when you demonstrate being a good mother by cooking fresh foods, and your ss might notice "hey my mom doesn't do that.." you are essentially pointing out her flaws to her kid, and he becomes defensive. Kids don't like that..not to mention, anytime a kid puts up a fight at the dinner table over foods they normally like, it's all about the fight and not the food. He is trying to win a power struggle.

Bottom line, you are not burger king, he doens't get to have his way, and children should not be in the drivers seat. You provide a good healthy meal, put it in front of him, if he doesn't eat, he goes to bed hungry. What we did with my ss who would gag and throw fits over good meals he normally ate, we offered dessert after his temper tantrums to ourselves. And if ss didn't eat his dinner, guess what? He didn't get dessert. And trust me, we ate it in front of him too.

Kids will not strave themselves, but they do like to be in charge. Chances are bm is letting this kid drive her life, instead of the other way around, and he thinks you guys should to. Plan your meals for yourself and your family accordingly, and if ss doesn't eat, he goes to bed w/o dinner. It will not physcially hurt him to go to bed w/o dinner, and if he does go to bed w/o dinner, and then says he is hungry, you offer him the same plate you offered to him at dinner...not something else. A couple of times with this, he will learn that he eats what you put in front of him, not what he delegates.

Good luck,
Candice

Candice is right! DH's son has awful eating habits and he lives with us FT. He picks his way through dinner regardless of what I cook. He'll only eat the main entree if he feels like it then an hour later, he's in the kitchen microwaving popcorn, eating a bowl of cereal, or making a PB sandwich which I think is BS. DH knows he's like this but does nothing about it so I don't care anymore. I quit buying jelly, popcorn, and cereal.

My sd prefers to eat the kinds of foods that are pre-packaged, pre-made or come in a fast food bag because that is what bm gives to her. She'd never had a school lunch made for her before (you know, with a pb & J, fruit and chips).... I don't think she ever had a home-cooked meal before I came into the picture! It was a struggle at first but then I started including my sd in the cooking process and now she loves to bake blueberry muffins, homemade bread, pasta sauce, etc.

So I have had the same problem here at my home. He started with whole fussy eating thing and I will not stand for it. Rule at my house is that this is a home where one meal (breakfast, lunch, dinner) gets made, suggestions before the meal gets made is always welcome but once I cook it, it is what we will all eat. My home is not a restaurant and we are a family so we all eat the one meal and we will eat it together unless you do not want to be a part of this family then you can go somewhere else. Also you eat what you dish yourself, if you want 2nd's that is always welcome but do not dish yourself a whole bunch and then not eat it, because if that is the case you will sit at the dinner table until it is done. My SS had an issue with this a few times, but for the most part he seems to get it now.

When my SS comes back from BM's it can go 2 ways either he is starving like he has not eaten all weekend, and when I ask him what is going on because he acts like he hasn't eaten that is usually the case where he hardly ate at all over the weekend because there was no food at the house, or he is being extremely picky where he will not eat, because he got to eat junk all weekend; top ramen, mac and cheese, eggos, cereal, hot dogs. soda pop. Now do not get me wrong, I am for the junk every once in a while but for all weekend long, come on throw something healthy in there.

Oh my LORD do we have eating issues. Lately it has gotten so bad I have been spending hours online trying to determine if the five year old girl has an eating disorder.

In our case however, it's nearly an opposite problem. BM has Narcissistic Personality Disorder with OCD and BiPolar tendencies. In as much, she doesn't really HAVE an identity as much as she adopts one. In other words, she is a vegetarian because she calls herself one not because she IS one. She is healthy because she only buys organic foods, not because she eats healthy. As her daughter is the summationof her identity, her daughter is forced to live her mothers lifestyle. Consequentially, this five year old child who is called a vegetarian has never eaten broccoli, beans, spinach, kale, peas, lettuce, etc.,
The truth is, she and her mother actually JOKE about the fact that she will only eat three things: pizza, noodles, and oranges. However, she takes the cheese off the pizza, and won't eat noodles with sauce. This happened when her mother told her not to eat sauces at our house because we were trying to put meat in the sauce.
The child is 5 years old and weighs 30 lbs. She has a size eleven feet, but still wears a 4t clothing, and often these are too big. She is thin. She is ALSO unhealthy. Her eyes are always red, she has colds constantly. Her mother however makes statements about how her daughter is a wholistic healthy unvaccinated breastfed baby. We are STILL trying to procure doctors records, because mother has the doctor convinced that the father is trying to force her daughter into a non-wholistic lifestyle and their doctor is a wholistic DR.
What is worse, is that now it seems daughter is using food as her only form of control. We will get to the point where we are so upset that we will give her noodles just so that she will EAT SOMETHING, and she will still reuse - claiming that she wanted them cold, or heated more, or with butter. We change them, and she refuses again.
We've tried EVERYTHING.
Once we tried what another Dr. Advised.... we cooked her a full meal, and she was made to sit with us, though if she didn't want to eat, she didn't have to. She did not. So, we let her wait till the next meal thinking she would eventually get so hungry she would eat what we gave her - I think it was a soup made of garbanzo beans and spinach with noodles if she ate the soup. She refused again. Third meal came, again she refused. Breakfast and another refusal. Finally we asked her WHAT she would eat, if anything... she said she would ONLY eat pizza. We finally broke down and took her for pizza, where she proceeded to take off the cheese and eat only the bread. For dinner, she was "not hungry". Two days later we received a letter from her mother claiming that we were abusing her child by refusing her food for 24 hours. Next time she came, we made her chicken cutletts and pasta with broccoli. She ate it. We were camping, and she was enjoying camping so much she didn't seem to care. She even claimed it was the best thing she had ever eaten. After the drop off we received a letter telling us to PLEASE abide by her daughters wishes to be a vegetarian!!!!! When daughter returned, she told us that her mother told her she did not have to eat anything she didnt want to while here, because we were trying to feed her meat which is "dirty".
What the hell does someone DO with that????????

Isn't her size almost considered child abuse? I don't know because I've never had this issue before but it certainly sounds like abuse. I would take her to a different doctor than BM and get her a check up asap.

As for the picky eating...I have the same issue except it's my BS. He's 6 and the pickiest eater I have ever seen. Just like Candice said "kids won't starve themselves" however my BS will. I've seen him not eat lunch, dinner and breakfast because we weren't having anything he "liked". Basically we weren't having chips, hot dogs, crackers or otherwise crap. I talked to his pediatrician and she told me that he would eat when he got hungry enough. He did...now I know whether or not he's hungry by how much of what he eats. He gets the same food we all get...sometimes he eats it and sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes he will eat the chicken one time and the next time he won't eat the very same chicken. I chalk it up to be 6 and certainly this will get better as he gets older.

Good luck to you!
Some people are like slinkies...not really good for anything but they bring a smile to your face when pushed down the stairs!