At 19 months old, Gavin’s eating habits are still somewhat questionable and recently, I’ve been receiving some heat for it.  Although he is a healthy weight and growing well, there is still a lot of concern about the fact that he doesn’t seem as interested in food as other children his age.  Let me qualify that - other children we know who are his age.

As I’ve said before, in a Chinese family, food is love - we live to eat.  The idea that a child does not like to eat deals a crushing blow and strikes fear in the heart of all those who love him.  So naturally, there are a number of people up in arms over Gavin’s lack of interest in food.  In fact, this has been a persisting issue since he started solids at six months.

Quite honestly, I feel I have tried everything I can think of.  I have also read quite extensively on toddlers who won’t eat and the advice is the same everywhere - keep offering food and try to relax.  The more anxious you are about your toddler not eating, the more likely he is to continue this pattern.  It has taken me a while to relax and just when I have started to accept my son’s eating habits, I have been accused of not trying to correct his behaviour or researching how this might be done.

I really don’t know what else I can do to encourage Gavin to eat besides forcing his mouth open and shoveling food in there and for obvious reasons, I won’t do that.  Neither will I resort to threatening him to eat.  I have heard of a mother who spanks her daughter with a cane if she refuses to eat - and I fail to see the logic behind that.  She’s just increasing the negative association that her daughter has with food.

So let’s break it down and take a look at the problem:

Gavin is 19 months old and he has eight teeth.  I’ve noticed that he tends to go off food especially when he’s sick or when he’s teething.  Since he still has quite a number of teeth to erupt, I guess it’s safe to say that the eating patterns aren’t going to improve on their own in the near future.

The times when he’s eaten well, the foods he ate were - cheese, bread, cereals, biscuits, noodles, ice cream, hot chocolate, soup, congee and rice.  However, none of these foods have consistently been a real hit with Gavin except the hot chocolate and the ice cream.  The fact that he eats ice cream with such gusto suggests to me that he doesn’t have a problem with eating but that he is just very selective about his food choices (not unlike someone we all know).  It’s just unfortunate that ice cream is hardly a staple food that we can offer him on a regular basis.

We have also noticed that Gavin eats a lot better when he is in the company of other children.  Perhaps it is the influence, perhaps it is the fear that all his food will be eaten, he seems to be more interested to eat when his friends are eating.  Aside from encouraging more outings with friends with kids, there’s probably not much else we can do about this until Gavin gets another sibling.

Other reasons for not wanting to eat - snacking too much, or consuming too much fluids.  I’ve noticed that we tend to feed him a snack after his afternoon nap - anywhere between 4pm to 5pm.  It may be a biscuit, it may be bits of bah kwa (dried sweet meat) and it can be with juice or chocolate milk.  Perhaps in our concern to make sure he eats, we have developed a habit of giving him too many snacks.  One way to keep track of how much he’s eating is to keep a food diary.

Sure, sometimes it isn’t the snacks.  Sometimes he just doesn’t like what’s offered at dinner and chooses not to eat.  So maybe what we need to do is have a consistent back-up to feed him in the event that he doesn’t like what is served at dinner.  And maybe what we need to do is take better note of the foods that he does enjoy eating and make sure we cook them more often?

You might have noticed that I have used the term “selective feeder” instead of “fussy eater” to give it a more positive spin.  They say that negative labels tend to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, such as calling a child naughty, so I’ve decided to remove this one by referring to my son as a “selective feeder”.  He’s not picky, he just knows what he wants.

If you have any other suggestions at all on feeding a selective feeder, feel free to post them in the comments below. 

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I’ve been down and out the past couple of days with a stomach bug.  I guess that’s what happens when you try not to “waste” the food (and drinks) your toddler doesn’t finish and consume them yourself.  Note to self: please discard all unwanted food from now on and remember that if you don’t think it’s safe for your toddler to eat it, then it’s probably not safe for you to eat it either.

When I felt the first waves of nausea, I thought hopefully that I might be pregnant.  Any hope was crushed by the doctor who confirmed that it was definitely food poisoning because of an elevated pulse rate, mildly elevated temperature, and vomiting (which happened while I was in the clinic) that subsequently made me feel better.  Additionally, based on my cycle, it was probably too soon for me to be experiencing pregnancy symptoms anyway.

Not that I didn’t try testing with a home kit.  I bought myself a Clearblue home test stick after being convinced about its accuracy from my previous experience with Gavin.  I was a little surprised to discover that it had gone up in price.  I distinctly recall it only cost about RM20 the last time I bought it.  This time I paid RM30 for it.  Ah well, I figured it was just all the price hikes and inflation.  Little did I realise that this was a new and improved test stick.

What I bought was not the old Clearblue test stick that I had used previously.  Instead, it was a new Clearblue Digital test stick with an LCD monitor to tell you whether your urine test was positive or negative!

