When my toddler was an infant, she would eat anything that I fed her. She ate all types of fruits, vegetables, and meats (even liver). I thought that if I gave her a large variety of healthy foods while she was young, I wouldn’t have any problems when she got older. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Once my daughter became more independent, she started to regularly turn away foods that she used to like. The only food that she would willingly eat was spaghetti and I couldn’t let her eat spaghetti all the time. Back when I used to babysit for my sister, I had the same problem with her kids. So, luckily I already knew how to handle my daughter's eating problem. There were a few things that I had to try because I knew that not all methods would work on all kids.
First, I tried to pretend to eat her food. I would make her a plate and if she turned it away, I would pull up a chair and proceed to “eat” it. This method worked on only a few of my nephews, so as I expected, it didn’t work with my daughter.
Next, I tried using a booster seat and letting her sit at the “grown up” table with us while we ate. I thought this one would work because it worked on about ten of my twenty-five nieces and nephews. Unfortunately, this one didn’t work either. It left us with a big mess to clean up as well because she tipped her plate onto the floor (accidentally).
After that, I tried the method that I wished I tried the method that I had tried first. We gave her spaghetti, her favorite food, with corn, peas, and other assorted vegetables mixed in it. At first, she turned it away, but then I said, “Look, it's spaghetti.” She took the plate back and ate a bite. She laughed, and then she proceeded to pick the vegetables out of the spaghetti one by one and ate them.
Since then she has been willing to try new foods. She eats meat, vegetables, and fruits, but if she doesn’t like it she will still spit it back on the plate. I am happy with the results and the best part is that it only took one try.
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