My 4-Year Old Daughter Won't Eat Solid Fruits and Veggies

A little trick I try is putting the baby food (secretly) in other things. Like I put it in smoothies or applesauce in pancake batter or a muffin mix. My daughter can't tell the difference.

Hi Julie,
Our son would not eat solids either (except lox -- go figure). He was around 20 mos when we had him assessed (he was born 11 weeks early, so we received free developmental assessments periodically) and diagnosed with oral motor skill development problems. We were surprised because his speech came early and was excellent. However, apparently his brain did not understand how to move solids to his molars for chewing and he also had weak cheek muscles. We went to a feeding clinic at California Pacific here in San Francisco that combined Occupational Therapists (OTs), behaviorists, and nutritionists. This group was for kids 3 and younger, and our insurance covered it. Other kids in this group had issues with certain textures, etc. There was a wide array of specific challenges, but the approach seemed to work across the board (though my sample size here is about five). Maybe they have something for slightly older kids. CPMC is not too far from the SF side of the GG Bridge. Also, just having an OT evaluate your daughter might help. In group, we used a specific progression of textures at each "meal." Also, before starting a meal, we massaged our children's cheeks a bit and tapped on their molars with something called a Nuk (like a toothbrush w/out bristles). This tapping attracted their tongues to their molars (to build this skill) and heightened their awareness of molars in general. We spent about four months in this group before we felt we no longer needed assistance. He was eating solids without issue. Our son is almost 5 now and has not shown signs of other developmental issues at all (fingers crossed). It seems he just had this one wonky issue. Perhaps your daughter has a similar issue. If she is not chewing her food very well with her molars and/or is not able to move it around her mouth easily with her tongue, I can imagine she would have gagging issues. Also, I agree with the poster who suggested an osteopath (one who practices osteopathic manipulation -- totally different from a chiro, btw). There are several good ones in Marin. They go to medical school (four years, I believe) and have a D.O., doctorate in Osteopathic Medicine. Email me if you want more info on why I'm such a fan of osteopaths (not peddling anything here; I have no relation to any D.O. other than being a grateful patient; I just don't want to turn this post into a novel!). You might try both of these approaches at the same time, as neither one will cause any harm.

Good luck with this! I know how hard it is when your child is having a tough time eating.
K.

I don't have great words of advise. but just letting you know that this happened to my son. He was ultra sensitive to textures of food even though he would eat hamburgers and other solid foods like pizza, grilled cheese sandwiches and french fries - what a horrible diet! He would eat bananas and apples after a while. I continued to buy baby food until he was 12 years old! This was the only way to get fruits and veggies into him. I would carry food with me every time we went out to dinner. There was just no point to the daily vomiting. My son is autistic and this is a very common thing for people with his disability. He started trying new things when we started him on a drug called Abilify. It also helped that his brother who is 2 years older constantly encouraged him to try new things and would make it fun, like saying oohh these meatballs are so spicy, I bet you cannot eat just one, and yummy this soup is so tasty and will make you big and strong. Dad and I said the same type of things but he listened to his brother lots more. Now at 18 he eats EVERYTHING and his favorite thing is ceasar salad. Good luck!

Hi Julie,

My son has sensory processing disorder and along with that came eating issues (the technical term is oral aversion). I took him to see Ben at the Los Altos Feeding Clinic (he worked at the John's Hopkins feeding clinic before moving to Los Altos and opening his own out-patient clinic). Within two months of our son being seen there twice a week, he was eating pretty normally.

Just remember that your daughter isn't trying to be difficult....most likely she has some sort of oral sensory issue and the texture of the food feels 100 times more intense than when you eat it. She may very well just grow out of it but there are options, if you don't want to wait around and see.

Take good care....

