Food and the Family

Yesterday was Mother's Day, and we had a wonderful day. We all went out for a meal at our favourite Italian restaurant and as usual the girls behaved better than my husband and myself. Our eldest was the only one who didn't eat a good meal. She picked at a few chips but the plate of spaghetti went uneaten, as did her share of the pizza which her sister polished off.

You see, my eldest is what most people would label a fussy eater. I am very aware not to call her that. I don't want her to be pigeonholed as something that can cause her misery for years to come.

You see, I was a 'fussy eater'. Or at least so I was told all through my life. Even now I have turned 30 I can still see my parents rolling their eyes every time I say we've gone out for a meal as they ask, "And did you find anything to eat?"

Food was an absolute misery, all through my childhood. My mum would pile my plate high with things I couldn't, rather than wouldn't eat. There's a difference between things you would prefer not to eat but can and things you absolutely cannot eat. For example, I would prefer not to eat sprouts, but I can eat them. Garden peas, on the other hand, I absolutely cannot eat or I'll gag and heave.

Because my mum served up a large amount of things that I absolutely couldn't eat, I got stuck with the label of 'fussy eater'. And once you have been given that label you start to believe it. So you will go out somewhere and want to try something but then your parents remind you, "Oh, you won't like that. You're a fussy eater. Better stick to the chips." Or you'll be in the supermarket, watching your parents piling the trolley full of foods you hate when out the corner of your eye you spot something you'd like to try, so you pick it up and ask politely. "Oh no, I'm not wasting my money on that. You're a fussy eater. You won't like it."

Over the years you start to believe it, so you lose your confidence to try new foods. You feel increasingly like your presence at mealtimes is a bother. It gives you a kind of fear about food that is very difficult to shake.

I believed that I was a fussy eater all my life, until I met my husband. I was terrified that I would bring my 'fussy eater' status into our relationship and had visions of cooking two meals every day for the rest of our lives - a 'normal' meal for him and a 'fussy meal' for me.

Well, guess what? It turns out I was never a fussy eater in the first place.

I just liked different foods to my parents.

I love rice and pasta, cooking a stir fry or casserole, making home-made pies, frying foods in a dry pan instead of in half a packet of lard, creating new recipes and seeing what works.

I love all the foods that my parents hate. So the foods I love were never cooked in my home when I was a child and I never had the opportunity to show my love for those dishes instead of my hatred for fishcakes, mashed potato and garden peas.

I know my eldest will find more foods she likes. That's why it's important to try her with things that we wouldn't normally eat as a family. Who knows, she might like the fishcakes, mashed potato and garden peas that I never did. But if not, that's OK. She knows what she likes and we know what she can eat but would prefer not to as well as the things she absolutely cannot eat.

She's not a fussy eater - she's human!