My 5-year-old girl is a really fussy eater. I don’t know how it happened because me and her dad and older brother will eat anything and aren’t fussy at all. The only things she will eat are dry pasta and cheddar cheese and will only drink small amounts of water. She’ll also eat chocolate, but only if it’s plain milk chocolate. We’re really worried about her as she’s not getting her nutrients, so we took drastic action last week.
We decided to try to force her into eating more food. Nothing adventurous – just plain chicken and beef and some veggies. Before that we were trying to be nice about it – bribing her and asking her and begging her. We tried giving her the food she wanted, with one other ingredient as a compromise, but she leaves it the thing she doesn’t want. She also won’t take vitamins.
We decided to stop giving her plain pasta and to mix it and cheese with other things. We tried a cheese sauce with chicken in her pasta, we tried cauliflower cheese with chicken and other things like that, but she refused. She’s refused to eat for the last 2 days and has gone to bed hungry the last two nights.
We thought that if she felt hungry, she’d cave and eat some new things, but she won’t budge. Now if we give in, she wins, but if we keep doing this, she’s going to make herself terribly ill.
Has anyone been through this before? I feel like a terrible mum right now, the situation is just so upsetting.
