I get asked all the time how we managed to broaden Rose’s diet. Just to reassure you all, we come from a place of white crackers smothered in butter 20 times daily.
Requests (demands) not being adhered to being met with absolute aggression, meltdowns and nigh on nervous break downs! (Me).
Rose was a different child back then. She was completely off this planet for want of a better phrase, impossible to play with, potty train, waking every half an hour at night, melt downs galore, no speech at all, and constant infections – ear, eye and diarroeh and sickness. I can remember a few days out in particular that were so a bad she would kick, bite and punch me if the day wasn’t completely on her terms. It felt never ending, and looking back her body was crying out for help. At that time I remember some days, wondering if I would be able to cope long term with our situation. I felt totally helpless, isolated, confused and like an utter failure as a parent.
Fast forward a few years, lots of research, a new career path and a different way of living and things are much easier. Rose is now verbal, potty trained, happy, and I can’t remember the last time she had a melt down. Days out are fun and enjoyable, and her health is surging. Twenty nine Jacob’s crackers are no longer a part of our daily diet and Rose enjoys a really diverse variety of nourishing foods.
Below you’ll find my top tips for transitioning diet = these are strategies that we have used and have been affective and have helped us evolve Rose’s diet. This a process and wherever you might find yourself on this journey ie your child eats one food or they eat a range of food – these strategies will be useful in any case in helping your child to enjoy the idea of food again!
Most importantly – Understand the reasons why there are certain food cravings/aversions in the first place..
- Sensory issues
Eating uses all of our senses. How the food looks on the plate, how it smells, how it feels and the sound it makes when we are eating can all affect how our children might feel about a food. Even the position their body is in can have an impact. Food play is so wonderful in these cases, because you can help your child’s other senses to feel comfortable in a very relaxed no pressured setting as a stepping stone to accepting foods.
Sensory integration techniques can also be useful in these instances.
Certain textures can also be distressing, or they might gravitate towards others. This is a key tool for us parents to use! I found with Rose that keeping the key sensory preference the same when trying to expand diet was really useful. For example Rose loved crackers, so I would find other foods that were crunchy such as carrot sticks, frozen peas, nuts etc.
- Microbiome
As you can from the weirdly set out, back to front visual that I created, the microbiome plays a huge part in picky eating! It works as a vicious cycle – the more restricted the diet becomes, the less and less likely the body is to want to eat anything but the foods that are feeding the bad bacteria.
- Addictive foods
Most processed foods contain addictive substances such as MSG. These enhance the flavour of foods and make the body crave more of them.
Foods such as gluten and casein can also become addictive because they can act like opioids in the body.
This is why so many parents struggle with removal of processed foods and things such as mac and cheese, goldfish crackers etc. Real whole foods will never compete with foods which are engineered with specific chemicals to make the brain crave more if them. It is a process and if the child has only been eating these foods removal of them will be like removing substance from an addict!
- Food sensitivities
Food sensitivities can be one of the reasons that children have a restricted diet and eat the same foods over and over. This can be because the body really helpfully tends to crave the foods that it is sensitive to!
Some research suggests that the body can be addicted to the chemical messengers such as histamine and cortisol. These are secreted in response to allergens in the body. Although these foods are damaging, the body experiences a soothing feeling from the chemical messengers – increasing the desire to consume these foods.
Food sensitivities also cause picky eating in the following cycle…
- Poor digestion
Many children struggle with poor digestion. This can be for a number of reasons – deficiencies, low stomach acid etc. In these cases high protein foods such as meat can be painful to digest.
Take the pressure off completely when it comes to eating food;
I know this sounds bizarre and can be so difficult. We all sit down to eat, immediately there is pressure;
- biological need to actually maintain life and you would like for this to happen in an ideal world (keeping your kids alive is one of your main goals)
- Financial – you have paid for the meal (food is expensive!) and so ideally you would like for this food not to be a)thrown on the floor, b) in your face or ultimately scraped of floor or face into c) the bin
- Your time – frustration that you have, spent time and energy cooking this meal, trawling through recipe books thinking ‘they’ll love this’ only for it’s eventual fate to be either a, b or c above.
Children sense our anxiety and stress, Even though you might not outright be saying ‘please eat the food, or I’m actually going to have a nervous breakdown/ neck a whole bottle of wine, because you won’t eat anything and I am actually losing the will to live’ your body language is probably telling them this.
The approach I like to use is to think of every meal as an opportunity for exposure. So even if they aren’t eating the food, the fact that they have even allowed within 3 metres of their vacinity is a win! If you think the meal won’t get eaten, serve a teeny, tiny portion, with enjoyed foods. This is much less overwhelming for them and much less waste for you when the inevitable a, b or c happens. You get less wound up and everybody wins.
If they refuse the served food, try your best not to stress about it. I know this can be challenging, but from my own experiences I find that it sets up an anxiety around the next meal time. After they have gone to bed, I advise buying and installing a punchbag to alleviate stress.
Their food preference is not going to change over night, but you can see each tiny step as a win.