Hi! My daughter has had the same problem from the time I tried switching her from Stage 2 to Stage 3 solids. She gagged, often vomiting. She is still - at age 7 - very sensitive to certain textures. I can't complain too much as I am sensitive, too. However, she gets her nutrition thru pureed foods (I love Jessica Seinfeld's cookbook "Deceptively Delicious") and my daughter has tried even more new things this way. I do have her try fruits/veggies in their whole state hoping one day she will "grow out" of the sensitivity. I wish I had better news but I've come to realize it's not her being difficult, she just has one of those sensitive reflexes. Good luck!

if fruits are the only things causing her to react this way, then it may be she just has not aquired the texture of these food yet, give her time...

It could be she does not like the taste of them, you might want to try cooking them a different way, say in chicken, veggie, or beef (low sodium)broth, and trying them that way.
canned fruit instead of fresh?

I am a grandmother and have dealt with this issue, i would
suggest you try putting a little chocolate or caramel on
a small piece of fruit to test if is actually the texture
or she just doesn't like the taste, (banana's make me
gag to) and try a little cheese sause on the veggies.
If it is the texture you will just have to settle for
pureed food. The other thing i did with my youngest was
to put finely cut up veggies in a tortilla, he loved
burritos and never knew.

Hi Julie
hope this helps... I never gave my (now 9 year old) baby food unless we went out for long periods of time, which was rare since I was a stay at home mom. When she could eat solid foods, I boiled, or baked her fruits and veggies and used the food processor to make it easier for her to eat. To this day, she will eat any fruit and vegetable I give to her. I plan on doing the same thing for my newborn as well.
Although the only eating problem I had with my first daughter was figuring out how to keep her from eat raw potatoes, maybe trying fresh fruits and veggies would help your situation.

It sounds like she has oral aversions which means she can't handle the texture/feel of the fruits and veggies so it gags her. The gagging needs to be addressed by both a speech therapist and occupational therapist for sensory issues. Sensory issues means that she may be having a hard time processing what is coming in through her senses - in her case not being able to handle the texture of the fruits and veggies. So you can ask your pediatrician for a referral to a speech therapist and occupational therapist. This is where it gets sticky - she's 4 y.o. and by that age they are covered by the school district for speech and OT evaluations. So many medical insurances will not cover these type of evaluations until after you go through your school district and they say it is there belief that it is a medical problem. Good luck!

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There may be something about the texture, I am like that with tomatoes. Give her applesauce, or keep pureeing for the time being. Over time, decrease the amount of time you puree and use a lower blender setting. She will adjust in time. Four is a funny age with food, they go through strange stages.

It sounds like she has sensory issues. Try taking her to an occupational therapist, or neuropsychologist for an evalation.

My son used to have terrible issues with texture. One thing that we tried that helped him through it was to get him started on finger-painting (as recommended by a food behaviorist). We started out with just colored foam in a zip-bag, then progressed to water color paints, then eventually to finger painting. Now, he'll eat almost anything.

Have you tried more solid fruits/ veggies? Over-cooked, limp slimey veggies would make me gag too. At 4 she should be able to eat thin apple slices and firm cooked/ raw veggies.

You must get the book "Deceptively Delicious". It is absolutely amazing. I have a 6 month old I will use it for in the future, but for now, I actually use it to get more veggies in my and my husband's diet. I know it's for "kids", but the recipes really are great. My husband actually asked me to cook him one of the recipes for his birthday! They really do taste great.

Hi Julie,
Young taste buds are still forming, so don't give up hope! There will most likely come a day when she will tolerate and probably even like fruits and vegetables. I have 2 children, one who eats like I do, primarily a vegan diet and the other is meat and potatoes like her dad... I have found Juice Plus+ for my family. Even my son and I take it because we struggle to eat a wide variety of fruits and vegetables year round and on a daiily basis. JP+ comes in capsules, chewables and a gummies. My sister gives my niece her gummies as an after dinner snack. Chloe loves them! For more info you can checkout my website, which also lists my contact information: www.chooseprevention.net.

