things aren't an inevitable part of every meal for any of you, but aren't the sought after 'holy grail' either. And if he asks for dessert, just say nicely and matter of factly 'oh, we aren't having that tonight, we are having cheese and biscuit and fruit - which would you like?'.

Msmiggins I agree with you. I have two dc and have never ever made an issue of food (probably because my own childhood was punctuated by adults trying to get me to eat things I didn't really want to). Dd is now 11 and as a toddler she would literally survive for weeks on toast and cheese and yoghurt - that was all she would eat. I gave her vitamin drops and offered everything I ate as well as something I knew she would eat and just never made an issue of it. She gradually tried different things and now aged 11 she is the least fussy of all her friends. Her favourite meal is roasted red peppers stuffed with cous cous and olives!

Ds is 18 months and currently going through a fussy stage despite until recently eating anything and everything. I'm not worried about it. I just give him what he wants - today he's had peanut butter on toast, a tiny bit of a fish finger and about a cm of a carrot for lunch followed by a yogurt and for dinner he wouldn't touch the shepherd's pie we had so I made him a ham sandwich instead which he loved!

I never want my dc to have any issues about food. As long as you are providing vitamins and giving them healthy choices I really think it is wrong to make them eat anything.

And as for reheating food they don't want again and again. ... that's just revolting. I wouldn't want to eat a meal I didn't want that had been heated up several times and given to me every time I said I was hungry that day. I wouldn't expect that of my dc either.

My brother would only eat potatoes and meat for most of his childhood.

He became a chef.

He has cooked for royalty.

If he eats well elsewhere, just keep offering a mixed bag and if he doesn't eat it all, take it away and no pudding.

You put a smallish, not overwhelming, amount of it on his plate and you make no comment. No ultimatum. No threats. No pleading. No big deal.

If he doesn't eat it, you take the plate away, unrattled. Knowing that it's not a genuine dislike, you don't make anything different to compensate.

If you want to find out if he's pushing buttons, you need to not engage. It might or might not be a case of button pushing. It might be a loose tooth annoying him.

Fairylea you talk a lot of sense. Floradix was a great thing for my fussy child. I also agree about reheating food- over and over.
Part of learning about food is to discover how exciting and delicious it can be.
Eating out really helped my son too- he loved places that he could help himself like chinese buffets, and the salad bar at pizza hut was great to get him excited about trying different veg and dressings. As he grew so did his love of exotic food and now he is 16 loves really adventurous dishes- he will eat just about anything, sushi, korean, Mexican, seafood, he loves his veg, nuts, game meat, exotic fruits, and pulses and amongst his teenage friends he is the one with the greatest love diversity in his food.

No don't insist he stay til food eaten.offer it,if declined scrape plate with no comment
Don't offer alternative snacks,no pop,no milk.water if thirsty
Dont exhibit any stress or big deal,simply only offer nutritious food

Curlew - I have struggled with this advice, which is why I haven't enforced it so far. However, my GP now says DS2 is severely underweight and undernourished and wants to see him every month to weigh him and check on his diet. To be honest, I would prefer the 'let's cook together/grow stuff/have fun with food' route.

Rules here.
This is dinner. Nothing else (I don't cook food I know my kids really hate.)
Don't like it? Have you tried it? Can you try a tiny piece?
Don't want dinner? That's fine but this is all the food that's on offer for the foreseeable!
Both my kids eat ok.
DS had fussy stages. Never made a battle over it. He helped me shop for and cook food. Great eater now!
DD (3) would live off mac and cheese but happily eats lots of other food!

Toffeewhirl- but how is having a confrontation about a microscopic portion of something before a meal going to help even slightly?

What if he just refuses? Where are you then? What is the reasoning behind it?

Toffee

It doesn't matter what the reason is behind your desire to get your child to eat. Unless your child has a developmental disorder you are only going to make them eat less by pushing them.

Children eat better for people who are not getting wound up about and over-involved in their eating.

Make the food available and have no involvement after that. If you can't keep out of it, make yourself scarce. Children can only be resistant eaters if their is a force to resist.

Encourage him to grow, prepare, handle, smell, experiment with and serve food but never ever express an opinion on what he should put in his mouth. Eventually he will realise that you are not engaging, there is no force to resist and he will lead his own progress back to a better diet.