The ethos below is built into us from our own parents, but if you can try to move your mindset away from the focus of;
Meal time + meal + child = empty plate/ full child
and possibly to….
Meal time + meal + child = happy child/ exposed to foods/ positive meal time experience
It’s all about managing your expectations in this game! The end goal is your child actually autonomously wanting to eat and enjoying a range of served foods, with no fear surrounding meal time/ food. If their well-being is being met at meal times it stands you in good stead for future! You are going to be veering them away from really loved, craved, addictive foods. Getting their buy in first is essential!
One thing I think as a parent we constantly worry about is if our kids are eating enough. I have really shifted my focus from that panic and tried to be more relaxed around the full meal not being finished etc. If they eat even a small amount of served foods and say they are full, I try to respect that they are recognising a body function and trust them!
If one second later they ask for a slab of cake then I’m thinking that maybe I was lied to.
But don’t fold!! By serving a loved replacement every time the served meal is refused we are just reinforcing a habit that is so difficult to break. Usually what these children are craving is NOT what their body needs.
If the meal isn’t finished and a preferred food is requested because you know they are hungry my advice would be to give a snack of something that ISN’T loved. But repeatedly serving loved foods when the meal is refused is when a difficult habit gets formed. And ahh those habits in our children – they are so easy to break aren’t they! Pass the wine.
Give as much control as possible within the realms of your own boundaries;
Allowing some form of control and choice whenever possible is key I have found to making different foods more fun and exciting.
The thought of my dinner excites me because I can choose whatever I want! I think by giving our kids some freedom in this area can really help to form positivity and excitement around food.
If your child has communication difficulties there are so may ways to involve them.
You could set yourself a task this week. For example tonight’s dinner. Think of, or even write down all of the ways in which a child might have some form of control over it.
For example;
- Going to the supermarket to buy the food – walk down the veg isle. Let them pick out whatever they like the look of. It really might surprise you. It might end up being the most random thing ever, and it might even open you up to different food! If able you could ask them to pick out something green, or all of the red items and collect them in a basket. A fun activity, no pressure or talk of eating. You could even take a visual of a red piece of card/ green piece of card/ their favourite colour piece of card and ask them to find foods to match the colour.
- Give options like ‘ which green/red/yellow food would you like in your rice/ pasta etc tonight’ Let them pick it out. Or ‘would you like meatballs or fish for dinner?’. They have made the decision here and you can use visuals to support understanding.
- Get out a recipe book and let them flick through the pages. Let them point at what they like the look of, then go to buy the ingredients together. Play a matching game with the recipe book, see what items they can find in the supermarket
- Serve family style – lay all the food out in the centre of the table and allow them to choose whatever they like from a range of foods you have chosen
- Let them help with any meal prep possible – Chopping, getting food from the fridge/ cupboard, mixing
It all sounds like hard work, but when you change your mindset and do these things for enjoyment instead of anxiety about them starving it actually become less of a chore.
Remember that you are the parent. Do things that you feel comfortable with.
Food diaries are essential..
- I’d say before you even begin to make changes, a food diary is one of the cheapest, yet probably most effective things that you can implement to help your child. This gives you so much power, knowledge and you can really quickly become an expert in knowing which foods are causing your child grief! After just a few weeks I noticed huge differences in Rose if we ate lots of tomato based sauces (these are all organic and nothing added/just tomatoes!). Stimming would increase, defiance and anger. After research, I understood why – SEE COMMON SENSITIVITIES. If your child has food sensitivities they may be addicted to certain foods, and some might be painful to digest and cause unpleasant symptoms that might cause anxiety surrounding those foods. The food diary is really helpful in this case! The diary we use can be found HERE.
Exposure, exposure, exposure…
When you start out you’ll probably be thinking that the below activities are such a waste of energy and time, when all you want to do is get your child to eat. Genuinely, exposing them constantly to a diverse variety of foods is the base-line for any new food acceptance! This has been instrumental in Rose’s diet transitioning. And it is something that I still practice with my kids daily! I like to think of it as each exposure being one step closer to them picking up a food and eating it. And even if they don’t, they’ve accepted it as part of the family meal/the food may be accepted as part of another meal. There are inevitably going to be foods which they don’t like full-stop. As adults we have preferences too, but living off 2 or 3 food types just isn’t sustainable, and will cause you lots of pain if you are trying to introduce a range of healing foods that diversify the diet.
Remember that it can take 20+ exposures to a food before it is accepted.
Some tips;
- Work on only a limited number of new foods at a time, more than 10 will become overwhelming for you and them
- Offer only one new food and offer it at the same time as foods that the child is already accepting
- Keep portions of new foods small so the offering is not overwhelming.
- Do not pressure the child into tasting the food. It should be the child’s decision
- Describe what the new food tastes like so they know what to expect
- Be a positive role model and taste the food yourself.
- Offer new foods during family meals when possible
- Serve family style – where everything is laid out in the middle of the table for the child to see and smell and have autonomy over what they are eating.
See THIS blog post on food play.
I hope this helps! As always if you have any questions or want to connect more – please send me a message. I can be be found @thehappyhealthyunicorn on Instagram.
