The journey to food heaven with my fussy eater, Lillie, trudges ever slowly forward. In the last couple of weeks, I have been trying a little experiment with her to see if I can get her to eat new foods and bit by bit, it has been working.
Parenting Advice
With the help of Lorna Clark, a Specialist Parenting Consultant, I have been trying a new tactic. I have had fantastic advice in the past, so I was overjoyed when they asked if I would like advice from Lorna. When I read in Lorna’s profile that she specialises in helping children who are fussy eaters (amongst other things), I knew she was the expert for me.
Tough Mummy
Lorna advised me for a few weeks to take away all the foods which I wasn’t happy about Lillie eating, mainly chocolate cereals, chocolate spread and the endless supply of chips, and instead only offered foods which I was happy for her to eat.
Could we do it?
At the dinner table, the talk was not to be centred around food or eating at all but general chitchat about what we had been doing that day, things we were looking forward to. If Lillie chose not to eat her food, then she could leave the table, but she was not to be offered alternative foods. If necessary, she would go to bed with no food. When I read Lorna’s advice, I knew that I would be in for a tough few weeks, but I also knew that I had to give it a try, and so I did.
Grocery Shopping
On a shopping trip to Tesco to do the groceries, I told Lillie that chocolate cereals, chocolate spread and chips were no longer available to her and that we needed to find new foods to try. To my surprise she seemed quite acceptable to the idea so as we walked around the shop we talked about the different foods she could try and she chose a couple of new foods.
At this point I would like to say, these are by no means foods that I feel are a ‘healthy’ choice for her but foods which I thought I had a greater chance of getting her to eat and can be adapted as time goes on.
New Foods
She chose cheese and tomato pizza, fish fingers and turkey burgers for tea, she also chose plain pasta, Peppa Pig and Hello Kitty Spaghetti as well as strawberry jam for sandwiches and cinnamon flakes for breakfast.
First Night Success
The first night she asked if she could have pizza and she ate the whole lot, to my joy because she had eaten all her tea, Ollie also ate all of his tea too – double breakthrough!
One Step Backwards
The next day I told her that she was having jam sandwiches for lunch and that if she didn’t eat those she wasn’t allowed to eat the rest of her lunch. When I collected her from school I was presented with a full lunch bag, she had refused to eat the whole lot!
and another!
We came home for tea and I made pasta with a smooth bolognese sauce but only put a spoonful of the sauce on the side of her plate. Again she refused to even try it, she said she would only eat the pasta if it was uncooked.
She went to bed that night, having eaten no lunch and no tea, and I went to bed feeling like the worst mother in the world.
A New Day
In the morning, she woke up at 6 am screaming for a tummy ache and went downstairs to eat a full bowl of cinnamon flakes. Again, at lunch, she was presented with jam sandwiches, but again, she refused them.
Thankfully, her keyworker is completely with me on the food front, so at afternoon snack time, she told Lillie that since she didn’t eat her lunch, she wasn’t allowed a snack until she had eaten one of her jam sandwiches. This time, she ate the whole lot without so much as a whimper.
Baby Steps
Since then, Little Bean has also ‘tried’ cheese sandwiches and Dairylea sandwiches but has said she doesn’t like them. For this I’m not bothered at all, at least she has actually tried them.
Lillie the Chef
Last night I had a brainwave and asked Lillie if she wanted to help me make some pancakes for tea, my thinking being they were basically eggs and milk which would be good for her. She jumped at the chance and helped me to make the batter and then I cooked them.
The picture above is Lillie eating up her pancake like it was the last meal on earth, she loved it and went on to have one more as well as a cake, a bag of crisps AND a yoghurt! Whilst I know that we are a long way off from the little foodie that I would like, for now, I am happy that she is beginning to try new foods.
The journey to now has been one of the most difficult journeys of my life but she is totally worth it and despite her stubbornness (which she gets from me) I wouldn’t change her for the world!
Excellent news! Well done LB :-). Well done to you too Sabina, it must be tough going but you stick to your guns and try and keep calm. Got everything crossed that LB continues to impress, I’m sure with yours and hubby’s love she will suceed xxxxxxxxx
I just came across your blog and I it is really interesting. I have also had fussy eaters and I thought I would post and say “keep going” :). My first son had got to the stage where he would only eat caulieflower cheese and yoghurt then I had it all over again with my second son…who was egg allergic and as a result ended up very suspicious of food and wouldn’t try anything new! I took the same strategy as you…slowly slowly introducing new foods and just didn’t offer them foods I didn’t want them to eat.
They are now aged 10 and 8 and they will pretty much eat anything…I must have served up broccoli about 300 times to my son before he would eat it without questioning and it took 4 years of eating homemade chilli con carne before he would eat it without picking the kidney beans out! Sounds like you have had some great advice and good luck.
Thank you so much for taking the time to respond to this post its really nice to hear from someone who knows how stressful it can be with fussy eaters, especially when they have found the light at the end of the tunnel. Every week is different for us these days, sometimes she will shock me and randomly pick up something new to try others she won’t entertain it. I’m just happy when she does and she is still a healthy little girl so that is what is most important. Thank you x