Parenting a Child With Feeding Difficulties During the Holidays

As a pediatric dietitian and mom of three, I'm sending some extra love and support this season to all families who are heading into the holidays with a child who is struggling with feeding difficulties. I’ve experienced both professionally and personally how stressful the holidays can be for families with children who are struggling with eating.

⁠If you are tempted to blame yourself, please don't. Feeding difficulties in children can have so many drivers that are beyond our control. Your child's eating is not a reflection of your parenting, despite what Aunt Gert might say.

Also, please don't be afraid to reach out for help if you have concerns about your child's picky eating or if you feel that things are getting worse.

The best place to start is your pediatrician or healthcare clinician, who can make referrals to a feeding therapist if needed. ⁠

DO's to help manage your picky eater during the holidays

Holiday meals can cause a particular kind of stress for parents who have a child with feeding difficulties or a pediatric feeding disorder. Extended family members can exert extra pressure and sometimes be particularly judgmental about picky feeding, food refusal, and portion sizes, making it even more difficult to manage associated feelings of shame while trying to feed your child.

If you are the caregiver of a child who struggles to eat, here are some strategies you can use in the days leading up to holiday family gatherings that are meant to help you put some guard rails around yourself and your child in the context of shared family meals:

• DO prepare your child: In the days leading up to the holiday, talk to your child about what to expect at the holiday meal (as much as you’re able) and what your expectations are (i.e., you don’t have to eat what is served, but you have to sit at the table with everyone for at least x minutes...)

• DO prepare your extended family: In the days leading up to the holiday, talk to extended family members as well (without your child present) about your child’s feeding challenges and how you prefer to manage them. Set clear expectations and thank them for respecting your process.

• DO feed in advance: Serve a hearty meal or two with foods and beverages your child can and will eat and drink before the holiday event to help prevent the hangries, low-blood-sugar-related tantrums, and melt-downs.

• DO bring a dish or two: Bring or make a dish or two together with your child that you know your child can and will eat. Make enough for everyone so that your child can feel good about sharing it with the table.

• DO make it fun: Before the holiday, involve your child in some of the holiday food prep, making the process as fun and playful as possible. Try using holiday-themed cookie cutters, food picks, weird utensils (Amazon affiliate link), and festive plates to help make food exposures to holiday foods feel less scary.

DON'T's to help manage your picky eater during the holidays

The holidays can be stressful even without the added pressure of managing picky eating or feeding disorders in children. Kids are like sponges—they absorb parental stress even when we think we're doing a bang-up job of hiding it from them!

So don't put additional pressure on yourself to expose your child to all sorts of fruits and vegetables and food textures they typically refuse to eat.

Repeated exposures to new foods are valuable, but not when a child feels stressed or pressured to eat, so cut yourself some slack in the new food introduction department until you and your child can get back into a calmer routine.

Here are some additional things to avoid:

• DON'T pressure your child to eat: At the holiday meal, serve your child some of each food offered, but do not pressure, bribe, coax, force, cajole, shame, or reward them into eating or taking a certain number of bites—remind family members who try to pressure your children to eat that you encourage them to listen to their bodies and decide for themselves whether and how to eat.

• DON'T blame yourself: Food/feeding often becomes a hot topic among family members who may mean well but have strong opinions and little expertise or understanding about child feeding and nutrition. YOU are the expert when it comes to your child, and there are so many potential drivers behind feeding difficulties that are out of our control. Try not to let outside opinions about your child’s eating make you feel ashamed, upset, or judged.

• DON'T be afraid to ask for help: Feeding difficulties can be driven by a range of different issues. If you are concerned about your child’s eating for any reason, start by talking to your pediatrician. Getting a referral for a feeding therapist who is knowledgable about your child’s feeding difficulties can make a world of difference!

In the meantime, here is a FREE picky eating download with 6 tried and true tips to help you manage selective eating in your kids. These tips are great for garden variety picky eaters. More extreme picky eating may need extra support before these tips will be helpful, but if you're in the cue and waiting to see a feeding therapist, check them out and see if some of the strategies help move the needle in the meantime.

If you are looking for more personalized guidance regarding your child’s nutrient requirements and dietary preferences, I am accepting new patients in my virtual practice and would love to meet with you. 

And if you prefer to learn via video, you can always enroll in my pediatrician-endorsed online course, Solve Picky Eating, which includes 12 self-paced short video lessons, downloadable guides, and checklists to support you along your journey of navigating picky eating.

Thanks for reading!

xo Malina