Goodness!  What will they think of next?

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If your child is a fussy eater and you’re at your wits end to get him to eat, here’s a tactic that seems to work for me quite consistently:

Let your child observe other children eating.

Nearly every time we have gone out with other parents who have children around the same age as Gavin, Gavin generally eats a lot more than he usually does.  And if we want him to eat even more, all we have to do is offer his food to the other child and Gavin will go into hoarding mode. 

For instance, I offered him a biscuit which he declined.  When his friend asked if he could have one of Gavin’s biscuits, Gavin suddenly decided he wanted a biscuit, too.

Of course, I suppose it takes a certain personality in a child for this to work…

I should have thought of this earlier, though.  When I was studying Dentistry, one of the behaviour modification techniques we were taught was called “modelling”.  One of the ways to help young children accept dental check-ups is for them to observe another child getting a check-up in a positive environment.  Being able to see that the other child is happy and unafraid of getting the check-up helps to reassure them that there is nothing to fear about having the procedure done on themselves.

Incidentally, while I was passing the time in a shopping mall in JB, I saw a VCD that is supposedly designed to help encourage your child to eat healthy food called Baby Gourmet.  There are three volumes, but I only saw volume 2 and 3 for sale.  I decided to buy volume 2 and try it out on Gavin, especially since it received the Dr Toy award - Gavin’s Thomas the Tank Engine book had also received the Dr Toy award and he loved that book so I figured we couldn’t go too far wrong with this VCD.  Besides the VCD was on RM15.90 - a small price to pay if it meant my son would eat better.

Since I bought the VCD, I’ve played it once for Gavin.  He paid little to no attention to the VCD which is basically a recording of various food pictures and soothing music in the background.  Perhaps it would have worked better if I had started using it on Gavin when he was younger and less discerning about what he watched on TV? 

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There is something very adorable about watching a toddler self-feeding…

This video is of Gavin having Baskin Robbins ice cream at Pavillion.  The decor probably isn’t familiar because we’re sitting in Starbucks.  Yes, for a change, Gavin chose to have ice cream instead of his favourite Starbucks Hot Chocolate.

Gavin has been self-feeding for some time now and he’s getting quite good at aiming the spoon into his mouth (although the food doesn’t always stay on the spoon and sometimes he doesn’t quite pick up anything with it either).

We used to worry that Gavin didn’t like eating.  After a while, we just stopped worrying and let him do as he pleased.  Now he self-feeds himself biscuit/crackers, rice, noodles and bits of fish which we put into his bowl and he drinks soup, juice, water and milk. 

They say that the more you fuss over something, the less likely a child is going to cooperate.  Perhaps that is why all our persistent efforts to get Gavin to eat in the past often met with failure.  Our stressing about him not eating made meal times rather unpleasant and the result was Gavin rejecting food.  Looks like when it comes to food, your child really does know best…

If you have a discerning gourmand for a toddler, the key is to offer variety.  If he eats, that’s great.  If he doesn’t, well, there’s always the next meal.  If you hate to see food go to waste, then there’s always Mum and Dad to eat up the leftovers.  Hmmm… no wonder I’m putting on weight.

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Okay, I’m a bad, bad Mum…

I bribed my son with a lollypop to get him to sit in his carseat.

But wait!  Before you brand me for the evils of my sins, you have to hear me out first.

I was taking Gavin and my Dad to have lunch with my 93 year old (or is it 94?) maternal grandfather.  He recently gave up his car so it meant he was pretty much homebound.  For a man who prides himself on his independence, this must have been a major blow for him.  Add the fact that he loves going out and it is almost like nailing the coffin shut.  He was clearly in desperate need for an outing.

Gavin was pretty good in the carseat until it was time to go home.  Dad drove us back to my other grandparents house and by that time, Gavin was clearly due for a nap and starting to get rather cranky.  He resisted my efforts to put him into the carseat for the final leg of our journey home.

I had two choices:

1. Force him into the carseat, endure his wails and let him vomit all the way home; or
2. Give him a chuppachup lolly pop and deal with his sugar buzz when we got home.

For obvious reasons, I elected option number two.

You would not believe how well behaved he was in the carseat.  There was not even a peep out of him all the way home.  He sat quietly in his carseat, licking his lollypop and looking at the passing scenery.  When we got home, he made no fuss to get out of the car.  In fact, I think he would have happily sat in the carseat for a some time more.

Admitedly, he woke up crying after his afternoon nap but at least I could console him.  Was it not a small price to pay for obedience in the carseat?

