Not A Fussy Eater, But Still Making A Fuss.
On last month’s post Is My Child A Fussy Eater?, I described four situations where children behaved differently at meal time.
This time, I would like to go a little deeper into those four stories and briefly discuss what could be going on under the surface…
Story #1
Juli (5yo) asked me if she could “taste it first” before I spread the yellow jam (marmalade) on her toast. She always has butter and red jam (berries) on her toast, but that afternoon, she felt like trying the other jam. After the taste test, she decided “It tastes funny, but I’ll have this one today”.
Like most children, Juli is curious. But she is also confident enough to transfer that curiosity to eating. Not all children are. The marmalade tastes funny, still she is willing to give it a go… I really need to follow up on this and see if she will have it more times in the future!
Story #2
I cooked the Bolognese sauce with grated onions and carrots, very finely grated, in the food processor! Even with my glasses on, I could not spot anything but the granules of minced beef in it! Jack (3yo), very skillfully I must say, managed to pick out of the sauce every tiny fragment of onion he found. Not the carrot fragments, just the onion’s! He enjoyed the pasta and the sauce, but wouldn’t eat the onion bits.
I know Jack likes onions because, if he didn’t, he wouldn’t have eaten the sauce at all. He’s just not aware of it yet. And his issue with onions could just be the texture… We don’t know for sure. But I wouldn’t remove onions from foods offered to him as he is happy – ok, maybe not happy as it might annoy him a little – to pick it out and then eat the rest of the food. It is a common part of the process of learning to like foods. One day we will notice he won’t be picking the onion out of his food anymore! (Edit to up-date: Jack is 4.5yo now and doesn’t pick onion bits out of his food anymore!)
Story #3
Most days at day care, Mike’s (4yo) lunchbox will be empty by just after lunch. By that time of the day, he will have smashed his flavoured yoghurt, pureed fruit, half muffin, dried fruit and cheese stick. Not every day he will eat his pasta, sent for lunch. Because there is usually nothing left in his lunchbox, the educators will offer him something from the kitchen for his afternoon snack. If he is offered anything cheesy or sweet (not whole fruit though), he will eat it, everything else will be rejected.
Even though Mike is already 4 years old he can’t use cutlery and only eats pureed foods, mostly straight from a pouch, or finger foods – or uses his hands to eat his pasta, usually sent for lunch in his lunchbox.
What we see here is a vicious cycle: Mike has been offered baby food for most of his life and given very little encouragement to use cutlery and eat foods of appropriate textures for his age. So, he finds it challenging to eat some foods, and rejects them. This behaviour compels his caregivers to only offer foods that don’t present a challenge and he will accept. And the cycle goes on…
Children develop and progress when presented with reasonable challenges, appropriate for their developmental stage. The older Mike gets, the harder it will be for him to catch-up with his peers and to develop into enjoying a wide variety of foods.
Mike also finds it hard to wait for mealtimes and will snack several times in between meals until his stock is finished! Probably for the fear he will go hungry, his educators are happy to allow him to snack at any time.
I’ve witnessed battle after battle with him, and other children, at lunch time. Most of those episodes happened because the child wasn’t hungry at lunch time. I think you can guess why Mike usually refuses his lunch at day care, right? Yep! His belly is full from snacking all morning!
Story #4
Bruce (3yo) spends meal times whinging, sometimes crying, with his head down onto his folded arms on the edge of the table. He never looks at the food on offer neither eats it or drinks anything. Any attempt of encouragement is replied with a shout and both hands blocking his mouth. He will usually spend the whole day on an empty stomach, but sometimes will accept a bottle of milk. If offered Oreo biscuits or Jatz crackers, he will very slowly eat one or two pieces. He also eats commercial chicken nuggets. Nothing else!
So, what is a caregiverr supposed to do? Offer Oreos, Jatz and chicken nuggets, right? He can’t spend the whole day on an empty stomach! That would be alright if Oreos were full-packed with fibre and vitamins, and Jatz a great source of protein and minerals, and commercial chicken nuggets were a powerhouse of good fats and carbohydrates! Dream on!!
Recently, Bruce has had his tonsils removed. More fussy eaters than you think will present some sort of health problem that prevents them from becoming proficient eaters. Tonsillitis is a very common one. It makes it painful to swallow the softest of foods and the child often develops an aversion to eating. The struggle may persist for some time after the surgery and that’s because the poor thing will need to learn to trust food, and adults offering it, all over again!
Naturally Fussy?
The whole point of me describing these scenarios to you is to illustrate the reality that no child will make a fuss and refuse to eat because they are bad little people or because the devil has taken control of their soul and wants to haunt and torture you. Or because that’s just how kids are: naturally fussy! No no!!
Young children are not yet able to express themselves and verbalise struggles that they are not aware of themselves. It is the adult-in-charge’s job to find out what the root problem is and support the child to overcome it, so they can develop a positive relationship with food and grow into a healthy adult.
I devote my time to helping parents and educators in doing just that. At times, a few habit tweaks is just what it takes to turn fuss into fun. Believe me, it is possible! It is not just me telling you this. Parents and educators who I worked with tell the same and even science tell us the same!(1) Science?! Who would have thought?! :-)
References
(1) The Spectrum of Picky Eating. Webinar (2020). Dr. Chris Smith & Rebecca Thomas (UK)
Featured picture by Cottonbro
