5 year old reactions (and eating)

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My 5 year old is quite typical in most ways, I think. She can be reasonable, and can have outbursts which I thought would have passed by now, but tonight’s was extreme, and I’m worried by what she said.

She takes ages to eat, and it’s annoying me a lot. Sometimes she will refuse for ages to try something new, or eat something a bit different, and then when she tried it, she likes it. Are dinners are mainly:

pasta with pesto (pistachio or basil)
quinoa with roast veg and tofu
curry with rice. Not at all spicy
orzo pasta bakes with cherry tomatoes and tofu
udon or soba noodles with veg
pasta with roast veg and seitan sauce.

we do these dinners on rotation so once or twice a week, when it’s curry or quinoa, it’s just painful. “X please can you eat “ etc etc. takes ages and just delays everything. Eventually someone spoon feed her usually and I just hate it. I decided tonight there’s no more dessert if there is a battle at dinner. I’m too tired of it. She was so angry at the thought of no dessert, which is usually yogurt and fruit, that she started hitting her head, crying, and saying she wanted to die. I stopped her, calmed her down quickly, and she ate. No dessert tonight but this reaction was shocking.

i just don’t know what to think or do! I’m not changing what we cook, and we’re not giving her pasta every night as she would ideally like. She loves tofu and most vegetables, but not so much in a curry. She will however eat it if push comes to shove and a good puddingpudding is up for grabs. We have bribed her before with chocolate or mango yoghurts. But I don’t want to do this anymore. I just want a normal dinner time. Also worried that the one year old will start to copy either the extreme reactions or the reluctant eating.

I haven’t read the full thread yet, but wanted to say that I absolutely agree with this comment. We had very similar issues with our DD and food, which started when she was about four, and looking back I can see that we did not handle it well and caused a lot more stress at mealtimes, and DD got very upset at times. I feel awful looking back.

In the end, we stopped trying to make her eat what we were eating and gave her food she would eat at dinner time - at one point it was potato waffles or chips, plain cooked chicken, and veg (usually peas). I’d never wanted to become a parent who made separate meals or relied on beige freezer food, but my sister had had similar issues with her eldest and advised me to just feed DD what she would eat and reduce stress.

And it worked. Eventually DD expanded what she would eat, adding burgers/ sausages at first, then onto pasta dishes like bolognaise, and now at age 10 she eats what we eat for dinner, though she’s not a fan of spicy food. I hated those two years of mostly freezer food and pizza, but it took away the stress at mealtimes for all of us.

Now DD is older, she can articulate why she doesn’t like something, and seems to have really sensitive tastebuds. Looking back, I think she liked the predictability of mass produced potato waffles and plain chicken.

I would suggest that you try this approach and just let her eat what she will eat. Reduce the high stakes, stop being stressed about it, and give yourself a breather.

You say that you’re vegan but it may be easier to allow your DD to be vegetarian to expand the range of ‘safe’ food that she will eat.