Alternatives

[lillibet]

I'm curious what other parents think of this post. Our solution has been that Alice doesn't have to eat what she doesn't like at dinner and then she has a before-bed snack of yogurt mixed with oatmeal and fruit, so she won't go to bed hungry, which drastically affects the ease of bedtime. And, mostly Alice will find something on her dinner plate to eat if she's hungry and if it's not a hungry day, very little is acceptable. And she does eat so many things that it hasn't been a big deal. But forewarned is half the octopus, so I think about strategies.

I understand the theory behind what these folks are trying, but in the family I know who did this, the alternative was for the kids to nuke themselves a hot dog and the outcome was two teenagers who really didn't eat anything but hotdogs.

Comments

[bkdelong.livejournal.com]

Hard to say. Our hardest thing is that W has no interest in food per se. He seeks anything possible to distract him from eating whether it be toys or magazines or something belonging something else. He stands in his chair, goes to the bathroom multiple times etc.

Eventually we get him to eat 2/3 of what's on his plate but sometimes it involves spooning things into his mouth while he's distracted. It's embarrassing. It's not so much he doesn't like it.

Though things he thinks he doesn't like we can get a handful of bites into him. Sometimes we propose alternatives but that doesn't seem to make a difference.

And other days he'll plow right through his meal. Haven't quite found the sweet spot yet.

[anotherjen.livejournal.com]

I'm curious: Have you tried just letting him get hungry?

[bkdelong.livejournal.com]

Yup...he gets hyper and even more distracted culminating in belligerence and defiance. So we're doing more mood management in some respects.

[anotherjen.livejournal.com]

Wow. I guess then the thing to do is make sure there are as few distractions around mealtime as possible.

[anotherjen.livejournal.com]

Our rule is that Ilana has to try whatever it is, just one taste. If she rejects it, she can make something for herself. At this point, she can microwave soup or frozen dumplings, or she can make herself a PB&J or cold cereal. She also has to have a fruit or vegetable with whatever she chooses. As her cooking skills improve, I don't care if she wants to make dinner for herself every night. We don't keep junk food in the house, generally, so whatever's around she can have, provided it covers carbs, protein, and produce. There's no dessert if she doesn't follow those guidelines.

I don't think it's necessary for the alternative food to be something boring. I am hoping that by tasting whatever we're having but having no pressure to eat it, Ilana will naturally get more adventurous about food. So far, this method has worked pretty well. I also try to make stuff she's more likely to eat (not "mixed up"), but not always. Sometimes, she thinks something will be yucky but winds up liking it.

I am vehemently opposed to the "just [number] more bites," or "you must eat this much" methods some parents use. It just creates a power struggle and negative food associations.

[firstfrost.livejournal.com]

My sister seems to be having good luck with the "try just one taste" theory with my nieces. The older one is very suspicious of foods she thinks she hasn't had before (she likes macaroni, but declared she didn't like spaghetti, because she didn't remember it), so "try one taste" does seem to lead to not as many foods being icky as she expects.

[kirkcudbright.livejournal.com]

That's pretty much the approach we took with Kylie. She had to try it, then she could go make peanut butter or Cheerios or whatever. (If it was something she had previously rejected, but more than a few months ago, she had to try it again.) She took that option a lot when she was younger, but not now that she's a teenager.

Travel was a challenge when she was a pickier eater. She was 10 the last time we were in Scotland, and didn't like most of what was on offer, but discovered cheese out of desperation. Since then, she hasn't met a cheese she doesn't like, even some I won't touch.

My own childhood was one of "you have to take some of everything, and you have to finish what's on your plate." What a complete waste of time.

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes--past the first bite, we don't ever coerce Alice into eating something she doesn't want. My own childhood was filled with the mixed messages of "eat more" and "eat less" and I'm trying very hard not to repeat that history with my own daughter.

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

By the way, speaking of food, how's your tummy?

[kirkcudbright.livejournal.com]

Much better now, thanks! I blame HMart - too much yummy stuff to eat it all at once - combined with early and deep-seated training in Not Throwing Food Out.

Not a parent, just remembering being a kid

[antikythera.livejournal.com]

I wonder if a hot dog is just yummy enough food that kids will love it anyways. The strategy you linked says the backup food has to be something bland. I assume that's so that if they really hate the meal they have an alternative, but at some point they'll get bored of the cheese/yogurt/tofu and decide to have a crack at the actual meal.

All I remember is that my mother tried to feed me all sorts of wacky stuff, and I ate it. When I was really little, a little of everything my parents were eating went into the food grinder for me. There were, according to my mother, a few phases where I would only eat one category of food, such as green things, orange things, meat, etc.

