Questions about sensory issues regarding food.

[Aggie]

I know this is real and even suspect *slight* sensory issues in our home. I remember physically gagging on string beans when I was younger and one of our dds did the same when she was 3. We both eat them now, though. I even understand just the texture of some foods being repulsive.

 

And I know there is a strong relation to food allergies and what dc won't eat.

 

So.....

 

If your dc has sensory issues with food, how and where or do you draw a line? Will some dc with si only eat mac&cheese or chicken nuggets?

 

If so, how did dc with si survive before processed foods?

 

If we invited your si dc for a meal, what healthy, natural foods would your dc eat? Are spices (flavors, not hot spicey) a component? Or texture? Smell?

 

How do you know where si ends and being picky begins?

 

I am not judging si children or parents. Or their eating. I think it would be hard for me to distinguish between sensory issues and a picky eater with my dc. And I wouldn't want to never have a child over for a meal if he had si. Really, I would work around that where I wouldn't be inclined to work around a picky eater. I'm a terrible cook and a worse hostess. But, if you have a physical reason to not eat certain foods, as si or allergies, I'll have something here you can eat. If you choose to only eat pb&j, just come over to play after lunch. (Oh, I sound really horrible!)

 

What is a hostess to do?

[always cookin']

Honestly, I do try to avoid meals with others and just schedule playtime after lunch. I don't make my dd eat anything in particular, but require her to eat healthy foods (in general). She mostly eats plain food - raw carrots, most fruit, bread. I do not cater to her, but I always have raw carrots, white rice, or other foods she will eat as part of dinner. I also allow her (and my other dc) to snack on healthy foods when they are hungry (nuts, fruit, cheese, plain yogurt, healthy cereal, veggies,etc).

 

I am actually taking dd to dr. today, but she has many other issues that go along with this (and always has) so I know this is not just pickiness. She has issues with clothing, behavior (anger control), any type of change. There are so many issues with her.

[Snickerdoodle]

My son has multiple food allergies and has had severe oral defensive behavior.

 

Now, if I was going to someone's house for dinner I would feed him before hand and bring him a sandwich and some fruit to eat. (Actually, despite all of his eating issues, his whole life I played the "what if we lived this scenario in the 1800's, what would this boy have eaten?" i.e. no processed food whatsoever).

 

I would never ever in a million years expect the hostess to cater to him or to prepare a meal that suited him.

 

This hasn't been a problem really for us because most people in our circle know that he has issues and that it isn't a spoiling problem.

[Aggie]

Honestly' date=' I do try to avoid meals with others and just schedule playtime after lunch. I don't make my dd eat anything in particular, but require her to eat healthy foods (in general). She mostly eats plain food - raw carrots, most fruit, bread. I do not cater to her, but I always have raw carrots, white rice, or other foods she will eat as part of dinner. I also allow her (and my other dc) to snack on healthy foods when they are hungry (nuts, fruit, cheese, plain yogurt, healthy cereal, veggies,etc).

 

I am actually taking dd to dr. today, but she has many other issues that go along with this (and always has) so I know this is not just pickiness. She has issues with clothing, behavior (anger control), any type of change. There are so many issues with her.[/quote']

 

Thank you. You've answered my biggest question! She can and does eat healthy foods even with sensory problems. She would be able to eat at our house...we have those foods here all the time.:001_smile:

[always cookin']

When we do do somewhere for dinner, I feed her before we go and bring a banana or something in case she gets hungry.

[Aggie]

My son has multiple food allergies and has had severe oral defensive behavior.

 

Now, if I was going to someone's house for dinner I would feed him before hand and bring him a sandwich and some fruit to eat. (Actually, despite all of his eating issues, his whole life I played the "what if we lived this scenario in the 1800's, what would this boy have eaten?" i.e. no processed food whatsoever).

 

I would never ever in a million years expect the hostess to cater to him or to prepare a meal that suited him.

 

This hasn't been a problem really for us because most people in our circle know that he has issues and that it isn't a spoiling problem.

 

I've not heard of the severe oral defensive behavior. I'll have to look that up.

 

It makes me wonder how non-life-threatening issues were dealt with 200-300 years ago, too. I can't imagine. And then the food allergies...whew.

