Picky Eater

Kiddo has always been a picky eater, or so his parents tell me. When I first started working with him, his diet was limited almost exclusively to foods which were the consistency of mush. Soggy cereal, oatmeal, bananas, yogurt, peanut butter, mashed up rice with gravy, and scrambled eggs comprised the majority of his diet, and a good amount of the time he spat those foods out as well. He would frequently go through phases where he would only eat two or three foods for days. Kiddo's diet was usually accommodated for at home, but it was often difficult for his mom to always have to make "backup foods" for him when he didn't want to eat a particular item being served. That, and eating only two things for days on end isn't exactly healthy.

At that time, my husband, Justin, was working at the Vertical Diner as a chef. Since Kiddo doesn't like going out in the cold, and I often ran out of new places to bring him anyway, I started bringing him into the Diner once every week or so, and Justin would hook us up with discounted/free food. At first, Kiddo would get just pancakes or a chocolate shake, because that's what he liked and the biggest issue was keeping him in a chair.

At home and when Kiddo would go out to eat with his family, he was usually put in a toddler booster seat so he wouldn't get up and wander around. There was pretty much no way I was putting a six-year-old kid in a booster seat, so the first few times we went to the Diner revolved around bringing him back to the chair to wait for or finish eating his food. Sometimes he'd sit down on the floor (his standard resistance tactic), usually he'd run away, and occasionally he'd lie down and spin in a circle making his "Satanic sounds," as they could be accurately described. But after a month or so of practicing sitting and waiting (and being rewarded with really good pancakes or a milkshake), he wouldn't get up unless he needed to use the restroom or had been sitting down for a dang long time.

Once he could wait in his chair, I began ordering random things off the menu, mostly side dishes or small plates, and would try to get Kiddo to eat it with me. I'd let him touch the food and destroy it or push the plate away, or eat it, whatever he wanted to do. When he tried a new food (even if he didn't finish it or found it disgusting and spat it out), he was rewarded with something he did like, either candy I'd brought along or a milkshake for eating a lot of new food. Eventually, he began eating all kinds of new foods, even tofu! He still prefers really soft foods which don't require a lot of chewing and have a neutral or sweet taste, but he's definitely made a significant dietary expansion in the past year and a half.

But, he was still sitting in a booster seat at home and at his grandparents' house long after he'd mastered the ability to do so at my house and at restaurants. Thankfully, however, his parent's booster seat broke and I would just take him out of the one at his grandparent's if I ever saw him in it, making some loud comment like "Oh, you don't need to be in a booster chair! You're so good at sitting in a big kid seat, let's get you out of there!" His grandparents eventually got rid of theirs as well.

Although Justin doesn't work at the Diner anymore, I still bring Kiddo to restaurants and introduce him to new foods whenever possible. Thankfully, I get to write that off of my taxes. :)

Today, for example, we went to a Middle Eastern market and restaurant that a friend of mine recently got a job at. We attempted to eat a dolma, raw tomato, and pickle slice, but he didn't like any of them.

However, he eventually warmed up to the delicious home made bread, after a few attempts.

Peace.