Autistic niece wont eat.

Julie - posted on 08/30/2009

I had the same problems with my sons. It is all about textures. What ever food she does like to eat try finding other foods that have the same textures to them and see if she might try them.

Jennifer - posted on 08/27/2009

Im afraid autism and picky eating go hand in hand, my son is 13 now and eats so much better than he did when he was 6, it takes time, and hard work, its so frustrating cooking for a fussy eater and believe u me its not just autistic eaters that are fussy most 4-8 year olds are...a lad in my sons class would only eat pink things, they had to add pink food colouring to everything so he would eat. My son would not eat meat at all, now he is eating chicken a huge step.

Céline - posted on 08/26/2009

WOW....my hat to all your mom's in this particular situation. My son is 12 and he has Asperger's. I guess i may have been thougher on my son than i thought because i did not let him " not eat" but it was not on purpous....we did not know at the time that he had Asperger's and we just thought he was just being fussy so we did not allow him to just eat certain foods. We did not force feed him but we did not bend when he did not want to eat certain things. If I knew he really did not like it....i would not give it to him but most of the time he ate it and he was ok. My son has also intestinal problems which makes everything "go" thru him within a few hours......so we did not have a real choice to make sure he ate.

Today Vinny eats what he wants...of course there are some things he dislikes but we have managed "without knowing" to avert the non eating habits of Asperger's.



Good luck to all you mom's....and give yourselves a great big pat on the back..you guys ROCK!!!

Linda - posted on 08/26/2009

My son is 12 and has Asperger's. He will only eat certain foods and only certain brands of those foods - for example he will only eat Tyson chicken nuggets and those have to be the ones in the box not the bag. He is slightly underweight for his height but not too much. I just try to keep the things on hand that he will eat. I try to encourage him to eat more of the healthier choices but, of course, that doesn't always work. I also have a similar situation to the one with your niece and the bakery. My son will only eat a particular kind of cheese cut at a certain thickness. We were able to get it at a local store deli but it recently burned down. Now the closest store that carries that brand is about 20-30 minutes away. His doctor says he is healthy so I continue to feed him what he likes - even if it is the same thing day after day. Luckily he does eat some things that have protein but I would like him to eat more vegetables and fruits. It's something we continue to work on.

Amanda - posted on 08/26/2009

Hi- my son is almost 3 and his eating problems started around 18 months. We think he has Asbergers but no diagnosis yet. Anyway - He lived on Carnation Instant Breakfast chocolate in a soft top sippy cup ONLY for about a year; I then added some powdered duocal to add calories and also tried pediasure - he was not gaining weight - he gave up his "chocolate milks" completely because I changed something!!! He switched to water and cherrios only. He has been going to speech therapy weekly. He has slowly moved to sweet tea and pop tarts now. We have started that he earns time to play with a special toy if he tries one bite of something other than his usual - we started this SLOWLY - dry spoon first. If he won't do the bite we ask that he "kiss" it - touch to his lips. He love Thomas the train so that is his motivation. It has helped tremendously. He now eats some variety. I also let him pick out one new thing to try at the grocery store each week... sometimes he tries it when we get home sometimes he doesn't but we are at least trying. Not sure if this will help you or not. Just wanted you to know you are not the only one. I sure feel like I am a lot of times. Good Luck!

Sandy - posted on 08/22/2009

Sounds like a sensory and repetition issues. My twins boys are ASD also and can be picky eaters. They often get stuck on one food item until it is gone. In OT they worked on food issues, It can be very helpful.

Roxanne - posted on 08/22/2009

My son, who is 12 developed problems eating about three years ago. He has always been picky and small for his age. Never ate much, but lately with him, there is more and more he won't eat. We have found with him that a lot of it is down to textures. It depends on how something feels in his mouth. He absolutely will not eat anything with noodles, rice or oatmeal. No ifs ands or buts. The only bread he will eat is the bread he makes himself (from the bread machine). He eats things that have a more crunchy taste feel instead of a soft feel.



My suggestion would be a couple things, if she is able, get her involved in helping to make the food (my son was more willing to at least *try* the things he helped make) and try foods with different textures. Take note of the ones that she likes and get things of a similar texture. It also might be a color thing.



We took my son to texture therapy for a while and he also got a lot less picky about some foods. I don't know if that is an option where you are at but it might be worth looking into.



The only other advice is really watch her calories and vitamin intake. Talk to your pedatrician. We struggled with my son several times getting enough calories in him. To this day he is still very skinny (in the 8th percentile for weight). I would suggest a food diary of what she eats and make sure your pediatrician sees it and knows what her calories are like. I only suggest this because of the HUGE struggle we have had for years with my son's weight and getting him to consume enough calories in a day. There was a point in time where we had to take him in to be weighed once a day (the hospital was an hour away!) and another time that they were going to hospitalize him for his lack of weight gain, so for us the calories were a major thing.



Good luck!

Roxanne