Aaiiiiiiigh.
April 30, 2007Some of you have been asking how we're doing around these parts, concerning my son's ongoing food issues. Well! Let me take a break from tearing my hair out to update you!
The update is, there's no update. The child has made zero progress. The prevailing wisdom (and yes, I have read Ellyn Satter; I want Ellyn Satter to come live at my house) seems to be that we should include at least one item he enjoys as part of our dinner, but the number of foods he enjoys seems to be dwindling daily. (He won't eat bread, people. BREAD.) He now refuses any fruit (INCLUDING BLUEBERRIES OH MY GOD). He wants only pasta. Only the small pastas. Orzo and tiny stars and eensy little elbows. With butter or ricotta. Try adding some sauce—just try!—and my god, you will pay.
Not only is he picky, he also has an enormous appetite, so if there's nothing on the table that he'll countenance, he is not happy with you. The Wisdom of the Eating Sages also dictates maintaining a blithe, devil-may-care attitude toward your child's eating, but that's difficult when he's shouting at you and weeping and it's just the two of you because your husband isn't home yet and hmmm, is that a beer I see in the back of the fridge? Indeed it is!
I feel for him. I think this is enormously frustrating for him as well as us. Lately he's been demanding "something un-yoo-sual" for dinner, but of course this is hilarious because "unusual" terrifies him. He's bored with what he likes but scared to try anything new. So tears and tantrums follow shortly thereafter. I've tried to make dinner pleasant, I've made it crystal clear to him that he doesn't have to try anything, but that he also doesn't get to spend dinner time pointing out how yucky everything at the table is, and not once has he managed this. Just keeping quiet about the yuck factor in his vicinity. Not once. It's amazing how one's shoulder muscles can begin to spasm just thinking about this issue! Huh!
Then the other day he stopped dead in his tracks outside a Japanese restaurant, inhaled, and said, "It smells incredible in there." I wanted to drag him inside and pour miso soup down his gullet.
We've limited dessert to one night a week, with the occasional exception, because every dinner was becoming all about dessert. Now every night it's a fight over whether this is a dessert night, or not. His newest line is "I've decided this is a dessert night because I'm the boss, and I get to say when it's dessert night." This is an interesting line, this "I'm the boss" thing, because it has never worked, not once, not ever, and yet he continues to use it about, well, everything. I AM NOT LIKING HIM SO MUCH THESE DAYS.
And look, I know. I KNOW. I know there are worse things we could be going through. He sleeps well. He is a delight in many ways. He's healthy and weighs enough and the pediatrician is unconcerned. But you asked! And this is what's going on. The End.
EDITED TO ADD: Me again! Hi! Listen, please don't confuse what I'm feeling about this issue with what I'm doing. As far as Henry knows, I am the the epitome of nonchalance when it comes to his massive refusal of every food item except tiny teensy pastas. We only address the behavioral issues surrounding dinnertime. We have read everything there is to read. And as for "Maybe he'll like..."--thank you. But no. I mean, probably yes, if he'd deign to put it in his mouth. But he won't! And in this way I am driven bonkers. But all inside, in a quiet way, ssssh. He's not affected by it. Okay?
Reader Comments (110)
my picky eater ate his first vegetable -- a baby cut carrot --tonight. he is six. he would not eat them at six months, three years, or last week, no matter what combination of shame, tough love or bribery we tried. i don't know why he chose tonight. i tiptoed into the kitchen and sang the hallelujah chorus sotto voce to my husband.
a few nights ago, I caught him quietly weeping on the back step because I had told him he had to eat a grape to get a snow cone. he wanted that snow cone, but he knew he couldn't eat that grape. he wasn't making a show. I found him blinking back the tears behind the kitchen door. i've learned that i can't control the feelings, opinions, tastes of adults in my life. why do I forget to accord that same basic respect to my children?
Oh, and anyone who says "he'll eat when he get's hungry enough"? No. That's just plain wrong. Food can be a much more complex issue than that.
