When your kid is a picky eater…
The ole picky eater scenario. Picky eating almost always relates back to poor gut flora development in a child and poor eating habits taught to them by their parents. The poor gut flora development may have been caused by: 1. Lack of breast feeding 2. Early Introduction of foods 3. Introduction of the wrong foods 4. Failure to heal their gut when it is recognized that they are becoming a picky eater. So how to fix the gut flora issue? (Recognize gut problems by watching the skin and the skins reaction to certain foods. Do they get rashy? Do they breakout? Have they been dealing with an autoimmune disease?)
Start with bone broth at every meal, boil all meats and use very simple foods that are easy to digest like boiled carrots with butter. After the 2-3 weeks of using bone broth to heal, slowly add more difficult foods that may contain fiber, such as rice or certain fruits. Try to cook rice after it has been soaked 12 hours in bone broth, this will improve nutrient absorption and further lead to the gut healing. If you like your child eating dairy, slowly add in simple dairy products. Start with sour cream, then move to yogurt, then kefir and then ultimately raw milk or organic whole milk.
At the end of the day, the child is a picky eater because the parent did not feed them properly in the beginning or the parent failed to control food situations later on and allowed the child to control and ask for sweets instead of healthy, nourishing food. This is a very quick fix if you believe your child does not gut flora problems. Simply switch almost all foods to nutrient dense foods and fermented or soured foods. Fermented foods are incredibly healthy and also have a pungent taste. Do not take no as an answer. Provide a meal such as this: Cheeseburger with sauerkraut and sweet potatoes. Make the child eat the sauerkraut to get the cheeseburger and sweet potato. If they do not eat the sauerkraut then they cannot get the real food. This sounds horrific, BUT the child learns very fast after a couple hungry hours that they need to eat and enjoy sauerkraut or kimchi or any other healthy fermented food! Remember, the stress you deal with now as a parent will pay off in later years when your child is not battling obesity problems or attention deficit problems because they were raised on and appreciate healthy, whole foods!!!
Written by Dane Miller