Fussy Eaters (merged)

GPedro

No child ever starved themselves to death.. if you're giving him proper food, he'll eat it eventually. Be strong!

sonsbear

Agree GPedro.

I have two. Son 1 - thought he'd never eat, worried for his health, etc. Anyway, very gradually he accepted a few things but up until last year he probably only had 4 or 5 meals he could eat.

He's 14 nearly 15 now and he recently ate some pizza - only ham and mushroom, he ate chicken tikka masala at school and now he eats that. His repetoire is has extended so I can make a good 10-12 meals for him but I have confidence now that he will get there.

He's actually growing into a really strapping lad who enjoys sport so all my health worries are non existent.

Now, my younger one was a great little eater until he hit 6. Now he's difficiult.

Even more annoying - if one son likes it the other one doesn't!

Hard not to worry though. I guess you could get him checked out as I did at the docs though?

freda

I only have experience with younger children, but my two respond really well to seeing it grown or prepared - i.e. plant and grow runner beans, pick, chop and eat them. Or pizza where they make it all up and put the toppings on.

Bizarrly enough my daughter will eat meat that she won't normally eat if I make up a song about it. The most recent one was 'MiniFreda had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb (x2) and she ate it up for tea' to the tune of Mary had a little lamb. She loved the fact it contained her name and was about her tea - roast lamb.

If he is eating breakfast, lunch and a snack I wouldn't worry too much about not eating tea unless he is losing weight or is otherwise suffering ill effects from it.

Good luck

JBD

Going back to your original post it seems as if your son will eat some snacks and lunch but not his official dinner. I would try and make these as nutritious as possible and not worry if he doesn't eat his proper dinner. My son wouldn't eat dinner until he was about seven, he just liked to eat very small amounts at a time.

serena

Lots of children don't like 'mixed-up foods' - eg stews, or pasta with sauce, or just food that has a sauce. I noticed most of the foods he likes don't have a sauce. My youngest still isn't keen on those at 15!

Will he eat fruit or raw vegetables? Perhaps with dips?

Another tip that worked for me is to have the food in dishes/bowls on the table, and let the children serve themselves. I never made a fuss about the quantity they took, as long as they had at least a little something from each bowl, and if they only took a little to begin with, then they could have more later.

Another tip is to let each member of the family choose one meal a day, that way, they learn to accommodate each other's choices, and also know that one day they get their absolute favourite - and yes, when they are a bit older, they can cook it for everyone!!

Apparently, it takes about people ten tries of a new food before they learn to like it (or not), so keep offering, even if it is refused at first.

Cullumpster

I'm having the same problem with my 3 year old, he will only eat mash potato sausages, waffles, chicken nuggets and fish fingers - however if you call them fish fingers he wont eat them, if you call them Nemo's however I've tried putting vegetables in the mash but he finds them, i have got him cooking with me and he will eat fish cakes made with tuna and mash of course He will eat apples and bananas by the dozen and an occasional grape but that is about it ! any suggestions ???

clairec79

My main thing was to make sure there was SOMETHING on the plate they liked, so they'd at least eat something

Re the potatoes I got them to eat jacket potatoes by putting them on their plates as a jacket potato then if they complained peel the skin off so they could see they are the same as boiled potato - only had to do it once or twice before they'd eat the inside without a problem, now they eat the skins too.

What if you let him help make it? Would he be more likely to eat it then?

If he likes waffles then ASDA do mini waffles with hidden carrots in them.

My kids don't like sauces either, they will now eat pasta bolganaise if the sauce isn't too runny, but ds still insists his are seperate on the plate (side by side instead of the sauce on top and he's not that keen on the sauce)

SkintSazzie

My 12 year old is still a fussy eater, I've tried everything from one end of the scale to the other. The one constant has always been Jam Butties! I've spoken to GP, friends, family, I refuse to speak to the Health Visitor as I believe she caused it! - at our last appointment with her she told me off for still giving him a bottle of milk (cowsmilk) at bedtime, he was about 2yr. I started giving it to him in his cup, which he would drink juice from, but he refused and it went downhill from there. I have 2 other older kids who will eat anything!
Dont worry about it - they will pick up on your anxiety and play up. Give them what they want within reason.
He will now eat chicken burgers with letuce on! and on holiday last year he gave us both a heart attack by eating octopuss! Even I would try it and he just dived in.
Good luck

skipsmum

GPedro wrote: »

No child ever starved themselves to death.. if you're giving him proper food, he'll eat it eventually. Be strong!

Actually thats not true. DS ended up in hospital due to extreme fussy eating. He was eventually diagnosed with aspergers, illeac fossal chrohns disease, and severe reflux.
He very nearly starved to death.
In the meantime the pressure trying to get him to eat put on our family was immense. You should really get him checked out just in case there is a reason for it.

Now we have a rule that he chooses his meals from a list so that they are fairly balanced (he cant process veg well, and fruit causes reflux) and we give stickers and rewards for trying new textures (one small mouthfull with the option to spit and drink water).
I appreciate some children are just playing up, but there are lots of different reasons why children wont eat.

jellyhead

clairec79 wrote: »

If he likes waffles then ASDA do mini waffles with hidden carrots in them.

Excellent, I'm going to look for those :T Both of mine eat carrots, but not many.

My 13 year old was a terrible eater. Back when he was little iceland used to sell veg chips - they were processed potato mixed with veg and came in 3 colours (carrot, sweetcorn and spinach). My boy didn't like chips though, so he wouldn't touch them. They had the texture of waffles really, they weren't solid like chips but he just had a mental block.