A Mom Just Like You.....My Journey through Life with 8 Children....

• Jan. 18, 2008 - Thankful Eater???? Picky Eater???? (Repost)

Thankful Eater???? or Picky Eater???? (Repost) Are there foods that turn your stomach just at the thought of them? I know there are some foods that cause me to feel that way. But I often have to ask myself, would I eat this food if I knew I was going to starve to death? The answer is always yes, of course I would. When I was growing up one of my jobs was to cook dinner every night. After I came home from school I would start dinner for the family. Because I had that job I would always make food that I liked. I was never given a menu directing me in what to make for dinner . I believe today that I am a pickier eater than I would of been if I would of been guided into eating things that seemed undesirable to me when I was younger. One of the main things I do not like is seafood!!! It just turns my stomach badly. My mother did put crab meat in our spaghetti sauce whenever she made it and I had no choice but to eat it. But I don't think things like that happened enough to break me completely of all my pickiness. Don't get me wrong I try to teach my children differently. I don't allow them to be picky eaters. I want them to always be thankful for the food before them. I am sure to model what I want and expect from them even though I didn't learn this lesson well enough while I was still young. My older brother also dislikes seafood. One day he went to eat at a friends house. He walked into the house and said it smelled great. When he asked what was for dinner she said it was calamari but he didn't know it was fish. When they sat down to eat he said he took a bite and realized it was squid. He said it was so chewy that he thought he was going to throw up. But he never did. I am sure that was so hard for him to eat but he found it too rude to not eat it. I once went to a older woman's home where she made tuna casserole. I was in the middle of heaping a pile of it onto my plate when I found out it was tuna fish. I rapidly put the serving spoon down and slowly ate the tuna with bites of everything else I had on my dish to help drown out the flavor. So what are we teaching our children to do in those situations? Are we teaching them to be thankful for the food before them or are we teaching them to be picky eaters? I believe there are just some flavors of food that we may not acquire a taste for at first. Till today I am not a fish eater but I truly think I can retrain my taste buds to tolerate it if I continued to make myself eat it on a regular basis. I will cook fish and serve it occasionally because I want my children to try all foods. I want them to learn to love all foods and not just like the foods that I find appealing. When I married my husband he did not like onions, tomatoes, or spicy food, he grew up eating very bland food. Today he eats all the foods I make including all the things he didn't like in the first part of our marriage.  I believe he grew up accustomed to eating the food only because I was accustomed to making food that way so he just learned to like it with time.  I think the same is true for our children. It is possible to train our children's taste buds and it is possible to retrain them if necessary, that is if you already trained them to be picky. In our home we require that our children eat alittle of everything being served for dinner. They may not have more food of anything until they have finished everything on their plate. They are never allowed to say, "I don't like." Also they must eat a small portion of everything whether it be just 4 peas, I use that as an example but to be truthful they love peas. . They have to eat everything. If they really don't like the taste I suggest they eat it with bites of other food on their plate that they do like. If they gag I don't rush them and I never make it a stressful situation. We take our time and do this slowly I do it in love and always with patience. If you do it harsh or forceful you will create a stressful situation and it will be a horrible memory for everybody. If they say they don't want to eat anymore because they are full or their stomachs just cannot deal with continuing trying the food or because they say they have to go potty (which is usually a manipulation) I will put the food away and bring it out for the next meal with a smile. Like I said I do it in love. They have grown to know that if they don't eat it then and there that they must wrap it for the next meal. They also know it is always better to eat it fresh so they have learned to get it over with. know they will not love all food but I do think they will learn to eat anything if we teach them that way. I am always my children's cheerleaders. I encourage them to get it done and to eat it then. I try to remind them that God makes wonderful food and that with time they will grow to love most of it. I had one of my children mention that to me the other day. They said I remember when I didn't like such and such food at all. But now I really like it. I want my children to succeed. So I make sure I only give them a very small serving of something I know they will have a hard time eating. Like I said if I know they will have a hard time eating peas, I will only give them 2-4. This way they can succeed and not fail. I always give very, very small servings of new foods too, even if it was nothing more than the serving size of a teaspoon. I know they can and will succeed with serving such a small serving size in the beginning. I can guarantee you that if I was forceful or harsh or demanding in any way that my child would not like that food today. I would probably still be battling them over eating it. They would resent me for forcing this horrible food on them and it would be a never ending battle to get them to eat it never mind them ever truly liking it. I make most of our foods from scratch. I make alot of beans and fresh veggies. I love to add flavor to my foods. My children are eating fresh raw garlic in their foods from when they are one year old. They don't know any different. If you start young you have won most of the battle. But if you didn't start young it is not too late to change them. It will just take time. If they are not snacking all day and the food you serve is what they get no matter what, well they will get hungry enough to eventually eat it willingly. I truly don't think there are many foods my children have a hard time eating. We eat raw veggies alot and we also eat cooked veggies. I have one child that has a hard time with meat like me. I always require he eats small amounts and I remind him that I too have a hard time with it but we would eat that little bit together. We always seem to enjoy it in the end. What would happen if we were in the end times? What would your children do if they were missionaries always eating at someone else's house? Or what if they were in another culture where they eat bugs? Some places are insulted if you don't eat