[Snickerdoodle]

http://www.sensory-processing-disorder.com/oral-sensitivities.html

[athena1277]

I think the best thing to do is to talk to the parent of the child before he/she comes over. My dd is on a gluten-free diet b/c of celiac disease. I always find out what will be served if she will be eating at someone else's house. I don't ask it to get the hostess to change her menu, only to keep my dd healthy. If she cannot have all or part of the meal, I send her with her own food to make up the difference. Friends that we see a lot are good about making at least one thing she can have, so she can eat the same as her friends.

[dirty ethel rackham]

Not all people who are picky eaters or have SI eat junky foods. We have a mostly whole-foods kind of household and I have a son who has dealt with major sensory issues. We are a mostly whole foods household. He stopped eating solid foods (made by me) as a toddler. Good thing I was still nursing or he would not be alive today. We were told to wean him so he would eat, but I am sure he would have shriveled away into nogthing if I had done that. As it turns out, he had decay in a tooth that came in deformed (not enough enamel). After it was fixed, he did start eating solid foods, but was very picky. We never gave in to the fast food or junky kid menues. We struggled. We did not eat at other people's houses because I didn't want to deal with the meltdowns that were sure to happen. We had to work hard to teach him not to be rude because he didn't like what was served. It was a LONG, SLOW process. After years of surviving on peanut butter on toast when he didnt' like what I served (made by him - not me) and a subsequent peanut allergy and then several years of neurodevelopmental therapy to help with the sensory issues, he is much better. He will always have strong likes and dislikes, but his palate has broadenend enough that he is getting most of his nutrition from healthy foods.

 

Anyway, I think it is perfectly okay not to have people over for meals who do not eat the way you do. We don't eat often with people who eat highly processed foods unless it is a "bring your own" kind of thing. Those who know me know how we eat and would not send their child to eat at our home if they couldn't handle it.

[AuntPol]

All four of us have sensory issues with food (and other things). For me, it's mostly smell (seafood and pickles makes me gag). For my husband, it highly smell (if I cook squash at any point in the day, he knows) and texture (hate the feel of cooked vegetables but will eat most raw except cucumbers which are "boring"). My daughter doesn't like chewy or crunchy textures and will mostly eat soft foods. My son won't eat anything mushy (no mashed potatoes for him and fries have to be thin enough to be very crispy).

 

Both of my kids have problems with anything "new" or even an old favorite that hasn't been served in awhile. My son though tends go through phases. He will eat one thing almost daily for awhile and then hate it for months on end.

 

From my kids and friend's kids with similar issues -there are several things that "most" will eat: baby carrots with ranch dressing, corn, peeled apples, pasta w/ butter, and rolls (as long as not grainy topped rolls lol). Rotisserie chicken tends to go well too. Even my meat eschewing daughter can manage to get rotisserie chicken down. Most kids will eat Cheerios for breakfast (though many skip the milk and some may want sugar added).

 

I don't send my kids to just anyone's house to eat. MY daughter eats at others houses more often and has been instructed to try everything and don't make a fuss and I will feed her when she gets home. My son, I am not so sure would be polite due to his other spectrum issues so I feed him before we go and he rarely eats at anyone's house beyond family. I wish I could avoid most family but since we live so far off, it is hard to avoid not having at least one meal.

 

A lady in my homeschool group has kids who can't eat most anything that anyone else eats. I can't remember what the allergies are. However, when they do projects that involve food or parties to eat, she brings their food seperate. I don't think I could even begin to figure out what to fix them and even then couldn't be sure that my jelly didn't have some peanut butter germs on it from using the same knife on my kids sandwich, etc.

[Storm Bay]

Vitamin/mineral supplements help. My ds had serious sensory issues when he was too little to be making them up. I used to put beet & spirulina powders in his watered down apple juice to get at least some kind of green veggie in there! He loved it.

 

He still has some sensory issues, but when he reached 3 or 4 he got to a stage where I could make him eat certain veggies (he still cannot eat cooked spinach due to the texture, but I make him eat it raw.) I make sure my kids eat dark orange and green veggies when we can. My eldest cannot eat many green veggies due to phsical sensitivities, but can eat spinach & brocolli, so I give them to her raw because she hates cooked ones more (she's 13).

 

To this day I loathe the taste of certain foods and I have TRIED to like them as an adult. They tend to be foods my body cannot handle, or bitter foods. eg, I have always hated tomatoes unless they're cooked with garlic, meat, etc, in a sauce, but now they cause me problems so I don't eat them if I can help it. Also, my body can no longer handle garlic...

[JenneinCA]

Since I feel partly responsible for starting this mess, I'll respond here.

