Re: [fast5] Re: Throwing fo0d away

Monday, August 30, 2010

Re: [fast5] Re: Throwing fo0d away

You know, if he starts refusing pasta and bread in favor of steak and shrimp, and he has issues with gaining weight, you might also get him tested for gluten intolerance. My main "symptom" back when I was a kid was an aversion to a lot of foods, breads being among the main ones. Being misdiagnosed for 40 years has left me with a fair bit of permanent damage that could have been easily avoided (plus the last 40 years would have been far more pleasant!). Most of that time the docs thought I was quite healthy, but hypochondriac (because of misc. aches and pains and issues like food aversions).

My kids are really picky about restaurant food too though. So are the adults. It comes from eating good food at home, and learning what tastes good. My daughter took one look at eggs-over-easy at a restaurant, tried one, and said "Mom, that egg looks weird and it tastes weird and I don't want to eat it". She hadn't seen "store bought eggs" for maybe 8 years, and it really did look weird after all that time. She also doesn't like maraschino cherries any more (after loving them for ages) but craves bananas. My husband has followed suit, so he doesn't argue. But what possible good can come from training a kid to force down food that really isn't all that great? You're basically training the kid to ignore their own best instincts.

On Mon, Aug 30, 2010 at 7:22 AM, Heidi overbeek <heidioverbeek@yahoo.com> wrote:

With my son we have very food restrictions, we just tell him not to eat more than his body needs. He is a natural faster, often eating 1 large meal a day. This worried me a bit, prior to me starting w/ fast-5, but now I see it as very positive. We only had 1 period that we tried to push food on him, when he was 12 and the pediatrician diagnosed him w/ failure to thrive b/c he didn't gain any weight in a year. But then we relaxed pretty quickly and stopped bugging him. He is 15 yo, 5'11" and 145 lb (very athletic.) I have noticed some disapproval though, to my parenting style. For instance from an older relative (at a restaurant) who complained to me that he hadn't eaten his side dish of mac and cheese, after he did eat a steak and shrimp! I smiled and said, "Oh that's okay, I'm sure there were enough calories in that steak and shrimp for one meal." I've also been in situations at restaurants when he took one look at the food and refused to eat it. Fine, he doesn't get anything else but he doesn't have to eat it, and he doesn't get in trouble either. Why make an issue? Completely bothered my friend who then spent the rest of dinner trying to entice him to eat it. Why bother? It wasn't even healthy food!

I had too many rules about food growing up, "don't eat that, you're too fat." And "eat more, your wasting money if you don't eat it." I tell my son what I think is healthy (high protein, high fat, low carbs, low processed foods, low seed oils, etc) but I would rather him eat a few extra candy bars than end up w/ food issues.

Heidi