Picky Eater - How Many Missed Meals Is Ok? and Crankiness from Hunger

The method I have seen work is prepare meals with at least one known acceptable food. Serve him small servings of all the dishes for that meal. He must clean his plate for seconds of anything. At the first sign of a tantrum, tell him that the meal is over, send him to take a nap, and put his plate in the refrigerator. When he comes down later for a snack, offer the uneaten plate. Each new meal is a new plate (don't keep the food around for days forcing him to eat it).

You need to just do it already.

You're worrying and wondering....and procrastinating. Feed him lunch and don't make any substitutions and don't go out of your way to cook something he likes. He needs to develop his tastebuds to reflect the family's.

So, you're like the old me, a dictator who is going to be obeyed regardless of the consequences to the child.

He's not going to conform to your rules, he's going to go hungry day after day after day and then end up sick and it will be your fault. It was my fault when it happened at our house. That's when I realized I was making really bad decisions about food and meal time. I decided to loosen up and have a happier life especially at meal times.

There has to be a happier area where you can get some of what you want and he gets some of what he wants.

The more YOU focus on is conforming to your dictates the more he's going to dig in his heals.

SO let's say he only wants mac and cheese day after day after day after day. You can hid yellow veggies in it. Get the recipe book about hiding foods in kids food. I can't remember what it's called.

Will he eat pasta? With sauce? You can hide beets and carrots and onions and more in spaghetti sauce if you do it in a minimal way so they don't taste it.

There are ways to get what you want without having a war about it and trying to force a 3 year old to conform. He needs to grow up having a voice too. He doesn't get to have one about big things but he should be able to make choices about small things. This is how he learns to make bigger decisions later on.

When you cook your meal make him something that he loves then add what you love to the meal. When you take a bite of the food you like make sounds and say how yummy it is. Don't make him take any or ask him to try it. Just make it sound like the best thing that has ever been in your mouth.

He'll be interested at some point, when the pressure to try foods he doesn't want to try is over and does not exist anymore. The less pressure you put on him the more willing he'll be to try new things. My granddaughter was 8 before she started trying new foods. She eats a lot more things now.

All I can say is that making a stand and trying to force the kids to eat foods they don't want to eat is not something they will respond to. Letting them have more freedom and they'll start to relax and be more interested in trying new things.

It took my son 2 missed meals to realize that I wasn't kidding about this battle. :)

Now he knows that he can choose not to eat what I serve, but he won't be getting anything else until the next meal. Which may be breakfast if we're at dinner.
These days (he's 5 now), he'll usually sit there and frump, announcing that he doesn't like what I've put out. And then 10 minutes later will take a bite, and announce that he does like it. The rule is that he has to at least try it.
I usually have enough sides with a meal to fill him up. So it's also gotten him to expand his palette.
Victory, me!

This is exactly how you have to play it. It may take a few days....

I'd also suggest having something that you know he will eat.

Also, why not let him pick a few dinners a week and help you make them. 3s like to help, so get him helping and involved.

Have you tried giving him choices? For example, would you like peanut butter and jelly for lunch or yogurt? I am all about picking battles but unless your child will only eat french fries I don't see why he must eat certain things.

I was a terribly picky eater as a child and grew up eating a ridiculous amount of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. My Mother broke all the rules and even gave them to me when I didn't like what she was serving for dinner. As far as vegetables I think I only ate carrots or peas until college!

As an adult I am still somewhat picky, but a very healthy eater with a very healthy weight. I don't really see the point in forcing a child to eat something they don't like.

go, mom! i think your strategy is great, and i'll bet that he won't go more than a day. keep us posted!
khairete
S.

Just keep doing what you're doing. As stubborn as he might be, he won't allow himself to starve. He WILL get hungry enough to eat what you're eating.

Yay, Gamma G! The voice of experience.

He's 3. Is this really the hill you want to die on? You don't have to "serve him only the foods he will eat", but you certainly wouldn't be a happy person if you were only allowed foods you DIDN'T like. Don't make food a battle.

I went so far as to meet with a dietitian because my 2.5 year old is the same way. I don't buy junk, period. If he doesn't eat with the family that's ok for now, he's still little, but he needs to eat. If all he eats at dinner is a role, or at lunch some applesauce, then so be it, I serve breakfast, a snack, lunch, snack, dinner, snack. breakfast and the snacks I let him decide what he wants from the choices I buy. Yogurt, string cheese, crackers, cut veggies and dip, hummus, p.b. and J's. fruit cups, oatmeal, fresh fruit ect. this way I know that he is getting some nutrition even if he skips a meal or 3. And he has. Only to wake up at 6 am, go to the pantry and demand pancakes and eat 6 of them, with peanut butter and bananas on them. Some days he eats really well, others he won't eat at all and I worry, but while he's small, he isn't underweight, and he's growing, so he's fine.

