Advice...noted.

Thank you, but my son is onto all of your tricks. No, he doesn't eat new and different foods when he's with other children. No, he won't eat special foods for other relatives. No, he would never go for kebobs or dipping sauces or blind-taste tests or wacky food games; no, he won't try just one bite, no no NO. And yes, I'm also scared of Donna.

Fortunately I am hightailing it out of town for a long weekend, and leaving Scott with Henry. My family will forlornly eat mac and cheese every night, while I consume anything that's not mac and cheese. Tomorrow can't come fast enough.

Comments

[pnuts mama]

alice- have a wonderful weekend with your friends! i also wanted to apologize for the assvice and i do sincerely hope things improve in a way that your stress over the issue decreases. hope the next few days are filled with fun.

donna- i am sorry if i drew any undue attention onto you in a negative way- i certainly don't disagree with your general theory, i.e., not letting the kid be the boss and having boundaries when it comes to manners. when i compared you to my great grandma please know that i loved her dearly and she was tough but fair- i think for her food was too precious to ever let someone not appreciate. waste simply wasn't even on her radar, and it's a lesson i should personally learn more from. she loved us all intensely and sacrificed a lot to be able to not take any sh*t from anyone over anything. so, it was a compliment and not disrespect.

[Mummy Crit]

I am also the mother of an unpredictably fussy eater and I've been reading all this with great interest. No advice from here, except that one thing I did was tell him that he could have two things that I would never make him eat, and he chose the two that I'd expected, which were things he'd never liked. I think it's a combination of a power struggle and child taste buds. He does gag if I 'make' him eat something he doesn't want to, but what he doesn't want changes so fast.

[RLJ]

Hey, Alice, no advice, just a virtual hug. Sorry if you thought I/we/any of us seemed to be saying it was somehow your fault or that you weren't doing everything you could think of.

It won't last forever. I mean, surely by 30 he'll have moved out, right?

[RLJ]

Hey, Alice, no advice, just a virtual hug. Sorry if you thought I/we/any of us seemed to be saying it was somehow your fault or that you weren't doing everything you could think of.

It won't last forever. I mean, surely by 30 he'll have moved out, right?

[Elise]

Very frustrating. I'm not even at your dinner table and I can feel outrage bubbling up from the "yuck" comments. Have you had him tested for food allergies and celiac disease? I've seen several children who exhibited strong food likes/aversions that ended up being tied in with food allergies. And not the way you might expect, like someone with a wheat allergy not liking bread, it's actually often the reverse, someone with a wheat allergy or celiac disease often craves pasta & bread before diagnosis. I'm sure you've thought of this, but I wanted to throw it out there anyway.

[victoria]

Heh. Here's a story from a non-mom who's totally not qualified to have any opinion:

My nephews used to act like we were trying to poison them whenever anything other than meat or starch was on their plates. Veggies were viewed as the child-killing work of satan.

One of them, aged 7, once said to my husband, "Um, you know that lady you left us with?" "You mean your aunt Victoria?" he asked. "Yeah. She tried to make us eat vegetables," the kid confided in horror, as though I'd attempted to sodomize him -- it was that shameful and outrageous to the kid that I'd tried to make him take one bite of a vegetable at Thanksgiving dinner.

Then my mother in law started enlisting the kids in the preparation of vegetable-based dishes (soups, casseroles). They washed & peeled & became proud of their contribution & willing to eat "their" dishes.

But this didn't happen before they were about 12. I don't know what you'd do with someone Henry's age.

[tanyetta]

my son is 2. he's barely 30 pounds. i honestly believe he is anti-food. i've tried everything! help :)

oh and the first commenter about potty training, i want to cry.

[Beth]

Not that this matters, but I had an orthodontist who, when I got my braces on, asked me what food I hated the most and then put it on the "forbidden" list. My mom was reading along, no gum, check, no toffee, check, no ice-crunching, check, and then she turned to me and said, "I wonder whose kid came in with cooked red cabbage all wound around their braces?" I, of course, felt all gleeful inside.

So the "pick two you hate and eat the rest" seems quite humane. But what do I know? I'm a terrible cook who can only steam, poach, and microwave single ingredients; my 15-month-old daughter hates bland food and wants everything I make salted, peppered, lemon-juiced, and/or salsa'd before she'll eat it. She'd be in heaven if she had a mom who could do things with flavor. Anyone want to do an exchange program?

[Bianca]

Oh, but mac and cheese is the mana of the Gods! *drool*

[Sue]

You might want to check out "intherough.dymund.com". Sarah invented a recipe that's fast, cheap, and her children ate four helpings. Sounds yummy, too. Might be worth a try.