Mr. Broccoli

When I was about 10, I had this friend.  I spent a lot of time with her and her family.  My sister and I would stay over at their house, go out to eat with them, etc.  Well, my friend had a dad (we'll call him Mr. Broccoli).  Mr. Broccoli apparently decided that it was his mission in life to cure me of being a picky eater.

Now listen people, I teach preschool.  I spend everyday with the same kids.  Everyday I try to shape and mold those children with my influence in small ways.  I hope that some of it will produce something good in them one day (I am certain that some of it is negative.  I'm far from perfect).  However, the fact is this; every night those children go home to be with their parents.  Every night, 97% (this percentage was totally made up) of what I try to instill in them goes down the drain.  Every morning, they come back, for better or for worse, as the children that their parents are raising them to be.

Mr. Broccoli had little to no chance of success in this matter.  He had me at his home maybe once every few weeks.  My parents had allowed me to get out of eating what I didn't want to eat for about 8 years.  Oh sure, he forced me to eat something off the buffet at a Chinese restaurant once, (just some plain, fried chicken breast pieces...something I was already eating, but which scared me because it looked different) but there was no way that my whole life was going to change over this.  I recall that once he tried to make me eat a piece of broccoli at his house.  I downright refused.  I was crying over it, and he was insistent that I try it.  My parents happened to show up during the escapade, and I finagled my way out of tasting the broccoli.  Looking back, I suppose my parents were spoiling me.  They probably should have made me eat that broccoli or at least taste it.  But let's face facts, at that point there was zero chance I was going to like it.  I was predetermined to find it disgusting.

I remember another time when a friend's parent was seriously annoyed with me.  She had asked if I liked hot dogs and macaroni and cheese.  I'd said that I did.  Well, when she called us in for lunch, I discovered that the hot dog was actually cut up and put IN the mac and cheese.  I was horrified.  There was no way I was putting that in my mouth!  I'm sure she tried to force me to eat it.  I'm equally certain that I did not.  I really was a stubborn kid!  I have no idea why the idea of these two foods touching was so shocking to me, but I certainly remember that it was!

I tell you these stories because 20+ years later, I still remember them.  They were huge deals in my life.  That seems absurd.  Why should a piece of broccoli and some hot dogs in mac & cheese have had such an impact? But that's how it was.  Eating is emotional for me.  It always has been. My eating habits have controlled my life in so many ways.  They were controlling my life as a small child.  They controlled it as a teenager.  They controlled it in college and on into my adulthood.

Small Victories

Successes, even little ones, make me feel like I am going to eventually kick the picky chick in me to the curb. Saturday was my nieces' joint birthday party. My brother in law spent all afternoon smoking ribs and sausages for dinner. We also had burgers, hot dogs, and enough side dishes to feed an army.

Mid afternoon he pulled a few sausages out and cut them up for people to snack on. I am not entirely certain what kind of sausages these were, but I think they were similar to a brat. I have tried a brat once before. They have been one of those things that have always looked totally gross to me. The inside is so...pieced together and chunky looking. Scary stuff! Still I had sucked it up and tried a bite once already, and I hadn't hated it. It was time to try again. I only ate one little bite this time, but once again, I found it to be much better than I was expecting. I am counting calories, and knew that I needed to save up for dinner, so I didn't have more, but it is something I will keep trying until I can actually find it tasty instead of just OK.

At dinner, I decided on a burger. This may seem a safe choice for most people, but you should know that I have only been eating burgers for about 2 years. As a kid, I would pretty much only eat McDonald's burgers, and that was it. Now I love them. I love them piled with bacon, cheeses, peppers, pineapple, tomatoes, onions, etc. Steak 'n Shake has this chipotle burger...holy cow (pun intended)...sooooo good! Anyway, I fixed my burger, and got all my sides, and was all set to pretend the ribs did not exist. My bf and brother-in-law apparently had other ideas. I needed to try those ribs. I have this thing about bone-in meat. It grosses me out. The thought of picking around bones and other inedible body parts to get to my food is utterly disgusting to me. Also, I am not a fan of smoky BBQ sauces. My brother-in-law assured me though that his ribs would not taste too much like BBQ sauce, and my bf agreed to pull off a choice piece of meat for me. So, hesitantly, I gave it a try. Folks, I have to admit, I kind of liked it! Had I not been so full already, I might have had my bf pull off some more pieces for me.

