What worked for your picky, picky, picky eater?!?

[Anonymous]

Child-rearing anti-pattern #382:

Anonymous wrote:Keep putting the meal in the fridge and bring it out at mealtimes. The child will eat wnen it gets hungry enough.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The "reward" for eating is not being hungry.

You aren't a short-order cook. When you stop acting like one, your son will realize he either eats what's there or is hungry. Natural consequences are what worked before people starting overthinking how to raise kids.

He won't starve. Letting him be picky will disadvantage him in the long run. I was very picky as a child and was catered to; it took years as an adult with adventurous friends and husband to get me to taste and actually like most foods.

Don't do this to yourself or him. "Here's what's for dinner -- If you're hungry, you'll eat it." <---Memorize this. Good luck.

Laughably off base. This works fine for a normal kid, but not a picky eater. Congrats on winning the lottery.

The child will not be "picky" if these steps are followed. I should know, having been a "picky eater" myself. But don't let me interrupt the martyr routine you have going on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, I am 41 and may be your worst nightmare: I am still an insufferably picky eater. I went through phases as a kid when all I would eat were flattened hamburger rolls. I'm better than that now, much better, but still very picky. Here are a few thoughts about what I know now and what helps me.

First, the "he's picky" label --STOP using it now. It will stick. It will BE his self concept. Just stop it.

My college roommate got me to try more new foods than anyone in my life before or since. You know what she said once about me that rocked my world? She said, "Mary's one of the bravest people I know. She just hasn't hit her adventurous stage yet when it comes to food."

She was so right! I'll parachute out of a plane today, but I have absolutely no intention of ever eating hummus. Seriously, I'd choose skydiving, bungee jumping, and being airlifted into a back alley in a foreign country over hummus. But by just saying I hadn't reached my food adventurous stage YET, she created the possibility in my brain that one day I will be more food adventurous. And I am! Comparatively at least.

Your instinct that it is about control and anxiety may be spot on; for me, much more about anxiety. (I grew up with lots of chaos, alcoholic patents, etc. Familiar foods were comfort. Safety. They still are. I'm insanely brand loyal. I've never had, and never intend to have, tuna that is not Bumble Bee. I don't trust other brands to taste the same, and what I want is sameness. Predictability. Safety.)

I disagree vehemently that hunger is the solution. My aunt believed that and refused to feed me anything familiar when I stayed with her one summer. I refused to eat for three days...not out of stubbornness, but fear. Finally, famished, I forced myself to eat the spinach salad and fondue she offered, out of desperation. A few bites in and I ran to throw up. She still wouldn't let me have anything but water for another day, until I passed out and hit my head. I was a GOOD kid, not a disobedient one. I didn't deserve to be starved, and I never felt so unloved and abandoned as I did when I was starved as punishment.

What HELPS is familiarity and a sense of safety. I will NOT try something new when I am scared and hungry. But if I feel safe and full, I might. Eating at a new place or a new person's home us HUGELY anxiety producing. If I can see one familiar item on the table...like, rolls, or carrots, or corn, I am immediately relieved and more likely to take a bite of something less safe.

My college roommate also helped me make connections between safe foods and new ones. I live potatoes, for instance. After 4 years she got me to try kidney beans by explaining that they were basically just tiny baked potatoes with jackets on. She cut one and showed me the white fluffy potatoey stuff inside. Now they're one of my favorite protein sources.

If you think that anxiety and safety are issues for your son re food, please don't let him go hungry as others have suggested. Give him one safe option at every meal. One thing on the table that he will willingly choose. That will bring down his anxiety and increase your chances of building on that success and getting him to add one new thing.

Tell your family and others that he's just not food adventurous YET. And love him. It's not a character flaw or a failing on either of your parts if he's got limited food preferences. He doesn't want to disappoint you. Please help him feel safe and ok as he's eating.

