Picky Eater, Tired of eating the same ole thing.
By jrkirsch75
@jrkirsch75 (72)
United States
October 3, 2012 9:20am CST
My 3 year old daughter, is such a picky eater. She used to eat a little better, but now it is like so hard to give her enough to eat. She's never been much of a meat eater, so no more hotdogs or pepperoni and lunch meat, never cared much for veggies, except for tomatoes and pickles.
Of course, I make do, by giving her stuff she will eat, which isn't good. For example, cheese puffs, fruit snacks, blueberry muffins, teddy grahams. But she won't eat much of anything else, anymore. She will eat cheese, yogurt, and fruit, but she gets binded up and has a problem going #2, yet is difficult to get her to enough fiber. UGH! If I wasn't bald, I would be now, from pulling my hair out.
She is picky on eating pasta one day and not the next, doesn't like sandwiches or peanut butter. It is so hard, sometimes making 2 or 3 different foods for each meal, just to get her to eat. And I don't want to force feed her, but it might come down to that.
I'm in need of help on ideas of how to give her the nutrients and vitamins she needs. Any ideas, from any other picky eater parents.
2 responses
@cutepenguin (6431)
• Canada
3 Oct 12
This sounds frustrating for everyone.
I've heard a lot of suggestions, ranging from just put a little bit of the less popular food on the plate next to the favoured food several times in a row and then gradually move to having the child taste just a bit of it and eventually give them a full serving all the way to advice that basically states put food in front of them and they will eat when they get hungry.
Strategies that have worked with my toddler (who admittedly, gets very hungry so is quite motivated to eat) are:
We put a little bit of a lot of different foods on his plate. We don't give him seconds of anything unless he's eaten quite a bit of the food (not always all the food).
Sometimes if he refuses food from his plate, he'll eat the same food if it's off of our plate. And I have occasionally cut his sandwiches into fun shapes.
And when I babysat a little girl who was a picky eater, I used to cut up veggies and fruits so that they looked like flowers and leaves. She'd eat the flowers, but not the leaves. Another family I worked for used to give their kids homemade smoothies a lot, and their picky kids would drink almost any fruit or veggies that way. My son thinks smoothies are a treat and loves them. We have also made up smoothies and frozen them in popsicle molds as popsicles, and even my picky little cousin thought it was a treat.
@jrkirsch75 (72)
• United States
4 Oct 12
Oh my gosh. Thank you so much. You gave me some great ideas. I just hope they work. I'm surprised that she's even up to 30lbs, because of the lacking of eating. I will definitely have to try the smoothies in the freezer molds and cutting veggies in different shapes.
Thank you so much for your response and I appreciate it.
@alvinmendez69 (28)
• Philippines
3 Oct 12
Well, don't forget to give her a glass of milk. It provides the essentials or nutrients which is not present to some food she eats.
@jrkirsch75 (72)
• United States
3 Oct 12
NONE of us care for milk, very much, but she gets it in her sippy cup before nap and at supper time. I just need figure out how to get the nutrients she is missing by not eating meats, veggies, and beans.
Thank you for your response.
