We all want to give our kids a healthy, balanced diet, but when they are difficult eaters, mealtimes can become a real battleground.
Mum, Hollie Smith shares her top ten tips from her book, Dealing with Difficult Eaters: Stop mealtimes becoming a battleground with fussy children, co-written with Dr. Sandi Mann and Sally Child exclusively with My Child readers.
Easier said than done, admittedly, but it’s true that attitude is everything when it comes to feeding children.Never let them see that their food issues are upsetting you – in some cases it will simply make things worse. In fact, don’t let them upset you. It’s OK. They’ll survive – however bad it seems!
Whether you’re trying to expand the limited food horizons of a fussy eater, or overhaul the habits of a child with a weight problem, you’ll need to be consistent, firm and resolute. You’ll get there eventually. Hang in there.
And encourage your kids to be, too.Get themin the kitchen, cooking their own food, and in the garden, growing it. Take them shopping, let them choose, allow them to prepare meals and snacks. Experiment, try something different every so often. And don’t forget to talk about food – it’s a fascinating subject.
Sit at the table with them, eat your greens, keep your treat intake limited. You are the foremost influence on your children, in eating and everything else. Their health is truly
in your hands and the example you set is vital.
Don’t offer food as a bribe or reward, however desperate you get, and keep praise low-key. Be sure not to ‘label’ them – you may well have a difficult eater on your hands, but don’t call them one to their face.
Watch out for the difficult eater with an underlying emotional need, and always treat the issue with care and understanding.
Do your homework so you know what the basics of nutrition are – that way, you’ll know off the top of your head what healthy alternatives you can offer a child who is asking for
junk food; or an appropriate replacement when a child simply refuses to eat something. Bone up, too, on what makes children tick psychologically – understanding a situation
always makes it easier to deal with it. And arm yourself with a good library of recipes and food ideas. There are so many different foods out there… it’s just a matter of discovering them all.
Get everyone else involved on your side. There’s not much point in dealing with a difficult eater one way, if someone else is dealing with it a different way.
Maybe your little difficult eater just doesn’t like certain foods, or maybe they have a perfectly understandable preference for white bread. Why not? They may be kids, but they’re also humans. A child should never be made to eat anything. Apart from being cruel, it’s counter-productive and certainly won’t make them more inclined to eat it in the future. And neither should a child be banished entirely from enjoying the things
they love, sometimes.
Don’t fret or obsess about food – apart from driving yourself insane, you may have the opposite effect to the one you were hoping for. What our kids eat is, and should be, something to care about and be concerned about. But leave it there. It’s all about balance – as are most things in parenting. On one side of the scales sits the parent who doesn’t give two hoots about their child’s health (the sort who’s prepared to shove a hamburger through a school gate because someone’s made an effort to improve the school meal service, perhaps?). On the other is that mad old bat Muesli Mum, banning
everything that’s desirable, hovering over her children at every mealtime, and potentially creating the worst of attitudes towards eating in her child. Two extremes – the aim
is to occupy the happy, healthy ground in the middle!
Get your hands on a copy of Hollie's book Dealing with Difficult Eaters: Stop mealtimes becoming a battleground with fussy children from Amazon
