Steph Geddies [00:00:00]:
So let's kind of take a step back and go, okay, we know the goals are we want to raise really competent eaters and we really want to kind of focus on those meal, family meal times. So once we've decided what the family meal is going to be, rather than just saying to yourself either like, my child will eat this or my child won't eat this. And then having to go, okay, they're not going to eat it. I'm going to have to cook a whole separate meal. It's like, okay, how can we serve this particular meal a little bit differently for each child, knowing what their preferences are, what their dislikes are, or what their challenges are? Okay, and this can be for all children. So, you know, one thing that the term that I like to use is let's consider but not cater for our children.
Sharon Collon [00:00:42]:
Welcome to the ADHD Families podcast. I'm your host, Sharon Collin, an award winning, credentialed ADHD coach and consultant and mama and wife to a very ADHD family. I am seriously obsessed with making life easier for people with ADHD and those that support them. My business, the functional family, provides life changing support and strategies for ADHD. I particularly love anything that saves time, decreases conflict, and creates space for fun. Do you want a life with your beautiful family that is more functional, fun and full of joy? Let's explore together the wonderful and sometimes wacky world of family life with ADHD in the mix. Welcome to another episode of the ADHD Families podcast. I'm your host, Sharon Collin, and I am so happy that you're here.
Sharon Collon [00:01:37]:
Today we are talking with the incredible Steph Geddes. Now, she is a registered nutritionist specialising in culinary nutrition. She translates nutritional evidence to delicious food and has a special interest in family nutrition and helping parents serve one meal for the whole family whilst raising competent, food loving children. Doesn't that sound awesome?
Steph Geddies [00:02:01]:
And I know that a lot of.
Sharon Collon [00:02:02]:
You are struggling at home with picky eaters and balancing all the demands while trying to make sure your kids eat something healthy. And she has a whole lot of really great, practical, non judgmental advice in this space. So let's hear what she has to say. You're gonna love it.
Sharon Collon [00:02:22]:
Hello, Steph. I'm so excited to have you on the podcast today.
Steph Geddies [00:02:27]:
Hello, Sharon. Thank you for having me.
Sharon Collon [00:02:29]:
Now, I would love for you to explain to our beautiful listeners here what you do as a nutritionist.
Steph Geddies [00:02:37]:
Okay, so I'm a registered nutritionist and I specialise in the culinary space. So essentially what I say that I do is I take nutrition evidence, and I translate that into delicious food. So that's kind of the overall summary of what I do. But I specifically work in the area of, like, recipe development and cooking classes, ambassadorship, that sort of thing. But I have a particular interest in family nutrition. I have two young boys, and one of them is what you would deem, I suppose, a very fussy eater, even though I don't love the term fussy eater, but that is essentially what he is. And it's been quite a journey sort of navigating that. So I'm really passionate about, you know, sort of helping that new generation of children, raising them to be food loving, adventurous kids and really competent eaters because, yeah, it's been quite a journey and I love sort of sharing how that works and how we can all create really positive relationship with food for our children, but also for ourselves as well.
Sharon Collon [00:03:35]:
Love that. Now, I'm curious, did you get into studying what you have studied after your child was like a fussy eater, or was it before?
Steph Geddies [00:03:47]:
Yes. So I was always in the nutrition space, but I've sort of narrowed down to a particular area of family nutrition, definitely since having my children. So I've got two young boys, one of which is quite an adventurous eater. He's pretty happy to eat anything, whereas the other one, my eldest one, is the fussy eater. And, yeah, going through that, it just really highlighted to me that it's not as simple as just, you know, cooking a meal and feeding it to your kids. You know, there is so much more to it. And at the essence, it's like we're parents, we just really want our kids to eat and eat well. But there's a fine line between how you go about that in terms of, you know, are you pressuring your kids to eat well? Are you trying to force feed your children? Because so much of how we approach that can have a big impact on their long term relationship with food.
Sharon Collon [00:04:35]:
Now, this is going to be a really interesting conversation because we've never had anyone like you on the podcast before. And I know that a lot of our community really struggle. Like, we've got so many barriers in the way of getting food on the table. We've got time restrictions, like being a parent of kids with neurodiversity, it takes extra time. So we're more time for than the average parent. There's food sensitivities, which I'm sure you will touch on. Now, the more extreme side of things is Arfid, which I know we've talked about. And then there is also, you know, the balancing of all, like, executive function for shopping and cooking.