This was not my first ribs experience, I must admit. Last summer a friend made some for my bf's son's birthday party. I tried a few bites of those as well, and I hadn't hated them either, but it takes me some time to work up to actually liking certain foods. Maybe someday I will be able to eat a rib without someone else pulling the meat off for me, but right now that is hard to imagine. Baby steps, friends. Baby steps.

Fear

If you are not a picky eater yourself, please try to understand something. We aren't picky because we are stubborn or trying to make your life difficult. I can't speak for all picky eaters, but I can tell you how it was for me. You know that irrational fear that you have? Think about it for a moment. Contemplate facing that thing head on. Think about letting that spider crawl all over you. Consider climbing up to the top of that mountain and looking down over the edge. Think about squeezing yourself into a tiny space and staying there all day.  That is how it felt for me.  If I looked at a sliced tomato, my mind never registered anything along the lines of "that would be so nice on a sandwich!"  Instead, I looked at it and saw something slimy and disgusting.  It didn't look edible.  Putting it into my mouth would have been almost as repulsive and frightening to me as biting into a fat slug.

Throughout my life, one of the scariest things to face was an invitation to someone's house for dinner. If it was someone who knew me well, it wasn't such a big deal..."Oh, Lauren is coming, we'll just order a pizza or make her a peanut butter sandwich,"  but even then I would feel guilty.  I knew I was depriving people of eating what they really wanted just to please me.  Still, the worst was visiting someone new.  First, there was the fear of offending them.  People have a tendency to feel very personally about the food they make, and I don't blame them for it. I hated the idea of hurting someone's feelings because I wouldn't eat their food.  But even if the person was really understanding about it, it was still awkward.  There were those who tried to encourage me to "just try it," and others who would try to find me something else to eat.  It didn't matter which way it went though.  In either case, it was uncomfortable.  I certainly wasn't looking to be the center of attention.  All I wanted to do was disappear into a hole somewhere.   

That's the thing about being a picky eater.  It's embarrassing.  It was never something I liked about myself (though I would fake-brag about being the pickiest person around).  It wasn't my desire to be picky.  I honestly didn't feel like I could do anything about it.  I wasn't in control of my life.  The selective eater inside me was calling all the shots.

Greek Fest Fail

I hate when I let myself down. I think I am going so well. I honestly believe that I am not that girl who has to fight back tears in a new food situation, but then it happens. Yesterday, I went to a local Greek Fest with my boyfriend's family. We had planned on having lunch there, and I had said I was willing to try it out. When we arrived, his family bypassed the outdoor food booths, and walked into a building that had been set up as a cafe. As I looked at the picture menu full of unfamiliar items, an extremely familiar and unwelcome feeling began to rise up in me. The terror was started to build. I could sense that if I didn't get a grip quickly, the tears would soon arrive. "Stop it!!" I told myself. It was irrational. There was nothing to fear here. It was just food, and there was not the slightest chance of my starving to death. I told my boyfriend that I didn't think there was anything in there that I wanted to eat. My plan was to walk through and look at it all, and then try to find something at the outside booths. Other people, however, are usually too helpful (and I really mean that in a nice way) to allow things to be so simple, and I was too emotional at this point to try to explain well. His family pointed out that there was chicken on the menu, but then remembered that I don't like chicken on the bone.  It is still so embarrassing to have so much attention on my pickiness. It makes me feel like a freak.

