Dd1 refusing to eat, school being picky about lunch boxes

[Marne]

Just got a letter home from schools saying 'no choc and crisps in lunch boxes'.

Dd1 (AS) is in reception and at the momment is not eating alot at home or at school, yesterday she ate 1/4 of a cheese sandwich. She's refussing to eat anything with seeds, anything with green in/on it, anything in a sauce, anything to dry (breadcrumbs), any veg and we are struggling to get her to eat.
Today she is off school with a cold and has eaten a bit of toast.

The one thing she will eat is chocolate biscuits

What can i put in her lunch box?

At the momment she has 1/2 a cheese sandwich, a handful of crisps, a choc biscuit and a small yoghurt/fromage frais.
Most days she eats 1/2 of what i give her.

She will eat fruit but has a piece of fruit for snack (suplied by the school), if i put an apple in her lunch she wont eat it if she had one for snack IYKWIM.

She will eat blueberries in her lunch i cant afford to keep buying them.

little bag of choc chip cookies or animal buiscuits? if you got some frozen berries, defrosted them and mixed them with yoghurt would she eat that (frozen a lot cheaper than fresh!). baby bels? brioches?

Im not sure if cookies count as choc. Frozzen berries would be a good thing to try, she sometimes has babybel but im a bit worried as she sometimes has cheese sandwich, baby-bel and cheese and onion crisps or yoghurt (maybe to much cheese/dairy).
Do you think home made cakes would count as un-healthy? Just made some flapjack for tommorrows lunch box.

Blueberries are 2 packs for £3 at ASDA at the moment. (150g pack, £1.97 for one)

Thanks combustiblemon- i will pop in to Asda on friday.

Today she ate 4 blueberries and a bite of sandwich for lunch.

She's small for her age, im worried she will become ill if she doesn't eat.

I will have to give her some chips for tee as thats one thing she will eat but she can't live on chips.

raisens, muscavado cherries (sp??), banana chips, banan chips with yoghurt coating, fruit bars (humzingers etc), carrot sticks, grapes, prunes, tomatoes, strawberries

frubes, berry shaped yoguhurts (cant remember the name of them), jelly pots, home-made jelly pots with added 'surprises' (little jellies or sweets {hidden}), drinking yoghurts (sorry dont know the name of any of them)

cheesestrings, dairylee dunkers, strippers, babybel, cheese shapes (proper cheese in child friendly shapes), tribites, cheese slices,

peperami, cold meats (ie billy bear), cocktail sausages, crackers (jacobs, water, table, etc) cheese 'biscuits', mini cheddars, cold boiled potatoes?,

and if it doesnt state bakery products... tarts, buns, flapjack, shortcake, those little roundish bread-with-jam-inside rolls which are individually wrapped (about £1.50 for 8), croissants, waffles, pancakes, scones,

hope theres something in there thats do-able. XXX

Thankyou for the great ideas.

She hasn't eaten much today, thought i would take her tempriture before bed as she has a cough and it was 39.0 , maybe this is why she's being extra fussy?

If you feel she needs to eat something different from school guidelines you should set it out clearly in a letter to them that the reason for this is her disability (then not allowing it carries overtones of discrimination).

Oooh, just saw about her temperature. She won't have an appetite with 39C- nobody could. Lots of cooling drinks! I'm just recovering from flu with high temperature and I have been off food for a week.

home made flapjacks are healthy, sounds great idea to me

carrot cake too

Oh I am an expert on this one.

She is DX with a consition where food refual is a common aspect.

preventing her eating foods that she finds acceptable is a breach of the disability discrimination act as it is preventing her from fulfilling her needs fr nutrition

You are in England, this should suffice. here in wales there are stricted guidelines I believe about snacks etc but even then they cant breach the act- and as our teacher tried it anyway, for the past 2 hours it ahs been written into his statement that he can have what he damn well likes to eat and drink.

Does she have a statement?

She not statemented (yet). I will talk to the school, at the momment she's hardly eating anything including crisps .

She seems to only eat chips and potato waffles, i cant get any meat or fish into her, this is the worse she has been, i know she has been unwell this week but the eating has been a problem for the past few months (getting worse).