Not to sound snarky, I promise, but this situation seems to be at the outer edges of the bell curve of this kind of issue (picky eating) you were dealing with a bad home situation and what appears to be some kind of anxiety or other issue that interfered with your functioning that presented through eating. I'm glad its worked out for you, but all of these anecdotes sometimes are not helpful for the poster and end up putting more fear into them. Posting one's own very specific trauma is more for the poster than to help the OP.

[Anonymous]

Question- for those who were notoriously picky eaters as children- did any of you grow out of it yourself? My best friend is so insanely picky that if we weren't friends from childhood I probably wouldn't invite her to dinner most of the time, its always a production if we go anywhere that is new because she won't already have a favorite to order. She actually jokingly "blames" her mom for giving in every night when she was a kid, but also knows that its not logically anyone else's fault. What's hard is that you can tell she laments not being a more flexible eater ( I think she feels bad that the group's dinner decision is always made around her) but at the same time its something so ingrained that she doesn't seem to have the will to change it.

Did anyone else just change it on their own? Happen naturally? I mean for very picky eaters, not the normal progression of one's palette changing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, I am 41 and may be your worst nightmare: I am still an insufferably picky eater. I went through phases as a kid when all I would eat were flattened hamburger rolls. I'm better than that now, much better, but still very picky. Here are a few thoughts about what I know now and what helps me.

First, the "he's picky" label --STOP using it now. It will stick. It will BE his self concept. Just stop it.

My college roommate got me to try more new foods than anyone in my life before or since. You know what she said once about me that rocked my world? She said, "Mary's one of the bravest people I know. She just hasn't hit her adventurous stage yet when it comes to food."

She was so right! I'll parachute out of a plane today, but I have absolutely no intention of ever eating hummus. Seriously, I'd choose skydiving, bungee jumping, and being airlifted into a back alley in a foreign country over hummus. But by just saying I hadn't reached my food adventurous stage YET, she created the possibility in my brain that one day I will be more food adventurous. And I am! Comparatively at least.

Your instinct that it is about control and anxiety may be spot on; for me, much more about anxiety. (I grew up with lots of chaos, alcoholic patents, etc. Familiar foods were comfort. Safety. They still are. I'm insanely brand loyal. I've never had, and never intend to have, tuna that is not Bumble Bee. I don't trust other brands to taste the same, and what I want is sameness. Predictability. Safety.)

I disagree vehemently that hunger is the solution. My aunt believed that and refused to feed me anything familiar when I stayed with her one summer. I refused to eat for three days...not out of stubbornness, but fear. Finally, famished, I forced myself to eat the spinach salad and fondue she offered, out of desperation. A few bites in and I ran to throw up. She still wouldn't let me have anything but water for another day, until I passed out and hit my head. I was a GOOD kid, not a disobedient one. I didn't deserve to be starved, and I never felt so unloved and abandoned as I did when I was starved as punishment.

What HELPS is familiarity and a sense of safety. I will NOT try something new when I am scared and hungry. But if I feel safe and full, I might. Eating at a new place or a new person's home us HUGELY anxiety producing. If I can see one familiar item on the table...like, rolls, or carrots, or corn, I am immediately relieved and more likely to take a bite of something less safe.

My college roommate also helped me make connections between safe foods and new ones. I live potatoes, for instance. After 4 years she got me to try kidney beans by explaining that they were basically just tiny baked potatoes with jackets on. She cut one and showed me the white fluffy potatoey stuff inside. Now they're one of my favorite protein sources.

If you think that anxiety and safety are issues for your son re food, please don't let him go hungry as others have suggested. Give him one safe option at every meal. One thing on the table that he will willingly choose. That will bring down his anxiety and increase your chances of building on that success and getting him to add one new thing.

Tell your family and others that he's just not food adventurous YET. And love him. It's not a character flaw or a failing on either of your parts if he's got limited food preferences. He doesn't want to disappoint you. Please help him feel safe and ok as he's eating.

