Family Alive

That’s all it was about.  One green bean.  Oh, it started out as three green beans.  All I wanted Analise to eat was 3 green beans before she could be done with lunch.  But she didn’t want to.  She cried that she didn’t like them.  She cried and cried.  And cried.  As we cleared the table, I told her all she needed to do was eat 1 green been. 

And eventually, since her green bean started to get a little unappetizing with all the coaxing and an attempt to make it more appealing with a dab of sour cream, Grandma Sandy helped her pick another green bean from the bowl.  And being the sweet grandma that she is, she helped her find the smallest.  So I know I wasn’t asking too much for her to eat one half-inch long green bean.  But she refused. 

At one point, she thought she might like the green bean with sprinkles, so I brought her pink sprinkles and we covered the bean.  Now it looks much less appetizing, in my opinion.  But she still wouldn’t eat it.  And she sat at the table for 2.5 hours. I know that her stubborn-ness comes from me.  So it’s like I’m battling myself, which is painful.  And in the end, it was nap time, and I put her down for a nap.  There will be more beans in the future, and I hope that next time the battle is shorter, and maybe sometime after that, there won’t be a battle, because she’ll just see how easy it is to just take one quick bite and be done with it.  She’s gotten very picky about food lately, and maybe bit by bit we can work our way back to some reasonable eating habits. 

Just another day of parenting.  

(When I asked my mom if I was ruining her for life for eating green beans, she asked is I’d been ruined by having to eat just one bite of things.  Hm.  Not really.  Just imitation crab.  My mom would get it occassionally as a treat for herself, and sometimes my dad would find it and cook it up for dinner for all of us.  Nobody won.  Mom didn’t get much, and all 3 of us girls had to eat some.  Torture.  That’s the only thing I’m permanently against eating.  And my sisters would say the same thing, I think.)