Help with ASD ds and his awful diet please?

[fleurlechaunte]

DS has autism. His diet is appalling. He eats no fruit and veg at all except for apple and orange juice, tomato based pasta sauces and a very occasional pea or small piece of broccoli. I really worry about this. He looks so pale and pasty sometimes.

How do you get more fruit and veg in your dc's diets and failing that can you recommend a good multivitamin and mineral supplement please?

What does his diet mostly consist of? Just asking so that the 'wise ones' on here can see where you might possibly sneek it in.

Try not to worry, as long as he is eating some form of fruit/veg.

DS2 will only eat broccoli/cauliflower and bananas so I usually just give them to him every day. He will also eat tomato based sauces, but don't tend to give them often.

What I do do though is "hide" his veg in other foods like mashed potato and tomato based sauce. I also make him a smoothie here and there with loads of different fruits.

My DS used to be such a good eater. He would eat nearly everything offered to him he went through a very fussy time at the same time his bowels were bad and got extremely limited in what he would eat. We supplemented and gave enzymes his bowels got better and he started eating more foods. Just recently he has got very fussy and will only eat banana (sometimes), apple (sometimes) and cucumber no other fruit or veg at all. SO now we are giving vitamin supplements (Biocare multivits) starting enzymes again and in the meantime I am trying to disguise things as much as possible so battered banana hidden veg etc with varying success.DS loves dried fruit but dentist said not to give it any more because his teeth are getting bad.

There is a book called "The art of hiding vegetables" which is good.
If you grate courgette finely into a pasta sauce near the beginning of cooking, it basically disappears.

Did you know that processed tomatoes are more nutritious than fresh ones? Something called lyco-somethingorother is more accessible to your body in processed form. Not really relevant but thought you might like to hear something cheerful.

If he eats tomato sauce you are in business - I use a Jamie Oliver recipe which basically blends courgette, onion, carrot, squash and red pepper into tomato sauce. Freeze a load and use all the time! If you add enough tinned tomatoes and tom puree, it tastes really nice. With grated cheese on top, that is a great meal with pasta! My DS is getting stuck on chicken dippers, smiley faces and beans - I feel like I am physically holding open the gates when it comes to his food preferences, while he is trying to close the gates tightly shut!

Might be worth a general children's vitamin supplement that the chemist recommends, or get the doc's opinion if you think he needs a better supplement? (a personal and entirely unqualified opinion, always check the label/ask for qualified advice etc etc). But whether he'd take it is another matter. We're very peculiar about foods, drinks, tablets etc. If it's in any way surprising or unexpected to our very sensitive senses, e.g. too crunchy, hot, cold, rough, smelly, salty, etc then we often just can't handle it. Tiny changes that you won't notice are huge changes to us, and difficult to explain. But as sickofsocalledexperts says, if you can get him to eat tomato puree type things almost anything nutritious can be disguised in there.

Thanks for your replies. I have done the tomato based sauce made with butternut squash, onions, courgettes, tomatoes and carrots before and he ate it but complains bitterly about doing so which just makes me feel so exhausted that I shrink away from doing it again but he DID eat it all so I need to make the effort.

"I feel like I am physically holding open the gates when it comes to his food preferences, while he is trying to close the gates tightly shut!" lol that is so, so true. It feels like an exhausting wrestling match every day. Ds would eat pizza, McDonalds nuggets and chips and battered fish and thats it if I allowed.

I do understand that there are sensory issues involved. The look on his face when I try to get him to taste a grape tells me all I need to know.

I am giving him a childrens multivitamin now, hope it does some good.

when my 13yr old son was small he wouldnt eat anything he didnt like the feel of. he has not eaten any fruit or veg since that age of about 2 apart from odd pieces to try. he is now almost 6 ft tall !!! he lives on pizza at the mo and only the ones from asda as they can be made fresh with no cheese and has just come out of a phase of birds eye chicken burgers ( had to be birds eye if not he would rather starve!)my advise would be to give supliments if poss ( hiding is good if u can succeed with it my son always knew when i tried that and refused to eat lol) now i just leave him to eat what he wants and make sure there is plenty of it . he does eat yoghurt cereal( always good as they are usually fortified with vitamins and stuff) and roast meat with yorkshire pudds ( no veg and no spuds )he has just been diagnosed with aspergers ( as in last week). my bigger worry now is that if he has a meltdown he wont eat for days at a time x

I have two ds, ds1 has ASD. The non-ASD one, ds2, aged 2, has an appalling diet - no fruit or veg, won't really eat anything except breakfast cereal, plain pasta with butter, and of course any type of cake and biscuit going. Ds1 is still quite limited compared to most, but will at least eat mashed potato, sausages and tomato-type sauce with pasta.

I've started giving them both Innocent smoothies every day, as well as Abidec multivitamins (thankfully they both seem to love the taste of that stuff!)..I don't know how good the smoothies really are but better than normal juices I think, even if they are ridiculously expensive.

And other than that, I just keep telling myself that one day, ds2 will eat something different, and not to get too stressed about it. But it's hard. They both look pale and pasty compared to other kids. I think I'd cry with joy if either of them actually ate a plate of meat and two veg.

Not easy!!