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Message edited 10/3/2013 12:41:13 AM.

Re: Back to eating pureed fruit and yogurt

That stinks...poor little guy! Does he receive ot for the SPD? Maybe an ot or feeding therapist could give you some advice? Good luck!

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Message edited 10/3/2013 12:41:44 AM.

Back to eating pureed fruit and yogurt

My older twin has the same limited menu as you described. I also think there is SPD but never diagnosed with one. He is 20M. I just keep hoping things will get better. He won't eat cold ice cream/ice yet. His menu is VERY limited compared to his twin. I just keep trying.

Re: Back to eating pureed fruit and yogurt

I speak from experience when I say this. Be tough with him. Stop buying the pureed fruit and try your hardest to get him back to eating the foods he was eating before he was sick. I had a similar thing happen with my DS and if I had to go back in time, I would have pushed him harder to go back to his regular foods after he recovered from being sick. At first I think a lot of it was sensory, but when he went for a long time without trying new things, I think it became more behavioral.

He is 5 now and one technique that we have been using to get him to eat things he used to, or new foods is this:
Offer him his regular breakfast and lunch and snacks, whatever that is

At dinnertime, he has to take 5 bites of the food you want him to eat. Once he eats the 5 bites, he can have whatever he wants to eat, snacks, milk, whatever. If he doesn't eat those 5 bites he gets nothing else.

Once you get him to eat the 5 bites 2 nights in a row, offer familiar/preferred foods for dinner the next few nights and try the new food again in a couple of days. If he refuses it again, you start from the beginning.

Once the food is added to his rotation of dinner options, increase the # of bites and fade the stuff he is getting rewarded with.

It's tough, and my DS went without dinner for 7 nights before he finally gave in, but he did. And then the next time we offered a new food it only took one night without dinner for him to try it. We also tried doing one for one, he would get one cracker (his favorite) for one bite of dinner. And then after dinner, if he ate all the bites he was allowed to play the iTouch for 10-15 minutes (a big motivator for him).

It's really hard, because you tell yourself you want him to eat something, but if you know he ate those foods before without a problem, I would really try to push him to at least get back to what he was eating before he got sick. Good luck.

Message edited 7/3/2013 4:11:27 PM.

Back to eating pureed fruit and yogurt

I agree with the above poster. If you know he likes those foods then you need to be stricter with him. DD still has major food issues and would always regress when she is sick. What works for us is we start with alternating foods...one piece of what I want...then one piece of what she wants until she starts eating it all herself again.

Re: Back to eating pureed fruit and yogurt

I also would write a long letter and send it to the school, advocating for him to receive increased services, especially if you can feel he can benefit (Or that it would help you learn to better work with him).

If his current provider can chime in as well, especially if they notice concerns, this too can help.

At least this is what worked for me.......

My school district seems to be very liberal with services though.

At his end of the year meeting we were actually fine with discontinuing everything and they wanted to keep OT in for next year.

Good luck!

Message edited 7/4/2013 7:35:20 AM.

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Message edited 10/3/2013 12:42:31 AM.

Re: Back to eating pureed fruit and yogurt

Most districts will tell you that the services they approve are for challenges in the classroom, not for eating or things that don't affect their classroom or academic performance. Some districts are more generous and may work with you on the feeding stuff. I think in preschool, though, they may be more willing to help.

DS gets speech and the speech therapist works on eating with him at lunchtime at school. At one of our meetings the question was raised whether this was something the school was supposed to be working on him. Luckily, he has a great speech therapist and a great OT and they both started listing the reasons why it should be something they work on at school. We also get parent training and the parent trainer has had some good suggestions on how to help get him to expand his eating. The district might be willing to give you that if you ask for it.