My son would go two meals. Be strong, this is a battle that is worth fighting. With that said, I try to have two things my boy will eat to every one that is questionable. He doesn't have to eat all of his dinner to be finished and leave the table, but he has to have two bites of each thing. One is a no thank you bite, and the other one is just to make sure he doesn't like it--one can't determine whether or not they like something from one bite alone. He does, however, have to eat all of his dinner to get a treat after dinner. My boy is highly motivated to eat the treat and he will determine if it is worth it to eat the "brussel sprouts" for the treat. He is a very thin and active child, so I don't worry about his weight. Also, I don't let my son have anything but fruits or veggies right before dinner which is when he really lays it on. If he gets cheese or milk out of his dad or someone else-boom he won't eat his dinner. I pay attention to what textures he doesn't like (potatoes are yucky to him). I also make meals somewhat predictable--tacos on Tuesday, mac & cheese on Monday, we have pizza often on Friday. My husband and I wait for date nights to have Chinese, sushi or Thai food. We eat a lot of pasta. One last thing to note--I did only take on the battle for dinner and snack time. For breakfast, I gave in to cereal, pancakes, French toast or waffles (he thinks eggs are weird). And for lunch I pack him p b & j or let him have hot lunch once a week. Good luck-yes he will eat when he is hungry.

I was the pickiest eater as a child. I did battle with my parents regularly and even my siblings got into it against me. The only vegetable I'd eat was french fries, sometimes baked potato. I wouldn't even eat ketchup or peanut butter. I swore as a parent, I'd do better.

When my girls were little, we adopted the "3 Bite Rule". They had to have 3 bites of everything that was served. That was it. Sometimes that meant 3 peas or 3 pieces of corn but once they had their 3 bites, they weren't required to eat any more. We praised them for trying it, didn't nag them to eat any more and eventually they developed a taste for foods they'd previously avoided. I made sure I included something they liked with the dinner each night so they could fill up on other things. Our 3 Bite Rule took the battle out eating. They knew what was expected of them and once they did it, nothing more was said.

The good news is your son will outgrow it. The less you make it a battle, the sooner it'll be over. I now eat almost everything (still don't like ketchup). It took me moving out on my own and learning to cook. My girls are the easiest eaters of all their friends.

I am all for wanting to picking your battles and worrying about nutrition but I have older kids and can't fight with one all day every day, so with my youngest a very picky boy I decided to pick one meal. It's just me and him for breakfast and lunch after the others are off so I offer some of the things he likes, yogurt, roll, cheese always with fruit and dinner he has to eat with the family what is being served. If he doesn't like it and doesn't eat much I know he has eaten healthy earlier and will again tomorrow. No junk maybe a cookie for trying a new fruit or veggie. That's worked for us and has kept it from being a big all out fight. Good luck.

Hunger-based crankiness is due to a drop in blood sugar levels.

There will be MANY battles in your life as a parent; PLEASE don't make one of them food!!! If you force him to eat foods he doesn't like, he will grow up hating food and disliking meal time. My dad did this with my sisters and me when we were little, and there are STILL foods that each of us cannot eat. For me, it's spinach and pot pies of any kind.

Instead, take an approach such as LuckyMom with the 3 bite rule. We have a very similar rule in our house, and it actually came from their pediatrician when I voiced my concerns over his pickiness and it's WORKED. They know that if they don't clean their plate (I don't serve much; they can always ask for more), they don't get snack. Period. And they have each gone to bed without snack a handful of times because they didn't finish their dinner. They know that they won't get anything sweet if they don't eat the healthy. They have surprisingly grown to like foods that they previously didn't like. It's said that babies/kids sometimes need to taste a food about 10 times before they start to develop a taste for it.

Of course, that rule is specifically for dinnertime, but for breakfast and lunch, I make sure I have foods I know they like that are also healthier options. They still get pop tarts every once in a while, and I do cook breakfast on the weekends when they want it. For lunches, if they want apple slices and peanut butter, that's what they can have. It's definitely more healthy than chicken nuggets :)

I also pay close attention to what I'm making for dinner. If the rest of the family wants stuffed peppers, my son knows that I won't force him to eat this because we've had it many times, and he's never liked it (despite the 3 bite rule and how many times he's had to have those 3 bites). So, I gave up and accept that he doesn't like stuffed peppers. Chili is another one he doesn't like.

Food is more about teaching kids how to make healthy choices than a battle about "you WILL eat this." Give him choices: do you want green beans or beets?

I'm reading this as the parent of teenagers, and I'm imagining how establishing that kind of relationship would backfire on me today. Yes, you want to have guidelines, but this kind of battle will eventually come back to bite you. A friend of mine always made sure to offer her kids at least one healthy thing every meal that they would eat. And yes, your son is only 3, but he's not too young to help solve this problem. Tell him you need him to eat enough healthy food every day. Make a poster with pictures of what you consider to be healthy food, and let him suggest some items to go on the poster too. Then tell him he needs to eat something from the poster every meal and let him help in figuring out what that will be. It's okay to have the guidelines that it has to be something that's already in the house and that you can serve the entire family. If he's helping you come up with the menu for the family's dinner he'll feel like a big shot, and if he gets to have input at the grocery store he'll feel empowered as well.

Flash forward 13 years, and maybe this will have contributed to a relationship in which you communicate with each other instead of butting heads with each other.

Good luck!