J refuses point blank to eat or drink at school for weeks at a time.

Not helped by random policies like, they can only drink water in a clear flask - he hates all flasks and water. They also tried the no junk food thing, which I understood, but he is losing weight all the time - has only gained a kg in 15 months, and that was all over the summer, which he is now losing. Sometimes desperate times call for desperate measures.

The school now totally understand that J is underweight and that hunger won't help his behaviour, so let him eat what he wants where he wants. Still usually nothing, but I can usually tempt him if I put biscuits in - not always, but better than eating literally nothing.

I would put in a firm letter about reasonable adjustments to meet needs related to her disability. Good luck.

MP had a similar thread yesterday. It's getting ridiculous!. Like taking a tornado jet to swat a bumblebee.

Mind I have a very different solution to all this: reinstate proper play. When I was at school we had an hours play at lunchtime after meal, ds1 get 5 minutes

Proper fod (I loathe all this reduced sugar reduced fat reduced food crap) plus decent amunts of exercise.

Isn't that the healthiest approach surely?

I also think some of the methods empoyed at schools as enforcement a5re errible- confiscating a snack chosen by a parent then making said child wattch the others eat? Pathetic and cruel and surely an incendiary to eating disorders.

i know a bit about nutrition, as well as mum to 3 kids on restricted diets I have one myself and a history of eating disorders (always clued up as a rule, the survivors of ed). I know that a home made flapjack or sesame cake with added seeds and dried fruit is A) yummy and likey to be eaten, and B) extremely nutritionally valid.

I appreciate what jamie oliver and the likes are trying to do and I am frustrated by the crap food brigade also, but its getting silly now.

Sorry rant over

Thank peachy,

In my lunch box i used to have a sandwich, crisps, small chocolate bar, fruit or yoghurt.

Now its no crisps and no chocolate

Dd doesn't realy eat sandwiches at the momment and because she wont eat her sandwich shes not allowed to eat anything else (until sandwich is gone), so dd sits there for half an hour nibbling her sandwich and then times up.

I do agree with 'healthy eating in schools' but if a child is clearly under weight and a fussy eater surely by limiting what they can/cant eat is going to make them ill/more underweight?

I have bought her a pack of chocolate buttons for when i pick her up?

Im getting realy woried as her trousers are falling down, shes still in age 3-4 clothes and they are too loose around her tummy.

Does anybody know if i should be taking her to the gp about her not eating? Its been 2 months since she has realy eaten a cooked meal/meat, she's now refussing meat, fish, veg, some fruit and most potato as well as her usual things like pasta, anything in a sauce, anything in bread crumbs.

I think i will talk to the school when i pick her up to discus the situation and how we can get her to eat more at lunch time. Evening meals are a night-mare as she's living on potato waffles.

Marne: no experience of this, but could you ask your GP for a referral to a specialist dietician? It might also carry more weight with the school if you have an 'expert' backing you up on your DD's food choices.

Also, this may be a silly suggestion, but can you try other carb sources than sandwiches? Think there was a thread a whole back about lunchboxes for sandwich-refusers which had some good suggestions. If she like potatoes, would something like baked potato wedges (cold) and a dipp go down well?

The only form of potato she will eat is potato waffles and sometimes chips, wont touch pasta but will sometimes eat crackers with cheese. Because of her sensory issues 9as) she if refussing to eat anything that scratches her throat anything too dry) and anything with bits in (pips, herbs etc).

Marne-You have my sympathies. My DS5 has AS and similar food issues. We have now had the fact that he was diagnosed with Coeliac Disease last year added to the mix (which immediately exluded many of the things he would eat!).

Our school has similar policies, but I am afraid they just have to put them aside in the case of my DS.

I give him sandwiches (with gluten-free bread obviously!) plus crisps, a yoghurt and a chocolate bar. He will not eat fruit so there is no point my putting it in his lunch bag. He also will not touch raisins or anything similar. He cannot have anything with biscuit in it so the usual bars they allow (KIt kat etc) are out of the question for him anyway.

chat to the gp and get a referral to dietetics; she wont be the first spectrum kid they've seen.

jimjams iirc has experience of getting her ds1 to eat also, maybe worth a holler?