what they feed you. Believe me they would not let themselves starve. They would begin to eat what was served them and they would begin to enjoy it. Especially if it meant they didn't have to starve. Train your children's taste buds early on to enjoy good healthy food. It is possible to learn to like good food with time. But it is easier if you do it from the start. I remember back when I sent my oldest son to preschool before we starting homeschooling his teacher would always comment to me how he was so content taking out his chopped up broccoli and dipping it in dressing and eating it while other children had snack packs and cookies. He would call them his little trees because that is what I called them and he ate them and enjoyed them because he didn't know any different. What kind of eater are you? Are you picky? Do you say, I don't like this or I don't want that?. Do you cheerfully eat what you are served? It is never too late to change yourself either. Start small and slow so you don't make yourself sick but add little bits of things you don't like to your menu. Eat it with something strong tasting that you do like to drown out the flavor at first of the thing you know you don't like at the time being. Let your children see you eat things they know you don't like. Tell them you are going to change your eating habits together with them. Make up a strong flavored sauce you both like so you can add it to the foods you don't care for. This will help get you started in this new adventure of changing the taste buds of your family. Ketchup is a good food disguise that alot of people like. When I was very young I didn't like meat. I still don't care for it very much today but I will always eat alittle bit at the meal to set an example for my children. My mom would cut up my steak into small pieces and that was one of the worse meats to eat because it was like eating a slab of flesh to me. What I would do is I would dip it in ketchup to help with drowning out the flavor. But of course the ketchup didn't get rid of the chewing and chewing sensation of this slab of flesh I was eating but I still ate it because I had to. Never require that a child sit at the table until their food is all gone. That is a battle you will never win. You are sure to lose because they are strong and they will hold out. They will win that battle always and they will become much stronger willed children because of it. If a child just sits there in hopes they will be able to dispose of their food don't ever let that happen. All it takes is one time for them to gamble it can happen again. Be consistent, and firm, but loving. Ask them would you like to be done and finish that at a later date? Then wrap it and don't forget to give it to them at the next meal. Even if the next meal is snack time. If you don't keep your word they will not believe in you. They will be winners and you will be the loser. Always win or always at least appear to win. Even if you have to take a small amount of food off their plate without them knowing before you serve it again. Once they know you mean it they will not try to get out of eating it. Winning is so important, it is the key element in being successful when it comes to training your children. You must always win if you are going to succeed!!! If your child sits there for a very long time then manipulates you by saying they have to go to the bathroom. Let them go, maybe even take alittle food off their plate when they are gone, I would sometimes do this to help them be winners in the end. I wouldn't take too much just alittle to help ensure they ate it all in the end. . Ask them if they want to finish it when they come back. If they say no, don't push it, wrap it up and serve it to them later on or the next day. Eventually they will learn the pattern and they will eventually eat what is served without complaint. Or they will eat it without wasting time like having going to the bathroom or sitting there for a long time. As a matter of fact don't let them sit there. Make meal time between certain hours and if they are not done by those hours the food gets wrapped until the next meal. If they really want to eat they will learn real quick to eat in that time frame. Otherwise there is no stress no worry you just wrap the food and they eat it at the next meal. Nobody is upset, nobody is stressed, nobody is manipulated. Everybody is smiling and you are winning! You must keep doing this until all food is finally gone. It is a process and you must be willing to win in order for it to be successful. It is only challenging at first but it will get easier with time. Don't give up you will be glad you endured. Be sure to not have bad food that they can sneak and eat it in the house when you are not looking. This is a key element when training them to not be picky eaters. If there are not cookies or potato chips or things like that to snack on they cannot sneak it and they cannot eat it. Also YOU have to be the example. Remember more is caught then taught. If they see you always eating bad food, they see you being a picky eater or they see you eating something other than what you are serving them. You might as well give up because you will never win this battle. You must be the example you want them to be. If you serve snacks make sure they are wholesome snacks. Serve foods that are good for them like raw nuts, raw cheeses, veggies with dip dried fruit. These are all good for them and they will grow to love them. My children love to eat fresh fruits as a snack. I can never keep enough of it in the house. They love raw food in general. RAW FOOD is soooooo important to your families health! Our bodies require enzymes to be healthy and if we are not replacing them on a daily basis you are setting your family up for illness. But that is a whole another blog in itself. Remember to try to train your children to be the best they can be. Train them to grow into adults that always put other people first and into people that care about their overall health.. Train them to be other oriented. They will be well adjusted adults because of it. Teach them all of Gods food is wonderful and try to serve organic whenever possible. Teach them that whole foods is how God made food so the closer we eat food to its natural form the better off we are. Lord God help us to train our children to love the amazing foods you gave us. Help us to be good examples and to eat a large variety of foods. Help us to set the pattern and for our children to follow them. When we are picky eaters we are complaining to you Lord that we are not pleased with what you gave us to eat. Help us to always be thankful and to appreciate that we even have food unlike many other countries that are starving to death. Thank you for the abundance of food our country has and help us to show appreciation to teach our children to show that appreciation and not be picky complainers. Thank you Lord for all you do and all you give. In Jesus name Amen

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