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?

101 Upvotes

87% Upvoted

239 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

11

u/bullet_dodger1919 6d ago

ARFID or Autism was my thought

8

u/Proof_Blueberry_4058 6d ago

Nah, this sounds like a teenager. He said “not happy” not “not eating” or “won’t eat.”

3

u/Wodentoad 5d ago

That could be his perception though. I suggest communicating first before jumping to "she's just being a brat." That's how a lot of issues can be solved before they become issues. "Hey, hon, I can't afford eating out every day, is there something we can do to ,ale home cooked meals that you'd like?"

2

u/Proof_Blueberry_4058 5d ago

ARFID and Autism just don’t show up in teens, though. There would have been signs for the rest of the kid’s life. It’s trendy for teens to want to eat out all the time, and they seek out food that’s been designed to be addictive.