Not to sound snarky, I promise, but this situation seems to be at the outer edges of the bell curve of this kind of issue (picky eating) you were dealing with a bad home situation and what appears to be some kind of anxiety or other issue that interfered with your functioning that presented through eating. I'm glad its worked out for you, but all of these anecdotes sometimes are not helpful for the poster and end up putting more fear into them. Posting one's own very specific trauma is more for the poster than to help the OP.

No worries, I'm not offended, and I'm aware that my anecdote is not data...but neither is anyone else's.

For the record, I'm pretty well adjusted (don't have any generalized anxiety, for example) and my childhood wasn't complete hell. I also had two older brothers who would eat pretty much anything. And my aunt wasn't intentionally cruel; she was quite good to me in many ways, but she was just certain that she could "break" my picky-ness with simple hunger, and it didn't work.

I'm also a teacher and I've worked with quite a few kids who are pretty extreme picky eaters, and I *have* seen a lot of commonality there, particularly with anxiety, and commonly with divorce/custody anxiety. I'm not at all blaming good parents for this---I'm saying that you don't have to be a bad parent to have a kid who has anxiety that manifests itself around food.

I do think the generalized takeaways that may be helpful to many parents of picky eaters are the suggestion to label the challenge as "not yet adventurous with food" or "just starting to expand his food tastes" (something like that) and the idea that fear, anxiety, and hunger rarely will result in expanding a palette (except perhaps in cases of extreme starvation). If a child knows he or she has a safe source of food, he/she may be more willing to try something new. I'm also a big proponent of building bridges to new foods...connecting familiar textures, similar tastes.

[Anonymous]

I think I was a pretty picky eater... I wasn't limited to chicken nuggets and pizza (like my kids are) b/c we didn't have nuggets and rarely had pizza. But, I grew up with a pretty limited range of foods that were offered (meat and potatoes). It wasn't until after college that the social pressure influenced me to learn to like foods I'd never eaten before: I "taught" myself to eat broccoli, cooked carrots, mushrooms, peppers, strawberries, cauliflower, shrimp, beans, etc. I still wouldn't be called an adventurous eater, but I can eat at public gatherings and not be the one who pushes things to the side.

I have a child who is a very picky eater and I sure hope he outgrows it at some point. He basically lives on carbs and dairy, all day, everyday. I was never THAT picky. But, I know that starving a child who is already scraping the 5th percentile (for weight) is not a good solution. I've stopped making "special" meals b/c at least half the time he won't eat it and it makes me really frustrated that I spent the time trying to please him. So, for now, I'm just making one family meal -- but I try to make sure there is at least one carb that he likes. He usually goes to the fridge for a yogurt or cheese stick to add to it. I'm o.k. with that (cereal would be o.k. too). HE has to make the choice. It's as true as it ever was -- you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make 'em drink!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Question- for those who were notoriously picky eaters as children- did any of you grow out of it yourself? My best friend is so insanely picky that if we weren't friends from childhood I probably wouldn't invite her to dinner most of the time, its always a production if we go anywhere that is new because she won't already have a favorite to order. She actually jokingly "blames" her mom for giving in every night when she was a kid, but also knows that its not logically anyone else's fault. What's hard is that you can tell she laments not being a more flexible eater ( I think she feels bad that the group's dinner decision is always made around her) but at the same time its something so ingrained that she doesn't seem to have the will to change it.

Did anyone else just change it on their own? Happen naturally? I mean for very picky eaters, not the normal progression of one's palette changing.

My younger brother was super picky, very sensitive to small differences in taste and texture and smell, too. He's now 39 and continues to be extremely picky. There are only a few foods he eats. He definitely is aware that his picky eating causes social problems and he very much wishes he could change. But he can't.

[Anonymous]

decent article about adult picky eaters and severe selective eating disorder: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/03/01/pickiness-the-secret-eating-disorder-nobody-s-talking-about.html

[Anonymous]

I had a perfect childhood and great, supportive parents and I am still (29) a very picky eater. I basically eat only white foo, like a toddler. I WISH I could learn to eat more so that I could stop being a problem for group dinners and work lunches. I admire people who can eat something to be polite. I routinely lie to explain why I am not eating (I am vegetarian, I eat kosher, I am getting over the flu, etc.) and people usually assume that I am anorexic, which I am not. I love to eat, but I prefer to eat the same few things.

