Mother's Day Meltdown...

ksm

Well-Known Member
and no it wasn't me. difficult child was enjoying the after church meal I had fixed (with easy child's help) the night before. It is a recipe that uses boneless chicken breasts, two cans of cream soup, and sour cream. It cooks while you are at church (2 to 3 hours on a low oven). We served it over buttered noodles. difficult child ate a huge serving, had seconds and was almost done with that when I mentioned easy child had helped me prepare it, the fruit salad and the dessert the night before. easy child started to tell her how easy it was to make when difficult child demanded to know what was in it. I had used a can of cream of chicken and one can of cream of mushroom. I hadn't really even thought about the fact that she doesn't like mushrooms. Well, I knew that easy child knew what kind of soup it was and didnt want her to blurt it out and feel difficult child's wrath so I let her know what was in it. OMG... you had thought we had poisoned her. She started yelling that she couldn't eat mushrooms! Acted like she was going to throw up and was generally overly dramatic about the whole ordeal. She refused to finish the meal or come back to the table. I don't know if she was mad because I didn't tell her or more mad because she actually loved the dish.

Do other people have to put up with this kind of behavior at 15 years old?? To me, there isn't enough mushrooms in a can of mushroom soup to even consider it as mushroomy! I find it very hard to make most dishes because she "doesn't like" just about every vegetable imaginable. If you can consider potato and iceberg lettuce vegetables... but those are the only ones she will eat. She will refuse to take small bites of most food to even try to see if she might like it.

I actually thought we might have a drama free day... but no. KSM
 

HaoZi

CD Hall of Fame
It's mushroomy and I won't eat anything with it in it, either. Doesn't justify that kind of drama, but at her age I might have reacted the pretty close (not a good thing, I was a difficult child, too). I certainly would have reacted loudly and refused to come back or eat any more of it for sure. Even now I'm all "blick bleck blark I'm not eating that," to close friends that I expect should know me better with an intent at humor that often fails (I'll stick with a simple "No thanks" to others). When making it for myself or Storm (who reacts the same) we have to stick with cream of chicken.
 

ksm

Well-Known Member
Yes, but would your yuck come after two platefuls? I can understand not liking the taste of something. But to have two big servings... and then Yuck?? KSM
 

HaoZi

CD Hall of Fame
At 15? Yep. If you have any idea how much I hate mushrooms, yep. But I tend to examine my food distrustfully anyway, ask a lot of questions, pick a lot, etc. I'm one of those extremely picky eaters (and yes, an extreme PITA about food, too - so I usually ask before I go to someone's on invite and eat first at home if need be).

And I'm the same about veggies, too, always was.
 

Dixies_fire

Member
Tk did that last week with lasagna fed half of it to the dog and picked all the hamburger out calling it mushrooms, but she's 8. And yeah she's eaten it before. I feel your pain. I just don't cook around her anymore. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. I also have her help me cook frequently. Because food is not the enemy! And yes I've said that many times.
 

InsaneCdn

Well-Known Member
Yup. That would have been me. Except the melt-down would have happened BEFORE eating any of it... because I don't trust anything that is a "mixture" of any sort, type, or description. The recipe as described = casserole = ain't NEVER going there. I'm probably a LITTLE more tactful in how I put it now (compared to when I was a teen) but the message is the same.

If you know I'm coming "home" for a meal (i.e. this isn't somebody that doesn't have a clue about what I can eat)... I'd be expecting the cooks to have considered that factor - and would (even now) be quite put out if you didn't...

Not that THAT is the right response... but I kinda get where she's coming from.
 

SuZir

Well-Known Member
I wasn't like that (after all when I was fifteen there usually wasn't dinner in our house if I didn't make it) but at fifteen many of my friends were. So are many daughters of people I know. Not all but those who get hit harder by puberty. And of course gfgness tends to make sure puberty will be hard.

My own little drama queens saved their dramaqueenery to other topics than food even when 15 but that I think is a gender thing.
 

DammitJanet

Well-Known Member
Well I must be the hard ass on the board because she would have not gotten a bit of sympathy from me. I use mushroom soup as a base for so many things and I have one who really isnt a mushroom fan. He hasnt complained yet. It doesnt have enough mushrooms to complain about, it just makes the food a bit creamy. I also have one who doesnt like onions but when I make a beef stew I use cream of mushroom and lipton onion soup mix and no one complains a bit. Thats what gives the stew the flavor. If they dont want to eat, there are jars of PBJ in the house. If they threw a fit like that, they wouldnt even get the PBJ. They certainly wouldnt get dessert or anything else good the rest of the evening.

