For nearly a year after she turned one, my niece only ate sausages and dry Weetabix and drank lots and lots of milk every day! We worried about her health but she seemed healthy and in good form.
My son however ate whatever I gave him. Both were born in the same week and we spent lots of time together so they were offered fairly the same food at the same time. We couldn’t understand what made my niece such a fussy eater from a very young age.
Now 9 years old, both my son and my niece are of similar healthy builtd and eat a big variety of food.
Most parents will encounter the fussy eater at some stage in their toddler’s development, and the key thing is not to worry. Remember being a kid and maybe a fussy eater too? Remember how you never ate your greens until you were a teenager (perhaps not even then?!) and you seemed to turn out okay.
When it comes to breakfast, lunch and dinner, kids will be kids, in that they’ll let you know exactly what they will eat and what they won’t. However, at this young age, it’s usually because they’re experimenting with lots of different flavours, food textures and yes, even colours, that makes them fixate upon certain foods.
Everything’s new when you’re young and being asked to taste all these dishes for the first time, it’s a bit stressful. So if your child sticks on a certain food, don’t make a big deal of it. If it’s a healthy food, great – encourage them to eat what they will, but try also to introduce small amounts of what you’d like them to eat alongside it. One fruit or veg at the time. No more!
No child can like all foods however, so when it comes to finding out what your child will eat, it’s all about trial and error. It also helps if you leave off bringing high sugary snacks into the mix until they’re around school-age. As they say – what you haven’t tasted yet, you can’t yet crave…