I have slowly gotten better over time, mostly since senior year of college. What worked for me was slowly branching out into foes that were similar to those I already ate. For example, I liked bread, so I tried a bagel (with peanut butter) and learned to like it. Encourage your son to try small bites of something more than once. My nutritionist said that you have to try something five times to know if you like it,because the first four times your are simply reacting to the novelty. But just because I like bread and bananas does not mean that I like banana bread. Small steps. Also, you will lose credibility very quickly if you try to go to quickly and assure that he will like something and then he does not. Tat will just prove that you don't get what it is like.

I disagree that your son is trying to control you if he is like me. Instead, he is trying to control his pickiness as best he can.

[Anonymous]

I had a picky eater until age 4 (3 options for dinner, 2 veggies, 1 fruit) and still has issues at age 7 but in no way limited. What I did is make their favorite foods from scratch (no spaghetti o's- buy similar looking pasta and add sauce.. in our case fish sticks, I made them from scratch but to look like the frozen ones)- made it look like DC's usual meal but it was from scratch. I gradually changed things to a different form, same taste (such as pasta- DC could only eat kraft mac and cheese- I switched to rigatoni with a home made cheese sauce). I started tying dessert to dinner (doing well- not having to eat everything- and I started increasing the amounts so that most everything was a good size- got larger plates to make it look like not as much.. DC is slender). We only give sweets for dessert so it's a huge deal. I then started switching snack to fruits only- strawberries with vanilla sugar- whatever- but snacks are now only fruit- and they may get salty items like crackers if they eat their fruit (my other DC is not picky but is learning to imitate DC1). I made a lamb ragu tonight which showed pieces of finely chopped carrots. I use dried onions chopped when it's too obvious since this throws DC off.. anyway, I had chopped celery and carrots. DC ate all the pasta and left lamb ragu- I try to make dinner engaging- conversation (what is the largest mammal?) and may use a book- such as today was a riddles book (we are moving away from this but this helped). So- I would not turn the page until every child took a bite- gradually DC ate everything except for two spoonfuls of the controversial sauce. DC eats veal scallopine, beef stew, shrimp, asparagus, cucumbers, cantaloupe, watermelon etc.. We all eat the same meal. I miss some of the spicy items (such as ancho chile shrimp fajitas) but we're ok. Tomorrow night is meatloaf burgers and broccoli, next night shrimp pad thai.. I really hope this helps- I was at my wits end since DH and I both love any food and are somewhat foodies, DC2 will eat brie, shrimp with cocktail sauce (and say "yummy!) but DC1 is the picky one.

[Anonymous]

My until-very-recently-picky eater (13) all of a sudden turned adventurous -- I am not sure what happened, but he now orders new and spicy things at restaurants (and eats them! hurray!) so there is hope.

[Anonymous]

Adult picky eaters-- were your parents adventorous eaters?

My oldest (7.5) eats anything--mussels, clam pizza, spinach, etc. My youngest was SEVERELY picky---to the point I almost got him evaluated. It was pain-staking to get him to try anything. He just turned 5 and is so much better now--but still fairly basic.

I grew up with a dad that was always taking us to hole-in-the wall ethnic restaurants and cooking up a storm. The man loves food. He is 1/2 Italian. I was eating all types of cuisine and my dad's enthusiasm for it helped interest me. My husband grew up in the Midwest with fairly bland food and a mom that didn't cook and we opened his eyes to food. He now eats anything.

