How many of you have extremely picky eaters in your house? I do! My 2 and 1/2 year old son will hardly eat anything and it drives me crazy on a daily basis. It just still doesn't make any sense to me because my husband and I are not picky eaters and we have been exposing him to all different kinds of foods since he was a baby...he just won't eat them!
When he started on solids we were thinking, "wow, this is great, he loves everything!". He ate EVERY cereal, fruit, veggie, meat we gave him...as long as it was the baby cereal or the baby food (we used Earth's Best Organic exclusively). Once he started showing interest in our food we gave him bread, chicken, veggies, puffs, crackers and he ate everything. Now, not so much. I can't pinpoint the exact time he stopped trying foods but it was pretty sudden. He now will only eat: YoBaby yogurt (I crush a vitamin into it each morning so at least he's getting vitamins...he won't eat them plain), Yoplait Whipped yogurt, graham crackers, saltine crackers (sometimes with peanut butter), taco meat (so I have to make tacos like, every week, and he won't eat it with a shell or any toppings), applesauce, a very occasional banana (used to eat them every day so maybe he got sick of them?), cheerios and rice chex cereals (won't eat them with milk, just plain), Cascadian Farms Chocolate Chip granola bars (won't eat any other kind of granola bars, I've tried), french fries (sometimes...only if they are the thin ones and even then he won't eat them all the time), Van de Kamp's crispy fish patties (rarely, but sometimes...he used to eat these all the time too so maybe he tired of them as well?) and very occasionally he will have a bite of a mozzarella cheese stick. The only truly "bad" food he likes are chocolate chip cookies.
Here he is with his Cascadian Farms chocolate chip granola bar...forgot to mention, we have to break it into little pieces too...he won't just take bites from the bar.
He used to eat so many other things and now, this is what I get to deal with on a daily basis and I just feel like a horrible mom. I dread meal times. I have tried everything, and still do. We offer him what we are eating everyday and it is always "nope". Everyone tells me he will outgrow this but I really don't think so. He won't even try things! What kid doesn't like ice cream, cake, pizza and macaroni and cheese? Mine. He won't even try candy or popsicles. People laugh and think it's funny, but it really hurts my feelings because I feel responsible for him not wanting to try things. I stopped taking him to meet other friends with kids for lunch because he won't eat anything and then I have to pretend it's funny or whatever. I've tried making smoothies with yogurt and fruit and he tried the first one but now won't try them anymore. He will drink most anything so I thought I would be able to get a fruit in him via a smoothie, but no. I've tried making the taco meat with veggies in it and he just looks at it and won't eat it. I don't know what else to do so if you are in a similar situation, what do you do? I don't have any friends with children as picky as mine. Sure, not all kids like peas or beans, but they usually will try things. Ugh...I'm at my wits' end and am praying my daughter is not like this or else I may have a nervous breakdown. I wish I knew where I went wrong so I don't make the same mistake again, but I really don't know. I did everything the doctors told me, followed all the timelines and rules of introducing foods and it just stinks.
Okay, I'm off to get him some plain cheerios and rice chex...