Eventually it was decided that my boyfriend and I would head outside to look for something else. I felt horrible because I knew he thought the food in there looked amazing. I finally did find something I was good with. I had Chicken Soulvaki on a pita with sour cream, tomatoes, and onion. My bf got a gyro that he thought sadly lacking in toppings.

We joined his family again to eat together, and I could tell he was jealous of their food. Honestly, one of the things they had ended up looking way better to me in person than it had in the picture. I kind of regretted not trying it (apparently it tasted like baked Skyline Chili). Thankfully my bf's family all had a ton of food and he ended up getting enough of what they had to more than make up for not ordering his own. The only one who really missed out was me.  They did offer, but I'm not big on eating after other people.

I hope that someday I will have put the pickiness behind me. I want to be un-afraid to try new things. I want new food experiences to thrill instead of terrify me. I know I have come a long way. I do try things now. I eat so many more things than I used to. I normally am proud of myself. But when I fail, I feel like I'll never change. I am not going to let those failures stop me though. It was a lost battle, but I will not let food defeat me in the end.

Picking and Choosing

Apparently, I occasionally ate burgers from other places.  I'm not sure when the only eating them from McDonald's thing started.  I do recall that I was pretty adamant about that for most of my childhood and into my early 20s.

In all honesty, I have no clue what led me to eat certain foods and snub others.  There were things that made no sense about it.  I didn't just like bland food.  Heat has always been my friend when it comes to food.  I could pile the black or crushed red pepper on top of my spaghetti sauce like it was going out of style. I can't figure out any method to my madness.  Why did I decide that baked beans and beans in my mom's chili were fine but that black beans or any other beans were not to be tasted?  Maybe I just got used to the stuff that was served the most often in my home.  Neither of my parents were particularly adventurous eaters, so there has always been a lot of monotony in what we ate as a family.  

The Formative Years of a Picky Eater

Everyone knows that kid...the one who only eats peanut butter sandwiches and chicken fingers and fries. Eventually, that kid grew up and started eating normal food. But what about the kid who didn't grow out if it? As a child, I was very selective about what I ate. I had my short list of foods, and I stuck fast too it.

It's been a long time, but if I had to come up with a list:
Peanut Butter (Creamy)
Jelly
Bread (but it better not have any crunchy seeds in it!)
McDonald's hamburgers
French Fries
Pizza (but I was very picky about the brand)
Chicken Tenders or Nuggets
My mom's (and aunt's) spaghetti sauce 
Certain shapes of noodles
Mac & Cheese (only from the Kraft box)
Certain brands of turkey hotdogs
Most standard fruit
Baked Beans (at least the ones that my mom made)
My Mom's Chili
Carrots
Corn
Cucumbers
Lettuce
Most normal breakfast foods (yogurt, pancakes, bagels, cereal, bacon, little smokies, eggs etc)
Cottage Cheese (though I eventually stopped eating this for many years.)
Desserts, though I wasn't a big fan of chocolate or anything with nuts in it.

I'm sure there were a few more things, but not many.

My parents tried in the beginning. There was the usual, "You need to at least try it," but honestly, it rarely worked. Maybe it was because they were both a bit picky themselves or maybe they just didn't think it was worth fighting with my absolute stubbornness. Probably it was both. The result though was that I would turn up my nose at most food without so much as tasting it. I don't blame them for this. I could, I guess, but why? They were (are) wonderful parents, and I wouldn't be who I am now without their guidance, love, prayers, and discipline. I remember other family members and friends being very frustrated with this stubborn little thing who wouldn't eat what was put in front of her.  Maybe my parents figured I would eventually grow out of it. Perhaps by the time they realized that wasn't happening, it was too late. I was what I was. I was going to be that girl forever.

Welcome

Hello world. :) My name is Lauren.  Once upon a time, I was the pickiest eater you probably ever knew.  Currently, I'm a fairly picky eater.  This blog will be the story of my journey in picky eating. I'd like to share with you the struggles of being a picky eater and take you along as I attempt to leave picky eating behind me.

Have I used the words "picky eater" enough?

- The Picky Chick