Even though I bribed him, I have to add that the following day, he sat in the carseat all the way home from 1Utama without fussing at all - AND he didn’t need the lollypop bribe, so I perhaps I haven’t yet created a nasty habit.  I’m still pondering how I managed to get such good behaviour all the way home, though.  If only he could sit like that every time…

Do you have a toddler that refuses to sit in the carseat?  What tricks do you use to get them to sit?  Please share them in the comments below.

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My SIL and I took Gavin to check out the new branch of Toys ‘R’ Us at KLCC and to do a bit of shopping yesterday.  We were taking the escalators up to Kinokuniya when Gavin spotted Starbucks in the distance.  He pointed to it and said, “Eh, eh.”

Gavin’s really into the whole coffee culture - or rather, I should say he’s into the hot chocolate culture.  For some time now, he’s been taking sips from my hot chocolate every time I get one from Starbucks.  In fact, while he occasionally declines my offer to share some ice cream with him, he has almost never rejected the hot chocolate.  Yep, he’s a kid who rejects ice cream.  My FIL once commented that never has he ever known a child who rejected ice cream before.  I would even go so far as to say that hot chocolate tops the list on Gavin’s food preferences. 

Fairly early on, Gavin started to recognise the Starbucks take away cups and would insist on having a sip when he saw it.  Yesterday was the first time he’s ever shown recognition of the Starbucks shop front.

Aside from Starbucks, Gavin has been demonstrating a marked preference for certain brands and items over others.  So evident is his preference that it has prompted me to create the Gavin’s Kid’s Choice Awards (yes, the logo should look somewhat familiar - it belongs to the Nikelodeon Kid’s Choice Awards).

And here is the first winner for Gavin’s Kid’s Choice Awards:

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The king of fruits, the Durian has often been known as the fruit that “tastes like heaven and smells like hell”.  A rich source of vitamin B and C, the durian also contains fiber.  It is also believed to be a good food source for pregnant women, although I’m not too sure why.  At any rate, since I enjoyed eating this fruit, I didn’t really question the merits of eating it while pregnant.  Perhaps it was because I didn’t want the hubby to discover a reason why I shouldn’t eat the fruit since he can’t stand the smell of it.

They say that babies can develop a taste preference even while in the womb because they can taste flavours from the foods their mothers eat.  Since I consumed considerable quantities of durian during my pregnancy, I had a strong suspicion that Gavin might like durians.

Recently, my FIL bought some durians home and we tested my hypothesis.  It would appear in this instance that Gavin has again demonstrated his genetic similarities to Daddy because he rejected the durian after the first taste (much to Daddy’s relief since it now means that Mummy is the only one who likes durians so he won’t have to tolerate it in our house once we move into our new place).

Well, my MIL hasn’t given up her quest to educate Gavin in the art of durian consumption so I guess you can watch this space…

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On Saturday night, it was a friend’s birthday so the hubby, Gavin and I went to 1Utama to join the party.  We had dinner at a little Japanese restaurant in the old wing, on the ground floor near Sun Moulin, Carl’s Jr and Dave’s Deli.  The front of the restaurant is a small Japanese grocery shop that I have often passed by without realising that there was a restaurant behind it.  The food was great and Gavin loved everything we gave him.  Since he was eating so well, we continued to feed him until he had had enough.

All seemed great until we were on the way home.  I was starting to feel a tad thirsty, but I put it down to the fact that I didn’t drink any water during dinner.  By the time I got home and put Gavin to bed, it was clear that my thirst was due to the MSG in the food.  It wasn’t until Gavin woke me in the middle of the night, crying, that I guessed just how much MSG must have been in the food.  My mouth was so dry, I could barely swallow.  Not only was I suffering, but Gavin, too, was having a fitful night.  He had two nightmares where he cried and howled worse than I’ve ever seen in quite a while.  When he wasn’t crying, he was tossing and turning around fitfully. 

And there I was planning to make another trip to this Japanese restaurant…  I guess we won’t be eating there again anytime soon.

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With so many preservatives and artificial additives in food these days, it is common for many parents to search for organic foods to feed their young ones.  The good intentions are noted, but one wonders sometimes how much of the so-called organic foods we are purchasing at premium prices are really “organic”?

I used to purchase them in good faith, believing that a product labelled “organic” from a relatively reputable outlet like Village Grocers in Bangsar would indeed be organic.  Not that I would like to cast suspicion upon anyone over the authenticity of the produce I’ve bought, but one can’t help having doubts when brocolli over a month old can still look as green as this:

I found this in the back of our refrigerator after forgetting about it for over a month since I bought it.  The label on it still had the packaging date so I know it’s over a month old.  If there are no preservatives, then how can brocolli still look this good after a month?  Or have I underestimated the lifespan of a head of brocolli?

After hearing a true story about a fruit and vegetable grocer who used to throw his old stock into a bin and label it organic, I’m afraid I don’t particularly hold much faith in labels any more.