My boys were brought up in a house where you ate what was cooked unless you actually had an allergy or completely disliked something to the point of it being something we simply could do without. Like if we could make a dish without onions for a child such as liver and onions...well we wouldnt put onions on that childs plate. Cory hated cherries. We never made something with cherries for him. If we made cheese cakes, we made one with strawberry and one with cherries. We normally needed two to feed our crowd anyway. Jamie couldnt stand coconut. We just never used it or gave him candy with it in it. Not a big deal because not much is made with coconut as part of a meal.

However with meals, what was put on their plates, they were expected to eat without a huge show. Eat it or go without till the next meal. Mine were great eaters and Keyana is also a great eater. She has eaten liver and onions, all sorts of deer meat, collard greens, most veggies, all kinds of things you wouldnt believe.
 

HaoZi

CD Hall of Fame
This kind of pickiness is why I started learning to cook when I was 10. I could make my own dinner if I didn't like what my parents were eating, and as long as I cleaned up my own pans and plates, it was fine with them. By 12 I was doing all the dishes anyway, so that was moot, too.
 

ksm

Well-Known Member
Well I must be the hard ass on the board because she would have not gotten a bit of sympathy from me. I use mushroom soup as a base for so many things and I have one who really isnt a mushroom fan. He hasnt complained yet. It doesnt have enough mushrooms to complain about, it just makes the food a bit creamy.QUOTE]

Thanks Dammit Janet. She has been eating cr of mushroom soup all her life. We just didn't discuss it. We don't order pizza with mushrooms, I don't put mushrooms on a salad, or add a can of mushrooms to casseroles. I am not a mushroom fan either, unless fresh portabello ones. But difficult child has narrowed her food choices to sweets, meats, and beige... beige as in pasta, rice, potatoes, bread, cereal. She has gained 10 pounds in the last couple of months. And when you are only 5 ft tall... 10 pounds is almost 10 %. We normally do the one bite rule of new foods... and if you put it on your plate, you eat it. I don't put the food on their plate they can choose to eat it or not. PB sandwiches is always an option. difficult child loves bean burritos but will won't take a bite of pinto beans that I cook from scratch. Once she ate a plateful of corn fritters from a restaurant buffet then didn't "like" them because it had corn in it. SHe will eat a devilled egg but not a scrambled egg, or a sliced hardboiled egg on a salad. She will eat pepperoni but not a hot dog... because of all the ucky stuff in hot dogs. But pepperoni is OK. (ugghh) She loves chicken, but came home freaked out because they served "chicken with a bone in it" at school. I asked, you mean, you found a little piece of bone in your chicken? No, she said, it had a big bone in it!! Duhh... it was a drum stick! I guess she never thought chickens had bones... as I usually buy boneless skinless chicken breasts! Tried to explain that chicken had to have bones or they couldn't walk around! She won't eat fish, but will eat fishsticks. She will eat chicken noodle soup from a can or ramen pkg. But not homemade because she sees little pieces of onions and celery.

Just so tired of her food hysteria. Sorry if I offend others with food issues. KSM
 

Bunny

Active Member
I wouldn't have had much sympathy for her either, especially since she ate two big platefuls of it! I don't know how I would react to the drama queen routine, although I do know that I would have told her that if she didn't come back to the table then she could do sit in her room for the rest of the day. That would have been her loss, not yours.

Do you think she was reacting that way because easy child helped you prepare the food, or because of the mushrooms, which she obviously didn't know where in it? I know that we've had problems with difficult child at times because he's said, "I'm not eating it if HE [easy child] helped make it!" That hasn't happened in a while now, but it was a problems for a little while here.
 

ksm

Well-Known Member
I wouldn't have had much sympathy for her either, especially since she ate two big platefuls of it!QUOTE]

I don't think it was because of easy child... just the fact it had cream of mushroom soup. I usually have the cans in the recycling bin as soon as I cook. It is not that I am trying to force her to eat mushrooms... it is just a recipe. I needed two cans of cream soup and I only had one cream of chicken so I added one of mushroom because it was Saturday night and I didn't want to run to the store. If I had had cream of celery I would have used that... but she doesn't like celery either.

Oh well, food drama, girl drama, school drama, homework drama, rule drama, boy drama, clean your room drama... I am getting desensitized to her drama. It just hurt on Mother's Day. KSM
 

Jody

Active Member
Oh my goodness, I just don't think I'de make it without mushrooms. I ate an entire pack last night with spinach and garlic and cayenne pepper and just a little tomato paste. I eat them everyday. difficult child hates them but I cook with them in all of my soups, and they are usually cooked down or very tiny, she never says a thing, but if it were on a pizza or something then she would wig out. easy child loves wheat bagel sandwichs and a big fat portabella mushroom as the main course. I wasn't a fan of them too much when I was younger though. Sounds like drama difficult child behavior. Ugh, I wish they would see themselves as we have to see them when they have these fits. I do sometimes give her a taste of her own medicine.
 
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