 

If your dc has sensory issues with food, how and where or do you draw a line?

 

I draw the line rudeness. I make no one try one bite. My kids can sit and be polite or be done.

 

Will some dc with si only eat mac&cheese or chicken nuggets?

 

I don't know. Probably. My daughter isn't that particular. She won't eat beans. She won't eat most fruits. She won't eat most veggies. She will eat meat. She will eat rice. She will eat bread. She will now eat pasta. For her it is a texture issue. I can't say that she ever would only eat mac and cheese or chicken nuggets.

 

If so, how did dc with si survive before processed foods?

 

Processed food are not something she ever ate. She had lots of sandwiches. She ate meat without sauce. She ate rice. None of this is processed. It is actually much easier to feed her without processed food.

 

If we invited your si dc for a meal, what healthy, natural foods would your dc eat? Are spices (flavors, not hot spicey) a component? Or texture? Smell?

 

She would love to eat meat (pot roast, chicken, pork chops). Rice or noodles without sauce. Any bread. She will choke down a few veggies if it seemed necessary.

 

How do you know where si ends and being picky begins?

 

I didn't know. I caused major issues in our relationship because I was trying to force her to be normal. It didn't work. We ended up at an Occupational Therapist because her gross motor skills were behind and when I filled out the forms we discovered the food issues. Looking back it was obvious. She ate baby food for a loooong time because she gagged on the chunkier foods. She was not interested in grown up food.

 

I hope this helps a little.

[Melinda in VT]

My selective eater is 3, and I'm still not sure what is just stubbornness and what is sensitivity.

 

There are a lot of foods he just won't even put in his mouth, but lately he's begun complaining about the smell of foods on my plate (he sits closest to me), so the smell might be contributing to his reluctance to taste.

 

To be honest, I've had moments where I wished he would try some of the overly processed kid food. After all, if he eats chicken nuggets that's at least chicken, right? And he might transition from there to roast chicken. Likewise, the difference between a McDonald's hamburger and a homemade hamburger with meat from the local farm seems a lot smaller than the gap between not eating any hamburgers and eating homemade hamburgers.

 

Mostly, though, I try to make good use of the foods he will eat. This means his pb&j is made with whole wheat bread and peanut butter and jelly made without HFCS.

[Parrothead]

Dd has issues with some food textures, but she still has a well-balanced diet. About once a year I make her try one of her foods to see if things have changed. Some have (she will eat strawberries now) some haven't (she still can't eat eggs in any form).

[Storm Bay]

My selective eater is 3, and I'm still not sure what is just stubbornness and what is sensitivity.

 

There are a lot of foods he just won't even put in his mouth, but lately he's begun complaining about the smell of foods on my plate (he sits closest to me), so the smell might be contributing to his reluctance to taste.

 

Your sense of smell doesn't come fully developed from the womb. All of my dc found they suddently didn't like certain foods once they reached about 3/4 when they were finally potty trained, etc.

 

To be honest, I've had moments where I wished he would try some of the overly processed kid food. After all, if he eats chicken nuggets that's at least chicken, right?[\QUOTE]

 

Less than half of a McDonald's chicken McNugget is actually chicken. Some of the other ingredients are downright scary! And I used to let my dc have it once in a while before we learned about real food sensitivities (by blood test.)

 

Mostly, though, I try to make good use of the foods he will eat. This means his pb&j is made with whole wheat bread and peanut butter and jelly made without HFCS.

 

 

We do similar with what my dc are actually physically able to eat.

[Cindyg]

how did dc with si survive before processed foods?

 

I think some of them didn't. I think it was called failure to thrive. I think a child with true SI would die before eating food he/she couldn't tolerate.

 

However, I also think that SI didn't exist so much before processed foods. I think there's something in our environment -- whether it's mercury, pollution, radiation, holes in the ozone layer, I don't know -- but something that is causing this.

 

If we invited your si dc for a meal...

 

If you invited our family for a meal, I would not expect you to accomodate this. If my child were severe enough, I would bring food for him. If he was a little iffy, I might ask you if you had any plain crackers or carrot sticks; or I might just let my child sit politely at the table without eating anything. I could feed him on the way home. Or if you were a close friend or our grandma, I might look in your fridge for a bite of something else. But I would not expect you to worry with this.

 

How do you know where si ends and being picky begins?

 

Mom and dad know. Just let them take the lead on what their children are required to eat. It's not that different from deciding whether a child is too sick to have school. :)