Sharon Collon [00:05:15]:
And, you know, if the parents have ADHD themselves, you know, trying to balance these things can be really tricky. So I'm really keen for you to narrow in perhaps today on the strategies of how to get your kids to try new foods and some really practical things of removing that pressure just to try and angle in on helping parents with that aspect of it.
Steph Geddies [00:05:39]:
Yeah, totally. We can definitely talk about that.
Sharon Collon [00:05:42]:
So perhaps where is the best place to start? Maybe the best place to start is something like, what do parents present to you? Like, what do they. How do they present to you in your practice?
Steph Geddies [00:05:54]:
So I don't actually work in private practice, but a lot of my experience comes from working with my own child. And I suppose what I would say is, in terms of him is just that being really selective around foods, but having those sensory difficulties. So it's not just about their behavior. You know, a lot of it gets put down to, oh, it's just behavioral thing. It's not about that. It's about that eating is actually something they need to learn to do. Okay? So from. From a young age, it's like they don't just automatically know how to do it.
Steph Geddies [00:06:29]:
We need to show them, and we need to encourage them, and they need to learn how to do that. So a lot of the time, the sensory aspect of it, it could be different for every single child. You know, I know my son, he struggles with soft, like, chewy foods. So for him, he's much more likely to eat crunchy foods. So I think the biggest thing is around understanding your child and what those difficulties present and how they present, and then sort of coming up with an action plan around how you can address that.
Sharon Collon [00:07:00]:
Okay, awesome. So you're talking about their, like, sensory profiles. Like, different foods have sensory profiles, and obviously different people favor different profiles, like, whether it's sweet, salty, crunchy, soft, chewy. I know in the western culture, we tend to have a problem with gelatinous things, but in, like, the asian culture, they love that. So tell me a little bit more about that. Like, how do we get our kids to try things?
Steph Geddies [00:07:31]:
Okay, well, it's an interesting concept because I think one thing we all need to understand is that we can't control what our children eat. Okay? So that's the first thing to just kind of release a little bit of pressure on yourself and go, I actually have no control over this. So we need to understand where they're at and go, all right, what is my responsibility as the parent and what is their responsibility as the child in the feeding situation and what your responsibility is? This is something called the division of responsibility by Alan Satter. And what it is is that the parent's responsibility is to decide when, where, and what is being served. Okay? So you're in control of all of those things. It's the child's responsibility to decide how much they want to eat, if anything is eaten at all. Okay? So it's completely up to them. And we don't have any control over that, essentially.
Steph Geddies [00:08:25]:
Okay. So the division of responsibility is fantastic for neurotypical children. And it works quite well for just that general kind of fussy eating. You know, they say it's very common. They'll go through patches and phases of fussy eating. And it works for really well to remind yourself of that. But what I found is that for some children, and this would be particularly for neurodivergent children, is that it doesn't always apply as well in that case. Okay.
Steph Geddies [00:08:49]:
Because there can be some significant challenges that are in our way with that. And what we need to really remember is a missing piece of that puzzle is it's not just what we're serving them, but it's how we're serving it. Okay? And I think that's the real missing piece in terms of tuning into your individual child and going, okay, well, I know that they're going to have likes and dislikes. I know that there might be certain flavors, smells, textures that they like and they don't like. So how can I serve what I've decided to serve in a way that they'll be, I guess, most accepting of that food. So how that might look and look, what I think should be a really great goal for all families is to enjoy family meals together. There's just so many incredible benefits of family meals together. And what often happens is when we're not doing family meals, we're doing separate meals for everyone.
Steph Geddies [00:09:45]:
And that way too much on the mental load. Right. It's hard enough just to do your general grocery shopping, everything else, other than having to think of separate meals for everyone. So let's kind of take a step back and go, okay, we know the goals are we want to raise really competent eaters, and we really want to kind of focus on those family meal times. So once we've decided what the family meal is going to be, rather than just saying to yourself either like, my child will eat this or my child won't eat this. And then having to go, okay, they're not going to eat it. I'm going to have to cook a whole separate meal. It's like, okay, how can we serve this particular meal a little bit differently for each child, knowing what their preferences are, what their dislikes are, or what their challenges are? Okay.