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It has always been my intention not to allow Gavin to tuck into junk food before he turned two years.  I even held onto some foolish hope that I could delay the introduction of junk food until he was school going.  Despite the number of times I had told anyone around me who cared to listen that babies’ palates are untouched therefore they don’t know crave for things they have not tasted, I still keep getting told that I am depriving my son of the foods he desires to eat. 

For instance, my FIL keeps a container of biscuits near his favourite chair where he watches TV.  Gavin loves to wander over to that table and point at the things on it, including the container of biscuits.  When he was younger, before he had even tasted anything other than breast milk and the food I specially prepared for him, my FIL would insist that Gavin wanted to eat the biscuits.  This isn’t necessarily the case - Gavin is just curious.  Even when he reaches out for the food we eat before him, he doesn’t necessarily desire to eat them.  Sometimes all he wants is to touch it just as he would any other new item he has never seen before.

I was a bit disappointed when Gavin was fed his first taste of ice cream before he had even reached the age of one year.  It also bothered me that Gavin was chomping on biscuits in between meals that were fed to him by my in laws.  The only exception I made was his rusk biscuits because they were fortified with vitamins and minerals and fairly low in sugar (especially when compared to regular biscuits which are empty calories and completely devoid of nutrients).  To add to that, he was also being offered deep fried foods during family meal times - though he was not necessarily always eating them.

The hubby keeps telling me that I am depriving Gavin, because to the hubby, life is all about food.  Personally, I felt that Gavin had a lifetime ahead of him to feast on these foods and since he is young and nutrition is paramount, I really wanted to get him off to the right start.  Unfortunately, with Gavin having only sprouted two teeth at the age of one year and being an extremely fussy eater, he has created a lot of cause for concern about his eating habits.  Being under a lot of pressure to get him to eat and being limited in the types of foods I could give him (since he doesn’t have many teeth) has meant I had to relax the rules about the types of food I would have otherwise been unwilling to offer him at this tender age.  Since our diets aren’t exactly the healthiest, it makes it that much harder to ensure that Gavin only eats proper foods. 

Before I met the hubby, I was a vegetarian.  I had even gotten to the point where I ate very limited chocolate and ice cream (my two vices when it comes to junk food) and was completely averse to deep fried foods.  I only had to look at KFC to feel physically ill.  Well, it’s hard to grow up in a family who buys fruits by the box-load and live with parents who were constantly watching my diet and not develop some instincts for healthy eating.  Unfortunately it only took some three years of dating and living with the hubby for the chocolate and ice cream to creep back into my life with a vengeance. Now not only do I eat KFC but I even look forward to it - gasp!  With my diet being the way that it is now, it’s been a little difficult for me to say what Gavin should and shouldn’t be eating.  “Eat as I say, don’t eat as I do” is not exactly a good formula.

So I relented a little figuring that as long as Gavin was eating some nutritious foods like wholemeal bread, cheese, fortified rice cereals and his rusk biscuits, I would allow him the occasional tastes of sugar and fried foods.  Some how or other, chocolate didn’t quite make it onto my list of acceptable foods even if I consume copious amounts of the stuff.  

You can imagine my chagrin when my SIL, during a playful session with Gavin, discovered that he willingly opened his mouth to taste Nutella.  I realise it was an accident and that my SIL didn’t expect him to be so willing to sample because Gavin usually requires a lot of cajoling before he will open his mouth to try any new foods.  Not only was he willing to try Nutella, he loved it!  What child doesn’t like Nutella, you ask?  Duh!  Well, Gavin has surprised us all by declining even ice cream when he isn’t in the mood for it.

When I told my SIL that my original plan was not to offer Gavin chocolate at such an early stage, she smiled apologetically and said, “Well, Nutella’s not really chocolate - it’s gianduja.”  Trust a chef to come up with a comment like that…

Okay, so Gavin likes his Nutella.  So what?  We don’t have to offer it to him everyday of the week.  Well, the scene in the kitchen this morning was definitely cause for alarm.  My SIL, who’s been dying to get back into Gavin’s list of favourite people (as he hasn’t been too keen to be carried by her since she came back from Perth), and my MIL, who just loves to watch Gavin enjoying his food, were both fighting to feed Gavin Nutella for breakfast. 

With everyone eager to bribe Gavin with treats to win his affections, I can see that my plan to keep him off the junk food (at least to limit his consumption of it as much as possible) is fading as rapidly as the memory of a dream upon waking up in the morning.  My only consolation (since misery loves company) is that another mother was complaining to me that the same thing was happening with her daughter.  Despite her constant nagging not to feed sweets and treats to her daughter, the grandparents just keep right on at it.  Sometimes I think we mothers are invisible and unheard.

Sigh… I need a new feeding plan.  Got any suggestions for me?

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