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If the preferred food is nutritious and easy to prepare, continue to offer it along with a variety of other foods at each meal. Your child will usually start eating other foods before long. Many times, serving the meal before your child becomes ravenously hungry will help avoid the situation.
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Once a child is focused on one particular food, it's almost impossible to get the little one to accept an alternative food. If your child goes without eating much at one meal, don't worry. Your child will make up for it at another meal or snack. Healthy kids regulate what they need to eat to grow properly very well without parental supervision. Simply provide nutritious foods at meals and snack times.
While specific situations are discussed below, some general recommendations are as follows:
- Set an example by eating a variety of healthy foods.
- Prepare meals that are pleasing to the eye, with different colors and textures.
- Start introducing new tastes, especially green vegetables, beginning at 6 months, in the form of baby food.
- Never coerce a child to eat. Mealtime should not be a time of fighting. Children will eat when hungry.
- Avoid high-sugar snacks in between meals to allow children to become sufficiently hungry.
FEAR OF NEW FOODS
Fear of new foods is common in children and new foods should not be forced on a child. Many exposures are needed before a child will be brave enough to taste a new food. Continuing to offer new foods will help increase the likelihood that your child will eventually taste and maybe even like a new food.
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