We often hear parents talk about their children being picky eaters. However, when does it go beyond just picky eating? There are times that it goes beyond the normal children making a stand, finding their own preferences and being a kid. There are times that there are physical and neurological reasons that a child may be resistant to eating and meal times. Occupational Therapists are specially trained to help children overcome some of these issues to allow for increased nutritional intake.
Sensory processing or modulation can play a big role in a child's ability to tolerate certain textures or smells. If a child has an overactive olfactory sense, smells can seem overpowering, create over sensitive gag reflexes and turn children off to food that has any odor. Oral tactile defensiveness can create difficulty with tolerating new textures, eating foods with different textures vs one consistency and progress through different stages of food. Occupational therapists work towards regulating the senses to allow for increased food variety and more pleasant meal time experiences.
Resistance to eating can also come from oral motor weakness. This means that some muscles around or in the mouth are not strong enough to chew certain foods or chew for long periods of time. Through different exercises, activities and strategies these muscles can be built up and strengthened to allow for the child to tolerate larger amounts of food as well as food that is more difficult to chew, such as meats.
Many parents that are experiencing the meltdowns, the refusals to eat more than 2 food items for weeks on end and the gagging through every meal = dreaded meal times. These times should be enjoyable; a time in which the family comes together, sharing their daily events and simply just spending time together. They can return to this with a little help from your OT friends. Reach out, make the call, and take back your meal times!
