Sometimes I sit and wonder how did I get here and then how do I get from here to there? Because some days I'd really like to be over there. You see there used to be a time when Abby was a good eater and she still is in some ways. I have no complaints to make about the amount she eats. In fact most people are shocked when they see how much she can pack away. Just last Sunday we had a pancake breakfast at church and the "sausage guy" actually paused in disbelief when Abby asked for a fourth helping. This has pretty much been the norm for her entire life. So if the problem isn't the amount of food she eats, then what is it?
Well as it turns out Miss Abby is becoming a bit of a picky eater and dinner time is a bit of a struggle. When she was younger and first eating real food she was very good about trying new foods and eating fruits and vegetables. Now I can't get a vegetable to cross her lips and what few fruits she was eating are now about as appealing to her as a lump of cold poison. I'm feeling a lot of pressure about the whole food thing especially now that she's in school where they stress healthy food and snacks and the teacher actually tours the room at lunch to see what the kids are eating.
So what do you do if your kid won't eat healthy? And I mean she just won't eat. Most of what goes into her lunch bag will come home minus the drinks. At home she loves apple sauce and will eat two at a time, but at school she won't touch it. Same with yogurt, which actually now she won't eat at home either. Of course by the time she gets home from school she's starving. Then she wants granola bars, gold fish crackers or fruit treats. Then we get to dinner where she'll often declare she doesn't like it or she's not hungry. That is unless it's pizza, chicken fingers or bacon sandwiches, then she's all in.
I'm trying really hard not to turn this into a huge struggle between the two of us. Most nights I make her plate for dinner and put a little of everything we're having on her plate. It goes without saying there will be something on her plate that she objects to. My response is always, "that's dinner so it's on your plate. You don't have to eat it, but that's all you're getting." I do try and make sure that I've included something she will eat which is almost always whatever meat we're having (more often than not chicken). Given her pickiness right now there are somethings I really don't expect her to eat, like Indian food. On those nights I'll make her something else. The list of things she will eat seems to get shorter every day.
I do notice that every once in a while we make some very small in roads. She loves pizza, but when she eats it at home she would make us take the toppings and the cheese off. They have pizza day once a week at school and since Mike and I aren't there to strip the toppings off she will now eat it with cheese and pepperoni. On the night we had the baked potato soup she actually tasted a very tiny bit of it before declaring that she would eat it when she was older. Then there was the night she ate and enjoyed peas. While I'm very pleased with that it's hard not to get frustrated. I'm well aware this is likely just a phase she's going through and I am doing what all the experts recommend which is just to just keep offering her new foods to try. Most importantly she's a healthy girl who's growing like a weed (a whole inch in a month), drinks her milk, lots of water and always reminds me she needs to take her vitamin.
3 comments:
Of course, I have no techniques or tips to offer, my sister was the pickiest eater imaginable as a kid and it caused many a dinnertime battle with my parents. This continued until she was in high school / college and felt peer pressure to try more exotic, vegetable-filled foods!
That said, she's 5'9" and was a collegiate soccer player, so she seems to have stayed pretty healthy :)
So... I wouldn't beat yourself up about it.
Well that's good to hear, thanks. I do know that it is likely a phase, but it's a bit annoying sometimes.
While Emily is a good eater right now, she has gone through a few periods already where almost nothing is good to her. I always go back to the advice my doctor gave me when Emily turned 1: sometimes she'll stop eating and won't like anything - don't worry about it at all - it will pass. My doctor has two small girls of her own so I trust this advice and it's helped me not get too stressed out over the eating thing.
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