I generally feed my kids some sort of cheese and grain type main dish (ie, plain cheese pizza, macaroni & cheese, or grilled cheese). That sort of diet needs to stop. I also offer them servings of vegetables (either canned or homemade). They usually don't eat the vegetables unless I literally spoon-feed them.
So, we have decided to offer them the same meal over and over again, without giving them anything else, until they eat it. As in "When I was a kid, if I didn't like what was served, I didn't eat." The meal consists of:
- tuna noodle casserole (pasta, tuna, cream of mushroom soup, cheese, green beans, carrots)
- some homemade apple baked bean type thing. It is very sweet (made with cooked apples, cinnamon, sugar, ketchup and beans) and is actually really good.
- green beans with butter, salt and pepper
- canned mixed fruit
They both ate none of it for lunch yesterday. For dinner, the eldest ate the noodles out of the casserole but not the rest. Today, the youngest ate the mixed fruit. They have both drank some milk, from time to time.
I have offered it for lunch yesterday, dinner yesterday, breakfast today, and lunch today. And by offered, I mean set their place at the table with their tray and drinks and silverware. I have served it hot, cold and warm. The time ranges sitting at the table range from 10 minutes to 1 hour.
Most of the time is spent with them crying that they want something else, and me explaining why they are not getting something else, why this food is good, what each thing is and what it tastes like. I have explained that they can have something else after they eat their food. I have also explained that they can have Halloween candy after they eat their food.
They do have access to other food, in the sense that they could get in the refrigerator and eat something, or open up their Halloween candy, but they haven't done that, so at least I have that going for me.
It is tasty food, definitely not spicy or bitter, and some of it (the baked beans and the fruit) is very sweet.
They haven't complained that they are hungry. After their "lunchtime" or whatever is over, they go back to playing without complaining, even though they complained during the whole lunchtime.
I have thought about just making their "normal" (ie, cheesy) meals, and slowly adding new things into it. But they refuse to eat macaroni & cheese w/ hot dogs cut into it, even though they like both separately.
Am I doing a good thing or a bad thing? Should I keep going with this? For how many more meals? How many more days? Are they really just not that hungry? If they get hungry enough, will they actually eat what's been served to them, or will they whine through the hunger for another day?
EDIT: I forgot to add that after trick or treating, we got together and sorted through their Halloween candy to get rid of duplicates, boring unhealthy stuff (like "candy sticks" which are just relabeled "candy cigarettes"), stuff they know they don't like (Twizzlers) or that I know they won't like (Warheads or Sour Patch Kids), stuff that is really bad for their dental hygiene (jawbreakers, taffy). If we ask them what will happen if they eat too much candy, they will respond with "Get cavities" or "Get fat". After sorting the candy, the youngest proudly showed his mommy what we had done and he said (with prodding) "I made good decisions!". Sooo... they generally get the idea of healthy nutrition and making good decisions. So, this whole not-eating thing really seems like a very long power play (since they won't even eat the mixed fruit).
Submitted October 31, 2015 at 10:39PM by BigBlackCracker http://ift.tt/1PWNrko Parenting
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