[xthread.livejournal.com]

I recently had occasion to realize that one of the side effects of growing up in a single parent household was getting a lot more exposure to cooking than I might have otherwise. Which is a pretty useful life skill, as such things go. (I know, somewhat tangential, but relevant to strategies - it's a few years before she's near there yet, but being involved in meal prep is definitely one of those independence and capability-affirming activities.)

[http://users.livejournal.com/urban_faerie_/]

Looking back on my own life I ate what the grown ups were eating pretty much from the time I was able to sit at the table. I always thought this was because there was no such thing as "kid food" in my house growing up. My mom didn't keep junk food or even frozen chicken nuggets in the house. I would go over my friend's house and find their food confusing and scary. I think I barfed the first time I tried kool-aid. To this day fast food still gives me a stomach ache.

My mom had this annoying rule of saying I had to have a, "No thank you serving" of whatever was on my plate that I didn't like (i.e eating one green bean) but she generally didn't force the issue because I ate most things save for a few things I really can't stand to this day... like peas, I still HATE peas. I think kids have much more developed taste buds than adults do so things we think are delicious are things they find yucky or overwhelming or just can't stand the consistency of. So a kid may refuse food for reasons other than being picky or bratty.

As an adult I know plenty of people who are healthy eaters who have picky children, so it is possible that my parents just lucked out. You know, I think a lot of the food wars that happen in families with small children have more to do with kids learning to assert their autonomy over their own bodies and push their boundaries than it does with not liking particular foods. It can be tough to be a kid and have somebody else regulating everything you do with your body, what you eat, when you bathe, use the bathroom and go to bed, etc, even the most in-tune parent isn't going to get it right all the time. Damn it makes me cranky just thinking about it.

I think what you do with Alice is a good compromise. She isn't forced to eat anything but she also isn't rewarded for being picky. This way, she can come to eating a variety of foods on her own. I'd say this is the way to go!

[gmpe.livejournal.com]

We do this with dessert. If you don't like dessert, you can skip or eat Cheerios. With dinner will sometimes require a bite of protein before a refill of carbs, or some such. I try to make sure the kids always have something I know they eat at a meal and I do get the kids to try new things. They are very good eaters, so maybe we are lucky? I think the hardest thing is not knowing what or how much they will want to eat. Two bites or two plates? Protein or carbs or veggies? It all works out, though.

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

We don't have dessert regularly enough to have rules about it. We try to get Alice to taste everything before rejecting it, but haven't stuck very hard to that. We do demand that she finish the quantity on her plate before demanding more of an item (e.g. no more green beans until you've actually eaten all the green beans on your plate). As you say, a lot just depends on how hungry and for what on any given evening and we don't stress about it.

[joyeous.livejournal.com]

Sounds like my niece and nephew, who eat nothing but oatmeal for dinner. My mom couldn't understand why they wouldn't even try her homemade stew, homemade meatloaf, etc. and was very hurt about it (I'm not talking about toddlers, I'm talking about pre-teens here...but it started with them not liking their food at age two and my brother immediately giving in).

[http://users.livejournal.com/urban_faerie_/]

Oh wow, my mom would have considered it the height or rude had I refused to sample a meal my grandmother made by the time I was a pre-teen! I think if I was still doing that at that age I would have been banished from the table!

I sampled a lot of old-fashioned (or just plain bad, my mom did NOT inherit her cooking skills from my nana!) food to save my grandmother's feelings. That was pretty much the law. Turning my nose up at my mom's food was one thing. Turning my nose up at nana's food... disrespect!

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

Thinking about hot dogs and kids, I suspect that particular offer fails the like-not-love requirement. It's also not bland or plain and does involve cooking, so it doesn't really seem to be an good example of the strategy as outlined. I suspect if those kids had been offered cottage cheese instead, things might have turned out differently.

(Though as a side note, if the teens grew up healthy anyway, I suppose one could ask if it was really much of a problem.)

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

Well, as joyeous notes, it can produce hurt by other cooks. It also makes going out to eat more difficult--I wouldn't want to only go to restaurants that serve hot dogs (although that reminds me of a funny story about a FOAF with MPD).

Mostly, though, I guess I have the sense that teaching children to appreciate a wide variety of food is a worthy goal--I might even say "a parental responsibility" but I think that's possibly too skewed by my own priorities. I'd be unhappy not to be able to share good food with her and to have her appreciate the food I cook. Having her take a bite of something new I've made and say "Mommy, this is delicious!" is one of the many joys of parenting for me.

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

FWIW, I'm agree with you, but I can see how some people would think it's fine.

I remember going to fancy restaurants as a kid and usually ordering a hamburger, which they'd always make. I had some seriously good burgers. :) (Personally, I'd tell a teenager they could eat something the place serves or not eat at all, and I'd be surprised if that attitude changes when I have a teen myself.)

