year 5, food and school trip

[marymary1000]

My Ds just started year 5, is undiagnosed but shows traits of aspergers, is already fretting about a school trip next June!!!

He really wants to go, its residential with 4 nights away and it will be great for him to go and I know that he will be fine. He has done cub camp which was a couple of nights and struggled with the food. He knows the deal, he has to be prepared to eat the food or he's not allowed to go.

He has decided that he wants to start trying different food now to prepare himself, but doesnt seem to be able to bring himself to let it pass his lips, its distressing to watch him fight with himself, there is no pressue being put on him we are letting him choose when we do a shop but so far its a no go apart from of all things a packet of chewitts!!

His current diet is restricted but healthy and we supplement with vegepa and liquid minerals and vitamins.

Any one dealt with this successfuly??

DS has issues with food, although with a lot of perserverance a few years ago he improved alot. ie 3 years of starting with just seeing new food on plate, then licking it, then taking a single bite, never forcing him to do more than the pre-agreed arrangement e.g. if we said a lick, whenhe licked it we didn't then say "ooh, now lick again/bite etc".

Anyhow digressing slightly, he went on a residential trip with school and the school were happy to make sure that he ate something. e.g. I guess I am lucky as his fave food is salad so they had salad available with every meal, or if he really didn't like something he was able to have a slice of plain bread afterwards (he likes bread with nothing, not even butter on, so not like it was punishing him) but not enough for all other kids to be 'jealous' that he was getting something different. They made their own lunches from a selection of things provided, so again it was easy enough for him to just pick up a slice of bread with nothing on it. Probably not the most nutritionally balanced few days he has had but he didn't starve.

DS (HF ASD) went on a residential in Yr 5. He did not have the food issues that your DS has but we were told that they would only be supplied with water to drink during the daytime. DS won't drink plain water, so I arranged with lead teacher to supply individual cartons of fruit juice which teacher would give out each day to DS. (Turned out it was a load of rubbish and they were given squash/juice anyway - so he ended up bringing the juice back with him - but at least we had been prepared!).
Is it a residential that the school go on to the same place every year? Can you find out what the food will be? It is usually fairly standard 'school dinner' type stuff so you might be able to find something that your DS will eat. They may well be used to catering for special diets. You have plenty of time to find out the info and work with the school/residential accomodation to work around this, so that your DS doesn't starve for a week!!!
I agree it will be great for him to go and would be a shame for him to lose out because he was worried about food - DS certainly enjoyed his trip - it was the 1st time he had been away from home without us, and gave him the confidence to put his name down for another trip when he went to secondary school.

Thanks for your answers, I know he won't starve as he will normally find something in a meal that he can eat, eg at cubs its was mince, mash and carrot, he ate the mash and carrot but not the mince.

I was more looking from the angle of him wanting to try different stuff but not bringing himself to be able to get it to or past his lips. Seems mad to miss this opportunity seeing as he's the one driving it, but not sure where to start.

whoops, sorry. There are things that both my DSs show that sort of issue with ie wanting to do something new but not being able to carry it through when the time comes. Not really solved it, but the only thing I can do is to be there so they don't feel a failure, see the tiny improvement even if they can't e.g. lifted food slightly nearer their mouth or something. But not too much positive encouragement whilst they are doing it else they feel too much pressure which worries them even more. DS1 fences (well) and he wanted to change weapon, really wanted to, but he found it so hard just to even pick up the new weapon. So for the first few weeks his coach was just encouraging him to pick up the sabre, then to try one move. It was painful to watch, there were lots of tears by DS1, we aren't there yet, but slowly he has improved to use the new weapon.

He has decided that he wants to start trying different food now to prepare himself

What an awesome young man. I have no advice to offer but wanted to just say that!

Ah right, just read your secod post and now can offer some maybe helpful advice.

Can you get a couple of weeks worth of menus from where he is going? Work from there. Do one days worth of food a week, just to give him time to get his head round each item.

Dd went on the residential and has a pretty restricted diet tbh although she can usually eat a bit of something out of a meal. They were allowed to take a tuck box though. Of course her friends took sweets and chocolate but dd doesn't eat those so she took home made cheese straws, lemon drizzle cake and flapjacks and snacked on those if she was hungry.Maybe that will be an option?