Toddlers will eat anything up to a certain point: dish soap, LEGO, dirt, ear plugs (just to name a few of the interesting choices my toddlers have made).  And then! Overnight they decide NOT to eat any of the things they usually love. Suddenly every meal is a struggle. WHY OH WHY?

 

Actually, there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for this. It’s evolution, y’all! Because back in the days, like millions of years ago when humans lived on the savanna, this scepticism to new food was a pretty significant survival mechanism for toddlers who would start walking around by themselves. Being picky is assumed to have prevented them from picking up and eating whatever poisonous findings they came across on the ground.

 

So, when we introduce new foods to our toddlers and they reject it, take a moment to think about how we’re trying to fight a million-year old habit.

 

It’s simply how we were all programmed. That doesn’t mean that we should just accept it and let it live its own life, on the contrary!

 

It just means that we are up against an innate caution that needs to be trained (hint: exposure is key here).

 

For more info on pickiness and how to handle it :