This was me for most of my life. But it was cucumbers and pasta with butter (no sauce, no cheese). I took the radical step of my first cheese pizza at 23 while working a long shift at Domino's.

At 25, I took a long hike with a good friend. Afterwards, we stopped at a Thai restaurant, I ordered a garden salad. Halfway through, I looked at my friend's chicken basil and thought, "My aversion to new food is purely mental. I can do this." I took a bite of his chicken, it was the first meat I'd tried without it being coerced, I tried not to overthink it and found that I enjoyed it. I ordered the same dish for myself. Within a few months I was eating beef tongue, oysters, roasted ants, you name it.

I'm not sure if my parents would have been able to break me out of my pickiness. If I overthought what I was eating, I'd gag, and I think that was the original seed of the issue. That's an unpleasant and embarrassing experience, and I think it happened very early in my life, earlier than I can remember. So I believe I developed an aversion to trying new food, and the overthinking/gagging became a self-reinforcing cycle.

What seemed to work for me was the combination of being tired and truly hungry — not just "I want to eat" but "my body desperately needs sustenance" hungry — along with being hours from home and in a place where everything on the menu was foreign to me. I don't know if you can replicate this scenario with your 14 year old, and I don't know if it would have worked for me at 14. Maybe I was just ready for a change in my life. But being malnourished affected me negatively, and I wish I had resolved it at 14 when I was still developing, rather than 25 when it was too late.

Its sad, because you did hurt yourself in the long run.

Nutricion during early days is crucial as it allows your brain and organs to develop faster, better.

I know as a parent i shouldnt force food on my kids but i am and i will keep on doing that knowing how big of an impact it will have on their life later on.

Forcing them might have a worse effect. Be relaxed about it and try to show them other ways of eating with unknown people might help though.

> with unknown people

Nooo, that was the source of the problem with me.

Only at 30 am I slowly trying things I wouldn't before, because I live alone and there's no one to see me gag and toss the meal in the garbage if I truly don't like it.

Sorry, meant visual input, not to eat in front of strangers.

It takes ~9 days for kids tastebuds to adapt to new food IIRC

My daughter won't each cheese. Except for mac-and-cheese, and cheese raviolis, and a dozen other things that have cheese. Basically, anything she liked before she decided she didn't like cheese, or that she didn't know had cheese before she decided she like it. How do you not like cheese?!? It took over year to convince her that pizza had the good type of cheese.

I stopped eating cheese at around 4 or 5 years of age. I just stopped liking it one day and started hating it instead. When I turned 25 I began eating pizza as an experiment, and had no problems with it, but still many years later I do avoid cheese and other dairy products in most situations. I suspect it might have something to do with lactose intolerance, but I have never attempted to verify this.

It seriously bothers me that I can’t bring myself to like cheese, but I literally just can’t — except for a handful of places where it doesn’t bother me.

As an example: At a food science exhibit about the interaction between senses, I tried biting on a cube of fairly mild cheddar while sniffing at a vial of onion aroma. Cheese and onion? No issue! However, literally as soon as I moved the vial away from my nose and I got the leftover cheese flavour alone, I started gagging and retching. As a foodie this bothers me to no end, but I just can’t do it.

My kids eat “cheese” pizza because I said it had no cheese in it.

Sounds like my sister. She never got over it. Still hates cheese. Eats many things with cheese in it, unless the cheese is extremely prominent. She'll eat a pepperoni and cheese pizza, but not a straight up cheese pizza for example.

I'd be tempted to make her sausage pizza every time she came over and just slowly reduce the amount of sausage on it ever time... (or mini-pepperoni - the important thing is that it's small).

There's a lot of different kinds of cheese. Some are garbage, some are the nicest thing in the world. Maybe she just hates one particular cheese and generalized?

Might not even be a cheese, but how it's prepared. I have a strong aversion (often triggering a gag reflex) with gooey/melted cheese, but almost any other consistency is fine.