[sethg]

Our backup is whole-wheat bread. You don’t like what we’re serving for dinner? Have a slice of bread. You just realized, five minutes before bedtime, after you took three bites of dinner and then ran off to play, that you’re HUNGRY? Have a slice of bread.

Also, the “you must finish all the X on your plate before you can have any more Y” gambit.

An important part of the technique, which seems to be implied but not really stressed in the article, is projecting an attitude of indifference about whether the kid chooses the meal you made, or the backup, or decides that he or she really isn’t that hungry after all. A child who perceives mealtime as a power struggle with parents may become more interested in winning than in anything else, including satisfying his or her own hunger. And as long as the child isn’t dangerously underweight, having an occasional less-than-balanced meal or even going to bed a little hungry isn’t going to do permanent damage.

(And I agree with antikythera and surrealestate regarding the hot dogs.)

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

When I was living with my girlfriend of the time and her two kids, there was the default meal option. If the kids didn't like what the adults were eating, they could have the default meal, which was, if I recall correctly, a peanut butter sandwich. It seemed to work out pretty well. And were I to have kids, that policy would be implemented in my house. I do like the "you must try it first" rules, and the blandness of the linked to article does have its appeal. It might be trickier than I might want to use on my own kids, though.

[bedfull-o-books.livejournal.com]

My Mom was very good about making me and my sister try something before rejecting it. (She made tuna noodle casserole once. It got a big veto and she never made it again. We had to try liver. We hated it. She hates it too, so she wasn't about to make us eat it. :-)

My grandfather treated each new food as an adventure, and so we got used to a variety of foods.

I remember my mother's friend and her kids came over for dinner (I must have been around 8 or so). My mother's friend made her kids PB&J because they didn't like what my mother made. I thought is was really rude, even then.

[minkrose]

Sometimes I think I was a picky eater because my parents had no idea how to encourage me. They treated it like a Problem and I saw dietitians... they never forced me to do anything, but my mom doesn't like adventuresome food and therefore did not make any for us. My back-up food, for years, was Gerber's meat sticks but then I got "too old" and eventually I stopped eating meat things all together because the texture grossed me out (until I was much older - now I'm fine).

Now, Andy makes all kinds of foods and I try them because I trust him when he says I'll like it. Now, I eat things my mom won't touch. I wish she'd thought to branch out and make foods she didn't like when I was a kid. I could have been eating asparagus the whole time! I ended up making most of my own food at the time, so at least I learned some cooking skills, but I was mostly making the same thing over and over (pasta) and I really could have learned more.

But, my mom didn't want to have kids until she met my dad and he was committed to doing that. I don't think she really had a Kids Plan. In my case, I have ALWAYS wanted kids and I pay attention to what everyone says about it, and I try to remember how I felt as a kid so I can do better. I think she did the best she could, and she's definitely getting more adventurous now (good for her!). And I'm making up for lost food-time now, too.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Reading these, I realize how strict a household I grew up in. There was one and only one food rule: "You will eat what is put before you." No choice whatsoever. We didn't even get to serve ourselves. Our plates were assembled for us with a protein, a starch, and a vegetable. Even if we hated it enough to throw up, there would be no leaving the table until our plates were clean and our glasses of milk drained. Only then were seconds or dessert allowed, if we wanted them. The adults adhered to the same rule out of their own free will, but we kids spent many a tearful dinnertime choking down things we hated.

As an adult, I'm a very picky eater with a narrow range of foods I like. Little wonder. Take me to a Vietnamese restaurant and watch me make a meal out of fried spring rolls because it's the only thing on the menu I like. I would have to be shot in the head before sushi could be forced into my mouth. It's a shame, really.

[starphire.livejournal.com]

It apparently worked wonderfully for that parent. I suspect a duplicate success would depend heavily on various individual factors. Since pb&j sandwiches are one of S's favorites, I wonder what would happen if that became the default alternative to what's being served. I wonder if she'd soon get bored of them, or we'd just be wondering how to get some more nutrituous food into her. She doesn't have a lot of "likes (consistently), but doesn't love" foods.
We generally insist that she try something before rejecting it, but I'm usually willing to throw together some healthy alternative if she doesn't like it.

[entirelysonja.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Our method is primarily to ignore whether or not the kids are eating their dinner. We do not offer an alternative, and we do not offer a bedtime snack. Bedtime generally starts within an hour of the conclusion of dinner, sometimes sooner, depending on how late dinner was. (Bedtime starts at 7pm, dinner is usually served sometime between 5:45 and 6:15.)

If there is dessert, we require that a certain amount of actual dinner is eaten first. Otherwise, we have no requirements.

I will have to consider whether the method outlined in the post would work here, and whether we'd be willing to try it. I suspect it probably wouldn't, because there is no such thing as a food Erika consistently likes but does not love. (Karl mainly rejects food when Erika says she thinks it's yucky. We are trying to get her to be quiet about it.)