This Question-and-Answer session came from the Soul of Discipline webinar Kim hosted last year. This question of how to help our picky eaters branch out into new food groups and develop lifelong, healthy habits is so pertinent for many of us. We hope you glean some good ideas from this discussion and share any of your own struggles/successes around this issue in the comments below!
Question: Do you recommend instructing a child what to eat instead of giving them a choice? It feels like I am forcing them to eat something that they do not like, and I am afraid that they may develop aversion to food in the future.
Kim says…
Yes, I sure had this worry as well. Fortunatel,y I had some conversation with number of dietary experts, nutritionists, naturopaths and pediatricians in preparing a research project into a non-medicated approach to working with Attention Priority Issues (API). A part of the study helped my colleague, Bonnie River, and I develop what we called “The Attention Diet.”
Putting together the puzzle of food refusal of young children was one of our key aims. You can come up with the greatest diet for kids, but what if they won’t eat it (image that)? What emerged for us was a specific strategy for food type introduction. Here’s how it goes…
o Really be determined to make this work. Know that you are doing something that will benefit your child throughout life.
o Picture the process going well.
o Picture yourself staying calm (ish) through the whole process. – Start Small
o For example, take a food group such as brassica and look for the most palatable vegetable in it such as broccoli that is slightly sweeter than some of the others. Or maybe something that you have a hunch will be less likely to be rejected.
o Put a very small piece of this vegetable in the meal mixed with other foods the child enjoys. Cut it up small enough so that the taste is minimal.
KEY POINT: Make sure the texture of any spoon full the child eats is something he likes but the flavor of the broccoli is present. The way the brain works for most children is like a series of gates leading to acceptance. The first gate is usually texture. If that gate opens then the chances of the flavor being accepted are much higher, particularly if there is only a small amount of a new flavor contained.
o Build up the amount of broccoli, etc., over time.
– Stay Close & Keep it Familiar
o Light a candle… every meal time.
o Say a thank you verse…every meal time.
o Hum a familiar song as you feed a young child.
o Tell or a funny or great moment of the day.
KEY POINT: This is a great way to keep the child from moving into her fight, flight, freeze & refuse brain.
– Insist
o Avoid bargaining.
“No, we will have as much a daddy feels is right.”
KEY POINT: Just a very small amount will suffice of the food group. The feedback we have received is that after around a dozen repetitions of the specific food, starting in tiny portions and building it up, the food will very likely be accepted and can become a normal part of the diet. Also it often means that the introduction of other members of the food group will be far less problematic.
o Avoid desert bribery
“If we have just three spoon full’s of broccoli then we can have some ice cream.” This signals that the whole deal is up for negotiation and meals time turns into collective bargaining sessions.
– Follow Through
o Don’t give up. Remember it will likely take up to a dozen introductions of the specific food.
If your child rejects the food, that’s fine. Your way of controlling the situation is to dial back the amount of the specific food if it is meeting resistance and mixing it in with even more appealing textures. But don’t give up.
One mother joked to me that she had to tell herself several times that it was “somewhat unlikely” that anyone in her family would die of starvation and that if she stuck to her convictions mild hunger would not only be a good friend to the process but would help her achieve compliance in other problematic areas. Which as exactly what happened.