I am hoping the love of food my large family has---holidays and trips revolve around the food--will rub off on my younger one. It seems to be working. We also feed the boys earlier since DH works late and I think kids that grow up around the dinner table with everyone sometimes do better with food. Once my youngest started eating family style at lunch in his preschool---you have to eat what they serve---he got infinitely better about tasting foods and his repetoire expanded. I was guilty of getting stuck in a rut of feeding him only what he would eat--but his growth had really slowed down around 2-3 years and I wanted to be sure to get the proper nutrients. Now that he's caught up and older I don't bend as much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Adult picky eaters-- were your parents adventorous eaters?

My oldest (7.5) eats anything--mussels, clam pizza, spinach, etc. My youngest was SEVERELY picky---to the point I almost got him evaluated. It was pain-staking to get him to try anything. He just turned 5 and is so much better now--but still fairly basic.

I grew up with a dad that was always taking us to hole-in-the wall ethnic restaurants and cooking up a storm. The man loves food. He is 1/2 Italian. I was eating all types of cuisine and my dad's enthusiasm for it helped interest me. My husband grew up in the Midwest with fairly bland food and a mom that didn't cook and we opened his eyes to food. He now eats anything.

I am hoping the love of food my large family has---holidays and trips revolve around the food--will rub off on my younger one. It seems to be working. We also feed the boys earlier since DH works late and I think kids that grow up around the dinner table with everyone sometimes do better with food. Once my youngest started eating family style at lunch in his preschool---you have to eat what they serve---he got infinitely better about tasting foods and his repetoire expanded. I was guilty of getting stuck in a rut of feeding him only what he would eat--but his growth had really slowed down around 2-3 years and I wanted to be sure to get the proper nutrients. Now that he's caught up and older I don't bend as much.

Super picky adult eater here. My parents weren't exactly gourmet eaters, and we didn't have an eating out budget, but they were definitely more adventurous than me -- they'd eat all sorts of fish and meat that I wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole. Now, as an adult, I do have a real affinity for very spicy food, which my parents never served, but I'm still really really picky about WHAT is spiced -- I love hot chicken vindaloo, for instance, but I'll spend an hour picking the crunchy seeds that the restaurant mixes into the white basmati rice before I actually eat it. (I've got more of a thing about texture than flavor, I guess.)

Maybe if my parents were MUCH more adventurous it might have made a difference...like, if I was missing out on family experiences as a kid or something - but I don't think their expanded tastes made much of a difference to me. They kept cooking food that I wouldn't eat.

[Anonymous]

Each night, I make one dinner and one dinner only! Anyone who doesn't like it is free to make him/herself a bowl of cereal or a sandwich. But I'm not gonna lift a finger to help them. And if they actually eat the meal I put upon their plate, they will get dessert. 90% of the time, they eat what I make.

Also, when I am planning meals for the week, I ask everyone (including DH) to pick one dinner they would like that week. they really like choosing, and it saves me from having to think about it!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Question- for those who were notoriously picky eaters as children- did any of you grow out of it yourself? My best friend is so insanely picky that if we weren't friends from childhood I probably wouldn't invite her to dinner most of the time, its always a production if we go anywhere that is new because she won't already have a favorite to order. She actually jokingly "blames" her mom for giving in every night when she was a kid, but also knows that its not logically anyone else's fault. What's hard is that you can tell she laments not being a more flexible eater ( I think she feels bad that the group's dinner decision is always made around her) but at the same time its something so ingrained that she doesn't seem to have the will to change it.

Did anyone else just change it on their own? Happen naturally? I mean for very picky eaters, not the normal progression of one's palette changing.

My little brother was insanely picky, and now he is in his mid 20s and still is. It is my opinion, and this is only my opinion, that catering to picky eating reinforces anxiety and fear of trying new things, weather it is food or something else. That making such a simple decision of whether or not to try a new food turns into a complicated over thought out chaotic event. Same as meeting new people, trying a new activity, etc. My brother stresses about food, if he comes to visit my parents still want me to make him a separate meal. It is so stupid.

Trying new food should be exciting, you never know what it will taste like, what pleasures it might bring. Take the anxiety away, it won't help anyone.