How to Keep Your Cool at Mealtime with a Picky Eater

When you have worked hard to cook a nice dinner for the family, it is extremely difficult to deal with disgusted faces or comments from the little ones, especially when you face this problem night after night. If you send them to their room without dinner at this point, do so. If you are simply looking to keep calm, here are some ideas.

Difficulty: Challenging

Instructions

1. Make rules and communicate them clearly to your children. Follow through with the rules you have established, including consequences.

2. Speak in a quiet, firm voice. Again, make your expectations clear. Do your best to focus on the rules and stay detached. Don't take their dislikes personally. This may help you to avoid stand-offs and dinner disasters.

3. Serve minimal amounts. Even so, you may need to be willing to let your child sit an extra half hour after dinner to finish. Calmly tell your child she needs to sit at the table until her carrot stick (or whatever) is eaten. Try to hold to this.

4. Avoid making deals. Once he's got you in negotiations, you've lost ground and he has basically sidestepped the rules and expectations. If you are tired of making deals, make sure this is part of your stated rules.

5. Offer the same few vegetables she will tolerate for several dinners. When introducing a new food, continue to serve the old vegetable as well. Insist on him taking a nibble of the new food. Then let him eat the old vegetable. Continue to introduce the new food this way for the next several dinners, gradually increasing the amount of the new food you require your child to eat.

6. There is no easy solution for a main dish a child refuses to eat. At dinnertime, try serving foods separately (for example, noodles, spaghetti sauce, meat) so kids can help themselves. Taco bars work well for this.

7. Prohibit snacks before or after dinner. Before dinner, it will ruin her appetite. After dinner, she needs a consequence if she has not eaten the meal. If she has eaten it, then she may be allowed a reasonable dessert after dinner, according to your judgment.

Tips & Warnings

• No matter how angry or frustrated, do not stomp off from the table and take your plate to eat in the bedroom.
• Do not shout.
• A crying child has even more trouble eating.
• Do your best to have the child eat a version of what you are eating. Making extra meals will only fuel your temper.
• Have faith that someday your child will eat what you eat. Don't give up. Don't feel guilty or blame yourself. Forgive yourself if you do erupt in anger.
• Avoid comparing your child to a sibling, friend, cousin, etc. who eats well.