Help with Food-5 yo will not try any foods

jodyp

New Member
thanks everyone,
All great suggestions..It is an ongoing battle, and exhusting.. He does receive Occupational Therapist (OT) twice a week and I will discuss with the therapist "brushing". This kid really pushes our buttons and we are trying so hard to keep things together. We don't want to put him on medication's and we are trying to deal. Now, of course, there are a lot more going on than eating.... Oh, by the way, he also eats off the floor...picks up food and eats it. Popcorn from a dirt piles, other people's food from thier table, chips from the street......Wierd/Crazy. He is the type of kid that will sneak food too. He is an adorable kid, but boy, he has his issues and he is a royal pain in the butt!

As far as food, again, I can't physically force him to try something. Maybe I should just let it run its course, with guidelines. No dinner-No Snack/Dessert! But I will leave an option of a healthy snack- banana or cereal bar. (he used to eat these items, but now has stopped.) Or just a bowl of cereal with-milk. Looks like I'm going to have to meet with our Developmental Pediatician again..... THIS NEVER STOPS DOES IT?
 

SRL

Active Member
Have you tried social stories about what's appropriate and not appropriate to eat? I've known a lot of parents who have had good success with children with Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD).
 

witzend

Well-Known Member
The thing that caught my eye about your post was the "we are now down to" and then a list of what he will eat now. That was what happened with us. M ate a lot of things, but eventually we were down to a certain brand of baked ham, peach yogurt, and cheerios. Period. We accommodated him. husband fought with him. There was drama and gagging and "vomiting", but it wasn't like it just urped up, it was a huge tantrum with screaming and then a vomit that was mostly spit and tears and it quite frankly was more credible as a manipulation issue than anything else.

Honestly, I'd get anything other than healthy snacks - ones that he likes - out of your house. Desert should be something occasional not an every night thing. Perhaps on Saturdays if he ate dinner without a scene starting with 3 nights a week, you go to Baskin and Robbins. Then work up to four, then five...

You'd be amazed what they can eat when they're hungry and there are no options other than breakfast lunch and dinner. It would be a lot easier and cheaper to try it this way for a week or two than to try medications. If you stand your ground and you see absolutely no movement from him, then you'll know it's something more than him being difficult. He won't starve.
 

Marguerite

Active Member
Getting junk food out of the house is important. I do get the impression, though, that a lot of the "you will eat what is available or go hungry" has already been tried to no avail.

The thing with Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) - it really is very different. A lot of the usual guidelines and techniques just don't work. Of course you have to try, but if it doesn't work you don't have to despair. There ARE other options and over time, you DO see improvement.

I'd forgotten about the eating off the floor. What used to horrify me was the eating off the ground in public, especially in the city. We had to be quick to grab it from him and even then it would trigger a rage.

At 5, his ability to not rage is going to be very limited. Also, any reward needs to be immediate. Reward also shouldn't be food-based or money-based. That can set up very bad habits later on.

A good reward can be playing a computer game with him, or a board game, or you sharing with him some other game or activity that he really enjoys.

Social stories are a way of writing a story for him, about him, that help him learn needed skills. For example, when difficult child 3 was starting school and needed to understand the routine, we wrote a social story for him to describe what his day would be like. I took photos to help reinforce it.
When difficult child 3 needed to learn the basic information about himself (name, age, phone number, address) I wrote it as a social story, with photos. "My name is difficult child 3. I'm a boy. I like to climb trees. I live at ... My phone number is... Mummy's mobile phone number is ... I have two sisters and a brother..." and so on. He was capable of memorising large chunks of text including long strings of numbers and syllables but at that time had little understanding. However, by writing this out for him and rehearsing him, it meant that if he went astray, someone could question him and find out how to contact us. We had to program him like a computer, or a budgie you're teaching to talk.

He's very different now!

Don't be too disparaging about medications - we reluctantly put difficult child 3 on medications when he was 3. We copped a lot of criticism for it. But within a week this boy was talking in full sentences, with understanding. What a difference!

Marg
 
Top