Pizza, for example, I cook until the cheese is browned and no longer gooey.

It's so much easier to just say I don't like cheese than try to explain this to people. Too many will cook it gooey then tell me "this way it's not burnt"...

You fed him baby carrots and chicken nuggets for 10 years? Why would you enable that? Make him hungry and he will eat with everyone else.

He's 14 - do you think you're the first person who ever suggested that?

I do this to my kids. I don't know if it helps. (The older one is 9 who eats almost everything and a younger picky eater who is 5.) Getting them to try a wider variety of food is often tough since it is easy to fall back on the usual stuff. Occasionally I have new types of food, I would make a small bitesize and use all the powers I have for them to take the first mouth. If they swallow it without tasting, they get a second mouth of it. They have to describe the taste to me precisely in simple terms, e.g sweet, chunky, sour, like apples etc. Often when they have a conscious bias, e.g. the younger one dislikes anything that resembles white creamy sauce, they will say it is "yucky". Yucky is not a taste descriptor. I sometimes add things they like e.g. bits of chocolate. My goal is to encourage them to focus on the taste and make connections like "this ugly piece of food will taste like chocolate since there is chocolate. Btw it is actually sweet as well". Basically, I am trying to address a unconscious bias in their imagination of the taste. It also helps to understand better what they really like and what is totally unacceptable. For example, taste-wise, tomatoes are off limits to my older one ... for now because you never know when it changes. :) Hope this gives you some ideas.

The battle seems lost at 14. In the early years though, picky as kids may be, they won't starve themselves. You can negotiate to such a point that they'll consume enough healthy food on the regular. If you always provide unhealthy alternatives these will be exploited. If you enable and pander they'll have nothing but garbage.

Of course not. I’m willing to bet it’s an issue with the parents actions over the course of a decade unless the child has severe mental disabilities. It’s impossible to believe an otherwise healthy 14 year old child would die by refusing to eat food other than carrots and chicken nuggets for weeks on end. Doctors may give answers but it’s up to the parents to follow through.

I was 18 when I was sent to a university hostel with a terrible dining system. My parents didn't give me a penny beyond what was required to survive.

Lo and behold, in a few months, I was eating terrible tasting mess food that I wouldn't have otherwise touched back home.

He's just 14. It may just take policies that are more radical than you probably like or endorse.

Tried that. Didn't work. He will literally vomit if anything touches his lips that he doesn't want to eat. Every time. So force feeding won't work. And he doesn't seem to get hungry. He will happily go days and days without eating rather than eating something he doesn't want to eat.

"Tried that. Didn't work. He will literally vomit if anything touches his lips that he doesn't want to eat. Every time. So force feeding won't work."

Nobody suggested force feeding. Probably because it's a terrible idea.

You unceremoniously, and disinterestedly put food in front of them and when the meal is over, there's no more food available from any other source.

At 14yo it's too late for this, but for other readers, this will involve at most 1-3 days of annoyance and disruption. They'll be hungry and eat the food and you'll have quickly ripped off that band-aid instead of slowly, excruciatingly peeled it off bit by bit over the entire course of their childhood - which is a good metaphor for a lot of parenting.

This relates to one of the best pieces of parenting advice I ever heard: You almost never see a child throw a fit/tantrum about being put into a carseat. Why ? Because it has never worked. No matter what they do or say or scream, they know they're going in that carseat. If you see a fit/tantrum/stubbornness its because they know there's a chance you'll relent ...

Tried that when he was very young (and have tried it again many times since), didn't work. He doesn't care about food. He will literally allow himself to starve to death before eating something he doesn't want to eat.

Its uncommon, but there are kids that will genuinely starve themselves if you try that.

This strategy does not work with all children.