Hi Julie,

My kids love Fruji's, a Fruit & Veggie bar from Nutrilite. I also give them Brainiums (which is loaded with DHA and Omega oils our kids brains need). Our girls love our Concentrated Fruits & Veggie chews too, and we feel better knowing they are getting the nutrition they need regardless of how many veggies they do not eat. All of these delicious organic nutritional products are a hit in our household. She'll love the Brainiums. Our kids think they are eating candy with the Brainiums (they are gummies) and love the Fruji's too. This might help you segue back into veggies and certainly give her the nutrition she needs in the meantime. I cannot recommend the Brainiums highly enough. Adults take them too (at least 9-12 a day. www.bbu4u.com is the website you buy these from and www.nutrilite.com will educate you on the quality and scientific testing of these products I am recommending.

I'm sure you are also taking a high potency organic omega 3 for your babies fetal brain development and getting plenty of folic acid too.

Good luck!

Hi, my sister has had the same problem with her son, pureed veggies by the way make great pasta sauces, I suggest taking your daughter to an osteopath because it could be that when she was born something happened that gave her this gagreflex, osteopaths have been a great help to my family for all sorts of reasons but yours was one of them, make sure the person is a doctor in osteopathy, good luck C. S.

Ground beef and, say, pears have totally different textures! I hope your doctor doesn't think that just because she can eat ground beef and bread without gagging, she should also be able to eat fruits and vegetables without gagging. Because fruits and veggies are WET and often SLIMY and MUSHY, way different from (cooked) ground beef or bread. (Raw ground beef . . . I can't touch it. It goes beyond gross into scary for me.)

Giving the doc the benefit of the doubt--perhaps doc just meant that since your daughter can eat many foods and will eat pureed fruits and vegetables, he or she is not worried about your daughter's nutrition?--this sounds like a sensory processing problem. In your shoes I would want to talk to an Occupational Therapist and maybe a Pediatric Neurologist or Developmental Pediatrician. Someone who has seen Sensory Integration problems and can tell if there may be something else going on. Most family practice docs and general pediatricians just don't have the training to spot sensory problems unless they're incredibly profound.

Edited:
I see I'm not the only one thinking you need an expert, so I'm taking out my attempt to persuade you that it's really not scary!

On a more practical front, if you're worried about what other people will think of your big girl eating jarred baby food, 1) develop a protective "who cares what you think?!" shell, and 2) blend the purees with yogurt and call them a smoothie when you're eating around other people.

Also, my younger brother had pretty much the same issue and he learned very early on how to swallow peas, corn, and tiny cubes of carrot whole. That meant he could swallow pills relatively young, which I envied every time I drank the pink amoxicillin of doom. Now that he's an adult, he makes it a point to eat raw fruits and veggies with a crisp or crunchy texture.

my twin daughters dont like fruits and vegatables much so i give them v-8 drinks just so they will have it in there diet

I wish I could offer advice but I wanted to let you know that I am going through the same thing with my three year old son. He has always had a very active gag reflex and has vomited with new foods. Currently, his diet consists of about five items and he refuses to eat *anything* else. I think the vomiting in the past has scared him out of eating anything new. The only way I can get him to eat veggies is to give him the pureed baby foods. I feel silly feeding a three year old baby food out in public but that's the only way I can get any healthy food into him. I talked to his pediatrician but I also got a similar response (he said "well, I don't know what you want me to do---you can't *force* him to eat different foods". Then he told me about a family member he had who only ate peanut butter sandwiches during his childhood (??) I'll look up the feeding specialist info at Children's too. Thanks.

I would consult a feeding therapist at childrens hospital oakland. If you have insurance it should be covered. They will watch her eat and ask you questions about her problem. They will for sure be able to tell you what is going on. Good luck.
-M.

Dear Julie,

My best advice is to be patient.

When I was a child I had a very severe gag reflex. My parents forced me to eat certain foods knowing that it would make me gag. But, at that time, whatever was put on your plate you were forced to eat. Sometimes I would gag the food down and then go in and throw up. It was truly a miserable experience. To this day there are still foods that I cannot stand to eat. I cannot stand the feel of them in my mouth and they, sometimes, still make me gag. I did grow up however, and learn how to eat many foods that I couldn't tolerate as a young person. So, please be patient and introduce new fruits and vegetables carefully and never force her. She truly has a problem. God bless you both and good luck. C. f