Gruel. Nothing but cold gruel from now on.
And I, too, have heard it all, and tried it all. Now, we just try to hold the line, fight the good fight, and pray that it will be one of those things that really does eventually pass. We try for one of those "one day we'll look back and laugh" attitudes. Some days we get closer than others.
I'll be sending you serious good vibes from Indiana around lunch-ish and dinner-ish. Any good vibes headed back my way at bedtime would be great. That and a bottle of Jack Daniels couldn't hurt...
My cousin ate only peanut butter sandwiches from the time he could eat solid foods until just recently. He is 19, going on 20. From time to time his parents would force him to eat a bit of sliced apple, or some baby carrots. But otherwise, it was PB&J or any combination of the three. All desserts, of course.
What changed? Well, he graduated highschool (I don't know how he made it through 4 years of highschool like that... but.. whatever) and he decided to take a gap year to study mandarin language and martial arts in China. Guess what they don't have a huge supply of on Chinese farms? Peanut butter. So now he knows how to eat other stuff, though he doesn't enjoy it. I'm pretty sure that when he's at home in the states he maintains his strict PB&J diet.
I don't know if it was the parents being too sweet to him (his mom would keep a "samby" in her purse for him well into his teens) or if he was just a stubborn bastard. Hmm.
Just know, your kid will never be that bad!
I have a 3.5 year old who loves starch, hates veggies and fruits.
It will work itself out.
oh, and we live in new jersey.
I know there are some children and some adults who have sensory difficulties with taste and textures of food, but I believe the majority of children like Henry (and a couple of my grandchildren) have simply learned that food issues are one guaranteed way to keep their parents' full attention on themselves. One of the grandkids learned to eat his meals when he & his mother came to live with us, one had to wait until her dad learned to ignore whether she was eating or not. It's tough for a few days, but I'd bet my lunch money that Henry will decide he'd much rather be at the table with you & his dad than banished to another room while the cat eats his supper.
Wow, Donna has the Tough Love approach. I don't know if I could do it, but I bet it would work.
My thought is - maybe it's something different. Maybe by the time dinner rolls around, he's too hungry to want to eat, and everything looks bad. For most of my life I've had a very high metabolism, and that was true for me - if I waited too long, I had to have the most bland food possible and everything else turned my stomach. My little girls are turning out to be the same way.
You may already do this, but my suggestion is be sure he has solid snacks, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Maybe if he's not low blood suger at dinner time, it might go better. (Or maybe this is totally unrelated to your actual child.)
Wow, Donna has the Tough Love approach. I don't know if I could do it, but I bet it would work.
My thought is - maybe it's something different. Maybe by the time dinner rolls around, he's too hungry to want to eat, and everything looks bad. For most of my life I had a very high metabolism, and that was true for me - if I waited too long, I had to have the most bland food possible and everything else turned my stomach. My little girls are turning out to be the same way.
You may already do this, but my suggestion is be sure he has solid snacks, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Maybe if he's not low blood suger at dinner time, it might go better. (Or maybe this is totally unrelated to your actual child.)
The problem for us is, for most of that stuff, EVEN I DON'T LIKE IT.
One piece of advice (it's hard not to dispense with the advice)...
I tell my kid at dinner "Don't yuck my yum if you want dessert."
Be a bitch.
"The Virtual Food Critic - He doesn't have to eat it to know that it is unacceptable..."
http://suburbankamikaze.typepad.com/suburban_kamikaze/2007/01/the_virtual_foo.html
I've resorted to giving a Flintstones vitamin every morning and telling myself "this too shall pass." It's the only way to preserve my sanity at this point.
I believe that you are a Great mother, and there is not a single, or even a few, perfect solutions. Each family has to try what works best for them cause every child and family is different. My husband and I had very differnent eating experience growing up and we are both healthy, intellegent people who both have foods we love, we hate and are completely neutral about.
Sorry for rambling. I think you are fanstastic. Oh and my hubby reads your blog too, he loves Henry's stories.