Okay, it’s another one of those times when I have found something
that speaks to me and that I feel passionate about, so I am going to jump up on
my soapbox and let fly…
We need to care more about what our children eat. And
understand that how we raise them to eat will teach them how to eat. A child
that is a picky eater has become that way because of how their parents shaped
their eating. A child might turn away from something new, but if you never
press them to try it, they never will…and then they will always turn away from
it. I have learned this with my children, but luckily in the opposite
direction. When raising my son, we would offer a new food to him, and he would
say it was yucky and that he didn’t want it. We would ask him to try it, but he
didn’t want to. If we had just left it at that, he never would have tried it,
and it would have been harder the next time…and the next. But we stuck with it.
He didn’t want to try zucchini, so I made it look like drippy tentacles, like
Davy Jones has. Yes, I know, not the most appealing image, but for a small boy
who was in love with Davy Jones, it worked. He tried it, and opened his eyes
wide and said “I LOVE these tentacles!”, and proceeded to eat a handful more of
them. And have stuck with this. He ALWAYS tries new food, no matter how much he
says he won’t like it. If after one good bite he doesn’t like it, then we let
it go and let him move on. But he does NOT get to leave without trying it, and
we make sure he tries it before it gets cold (and thereby less tasty). And about
90% of what he has tried like that he realizes he loves. And those he does not…well,
we make sure to have him try it again about once a month, to see if he still
doesn’t like whatever it is. And you know what, a few of them he has come to
like as well, as his tastes changed. He used to hate pasta and cheese
(mac-n-cheese is the invention of the devil to him), but now he will eat pasta
with sauce, and he will eat cheese on pizza and as a cheese stick, and
sometimes grilled cheese sandwiches. Still won’t eat mac-n-cheese, but I am not
sure that’s a bad thing. And for a while he didn’t like garlic, which is normal
for a young child’s tastebuds…but just recently, he has fallen in love with
garlic bread.
I have often wanted to mention our success to friends with
children that have become picky eaters, but it’s hard to do that without
pointing out that it’s mostly the fault of the parents. And it’s also harder to
get the children to start trying things once they are in a habit of turning
things down. But just today I came across THIS article, and that spurred me to
want to share the info and my success more, and to write this blog (that no one
probably reads):
The article explains that French children have much better
diets and are far less picky, as a result of how their parents raise them to
eat, and how schools in France are contributing to better nutrition for children.
There are a number of articles linked to from this one, that give further
information that is helpful for raising non-picky eaters. But one that I find
very interesting is the blog of a woman that is following the daily lunch menus
of various Kindergarten classes in France. THIS entry in particular caught my
interest, because of her comments.
As she says, how many of OUR (meaning American) Kindergarteners
would have even tried the foods mentioned in this menu? And think about the
fact that no junk foods are offered, and that parents don’t pack lunches for
their children (except in the case of food allergies). I feel my husband and I are doing a mostly
good job of making sure our kids are picky, but we aren’t even coming close to
offering as much variety, and we definitely fall into the realm of feeding them
commercialized food. This entry, and the others, make me a little ashamed at
what we feed our children.
Here is another blog entry where she mentions a book that goes
into detail about what school children eat around the world. I actually think I
want to get this for myself and take a look at it, and see if I can help our
family eat better than the standard American diet.
I know, this is a lot of links, but really, the articles/blog
entries explain the truths better than I could, and so really I can only
provide my opinions and insight on top of the well-worded thoughts provided in
the links. I am hoping that all those reading this would also take inspiration
from these links, and consider what they are eating and what they are feeding
their children. It’s never too late to change one’s diet, regardless of how
picky one (or a child) is.
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