How to Help Your Kids Adjust to A New Menu at Home
We’ve all been there. We are tired of dealing with the physical and emotional side effects of a less than stellar diet, so we decide to start cooking at home, serve more fruits and veggies to our families, and cut out the sugar. We make a beautiful dinner for our kids… just for them to push the food around on their plates, refuse to eat, or flat out complain.
After a few tries, this usually goes one of two ways:
Begging, bargaining, or threatening our kids to “Just eat a few bites!”
Making two meals, one for them and one for ourselves.
Either way, it’s exhausting! And we usually end up throwing in the towel pretty quickly. But, what if I told you there is a better way?!
By using just one simple strategy to help your child cope, you can make this process so much easier on both you and your kids, decreasing meal time stress, connecting with your child, and improving access to nutrition for the whole family.
Addition Over Subtraction
My number one tip for introducing a new healthier eating style to your kids is to focus on adding foods, not taking them away.
It can be really tempting to “clean house”, get rid of junk foods, cut out sugar, etc., when we are ready to start feeding our family in a more nutrient dense way. And if you have been a dieter in the past, this will feel very familiar to you. Most diets encourage removing all “tempting” foods from your home or encourage you to start restricting or eliminating foods in some manner. However, despite this being a very common recommendation (that does appears to make sense at face value), there is no evidence that subtracting foods helps individuals or families create sustainable health changes. The thing is, when a family cuts out entire foods (e.g., dessert) in one big sweep or removes favored foods from the menu, I can all but guarantee that this will be a short-term change.
Subtracting foods too soon or too aggressively leads to feelings of deprivation and restriction. For kids, it can cause food anxiety and uncertainty. They may worry about whether there will be a food that they like at dinner, if they are going to be pressured to eat, or believe that they will never get to eat the foods they like again. In order to cope with the uncertainty and try to gain back some control over what they put in their bodies, they will rebel, reject, whine, plead, bargain, shut down, or any number of reactions based on temperament and family relationships.
And, to be honest, this isn’t fair to our kids.
When we take away foods they enjoy and are familiar with in the name of “health” we are imposing our own learned beliefs informed by years of dieting messages. We are also teaching them to associate physical health with deprivation and inconsistency.
As parents, there is no need to beat ourselves up for doing this in the past. Like I said, WE HAVE ALL DONE IT, but there is a better way forward that you can start when you are ready.
Focus on what you can add to your family’s meals, not on what you believe you should take away. Can you start serving a fruit or vegetable that they are familiar with alongside each meal and snack, or making sure there is a protein option? If they usually have a sugary cereal for breakfast, consider adding a protein and a fruit on the side in small portions. If they love frozen pizza for dinner, start by adding a raw veggie that they already like with a dip on the side. For packed lunches or snacks, you could include home made granola or trail mix with nuts and dried fruits for protein and fiber.
Once your kids become accustomed to seeing these nutrient dense foods more often, they will feel less stressed when you start to introduce bigger changes. This is a great time to start incorporating more balanced meals, continuing at this point to choose entrees and sides that they have eaten before or ingredients that they are already comfortable with.
Each step stretches their tolerance to change, and allows you more range in what you can serve. These small changes add up to big differences. Soon they will be more open to trying a wider variety of foods - with less stress on you.
By focusing on adding instead of subtracting foods, you are giving your kid space to process change and cope with it. Over time, you will organically notice that you have decreased the less nutritious options - not because you cut them out in one fail swoop, but because there just isn’t room for them now that you and your kids are eating all the new, delicious, and healthy foods you have introduced.
And as always, if you want more information on how to create sustainable healthy eating habits and raise body positive eaters, feel free to reach out. I am happy to help!