This

Stop buying nuggets and start putting real food on the table

Does't want to eat? Too bad, maybe next time

This is the same behaviour as with morbidly obese people. If you can't get out of bed by yourself you're not getting food. PERIOD

Growing up eating what he wants, not going hungry or worrying about food or his parents health, I’m guessing he’ll be fine! Lots of people go through a long fussy eating stage, and tbh carrots and chicken aren’t that bad :)

Sorry that you're going through some challenges with your child, but I do not think it is even remotely fair nor comparable to contrast the situation of your child (who have a parent posting on Hacker News, meaning you're likely making at least some kind of livable if not more-than-livable income) with that of a child whose parent is literally unable to place food on the table. Quite frankly the question is a bit insensitive at best to the latter situation. Did you read the story?

The mother in the story volunteered at a food bank, because she was afraid and ashamed to apply for the food vouchers themselves, for gods sake - are you serious when you say "I can't help wondering if he will be similarly affected as mentioned in the article"? The child in the article forced his emaciated mother to drink the entire glass of milk in front of him out of fear of her own safety and clear malnourishment. THAT is the trauma and anxiety that damages children growing up, not a mediocre cordon bleu. Does this sound like your situation at all?

Think about it. Have you ever, in your career, worked late into the night because you WANTED to? Now think about another time you worked very late because you HAD to. There is a massive difference in stress and the effect on mental health.

In conclusion: yes, it's better to choose to go to bed hungry than to literally be starving and be unable to get food. Your kid is gonna be alright, this is the perfect time to take a step back and be THANKFUL for having what the kids and parents in the story do not have.

I think this comment is a bit unfair. They weren't belittling the situation in any way. They are concerned about their own kids and posting in a thread about kids and food. You're really tearing into them and I do not think it is warranted.

I don't know, it's a bit like reading a bit about ethiopian children who have 3 textbooks from 1994 for 100 students, and chiming in "My friend's kids' school is teaching them computer programming already, but my child's school has no such program and even forces children to share laptops for school assignments. I wonder if he will be left behind?"

A child and mother who suffer from malnourishment and must rely on food stamps, who had a single glass of milk for dinner, vs. picky eater kid who threw a tantrum and went to sleep hungry instead of eating cordon bleu.

I have a close family member who has an eating issue like what's described in the comment I was replying to. I also went to high school with several kids who admitted that they grew up waking up in the mornings not knowing if they would eat that day. The situations are not comparable.

I was a "picky eater" who "threw tantrums" when I was a kid. In college I ate every other day because food made me feel so shitty. Should I never talk about my food-related autoimmune issues because I had the money to go to college? Discussion forums are importantly open to anyone who has a related experience. It sounds like a concerning issue because they stated that their kid is 18" shorter than their peers. I'm glad they posted because in the off chance that their kid is celiac, this comment could change their life (regardless of how much money their parents make).

Celiac's bodies attack themselves when they eat gluten. This ends up wrecking the small intestine and can lead to nutrients not being absorbed. It also gave me awful sinus headaches which is why (until I became more aware of it) I was incredibly averse to food.

People often forget how good life is in America. Up until recently, I don't think I had ever gone 24 hours without food. (I recently tried intermittent fasting as it's supposed to be good for your health.)

When the national news is focused on the crisis of someone making a boorish remark, you know life is good in America.

I think it's extremely unlikely that a fussy eater would starve themselves to the point of actual malnutrition. The fact that he's shorter than his peers is probably unrelated.

I'm sure it's not universal, but I was super picky growing up and I turned out to be celiac. The food was messing up my body and I think I knew in some way. I wasn't in any way selecting the correct foods, but food was an issue and I was hesitant to try anything new.

interesting combination, totally different textures. I'm surprised feeding clinic didn't help. It's not like he has dysphagia or something.

..and here I am getting irritated that my 5-year-old doesn't eat courgette or broccoli (whilst his 3-year-old sister eats everything)..

Have you tried supplements and multi vitamins? If he won't eat maybe he'll drink it or swallow a pill?

Baby carrots and chicken nuggets should give you most of the nutrition you need if you eat enough.