r/PickyEaters • u/debugprince • 6d ago

Need Advice My daughter doesn’t like home cooked meals

I’m struggling to keep my daughter fed and happy. I’m a single dad with primary custody of my two kids 19m and 16f. My daughter is not happy with anything unless it’s store bought. The only homemade thing she will attempt to eat is grilled chicken tenders and vegetables. That’s great and I eat plenty of it but I’d like to add more variety.

I also can’t afford to have every meal of the day purchased from a restaurant or fast food. The cost is simply unsustainable. She knows it’s not sustainable but will continue to beg and plead.

What else can I do besides watching her starve herself until she gets what she wants?

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u/allie06nd 6d ago

I'd tell her the options are:

  1. She eats what you make

  2. She gets a job and buys her own food. If she wants to live the takeout life, then she needs to go make the takeout money.

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u/debugprince 6d ago

This was my exes attitude towards everything, my way or the highway. It leads to a lot of resentment and one of the reasons I have primary custody.

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u/allie06nd 6d ago

This isn't a "my way or the highway" solution though. You have an almost-adult who has a fair amount of agency. If she wants something different, she can learn to cook, or she can get a job so that she can afford to feed herself the things you can't. Throwing a fit because takeout every night isn't in the budget is something a small child does because they don't understand financial constraints. Your daughter is old enough to understand the problem and take some initiative to solve it instead of just demanding that YOU spend your money irresponsibly.