Steph Geddies [00:10:28]:
And this can be for all children. So, you know, one thing that the term that I like to use is let's consider but not cater for our children. So what we're talking about there is going, okay, we're being really considerate in that they have preferences, you know, like adults. Kids like some foods and don't like some foods. That's completely normal. It's also normal to have sensory preferences. Some like crunchy foods, some like soft foods or different taste preferences. Okay, that's all very normal.
Steph Geddies [00:10:54]:
But what we want to do is go, how can we consider that in terms of still cooking a family meal and serving a family meal, but not cater for them so that we're not cooking a whole separate meal for them? So the best way to go about that is to, I would say, come up with a list of what you think are your child's accepted foods. Okay. So they're all the foods that, you know, that your child mostly accepts. And I think this can actually be really helpful to write down. Okay, now we don't want to write it down so that we just have one list and we only serve them those foods. We're writing it down so that we can take away a bit of the mental load, so it's just always there in front of us. But also we can share a bit of that mental load so that if we do have other people caring for our children at mealtimes, it's easy to share this list with them so they know, oh, great, like, I've got this list. I know with my child's daycare, they were so thankful when I shared a list with them because they were like, we've never known what to do if he refuses lunch.
Steph Geddies [00:11:49]:
So now we know that we have this list of accepted foods. Can we just tweak his meal a little bit to suit one of those accepted foods? Or if he does refuse, is there something else on the accepted list that we can give him? So I think it's really good to share that list with other caregivers. But what that list does is it just helps us go, okay, when we're serving a meal that might be new to them or might have new ingredients or new textures or new flavors and tastes, etcetera, how can we put at least one accepted food on the plate so that there's always something that's familiar to them, because what we don't want is that, you know, typical. We put the meal in front of them straight away. Instant rejection. You know, they look at the meal, there's nothing familiar to them. There's nothing that they know is comfortable, nothing that they feel comfortable to eat. So if we can put at least one accepted food on there, and that doesn't have to be something that's, like, cooked completely different.
Steph Geddies [00:12:41]:
What I would really suggest is to look at convenience options. So things like precooked rice or, you know, quick cooked pasta or some things you might want to keep in the freezer, you know, if your kids are into, I don't know what it might be like, chicken nuggets or things that are essentially what might be deemed as kids food, but you're serving it as part of the family meal. So it's just those accepted foods that, you know, are easy to prepare. So you're not having to cook a whole different meal, but you're putting it on the plate with other aspects of the family meal so that they're still getting that exposure to the family meal. And that is the most important bit of it. Okay. It's the exposure because we know that kids need to be exposed to foods ten to 15 times, and that's for a neurotypical kid. So it might be even more for those who might have that extra complex layer of sensitivities or things like that.
Steph Geddies [00:13:33]:
So exposure is absolutely key. And that's why family meals are so good, because no matter what's happening every night, they're going to be exposed to family meals. And the more that you do that, the more likely they're going to be to accept those family meals.
Sharon Collon [00:13:48]:
So family mealtime can be such an emotional journey for parents, like, whether you've got neurodivergent kids or neurotypical kids. So we grew up in the era where you finished everything on your plate and you didn't leave until you, like, there was so much pressure around food. And it was all very different to how we promote parenting now. You know, for a lot of families, it brings up lots of emotion. Like, should I be like, I'm worried about them not eating enough? Because a lot of our kids, you know, especially if they're on medication, they might be a little bit underweight or I'm worried about, you know, like, whether they're just eating the same thing all the time. Like, I know kids with ASD and things like that, they can. Some of the parents talk about they just eat the one safe food all the time. And I can.
Sharon Collon [00:14:39]:
I can get it. Because if you bite into a blueberry, there's all different flavors from that one fruit, but if you bite into, like, the same brand of chicken nuggets, it's so consistent. So from the kids point of view, like, that is safer, right. Because it's a consistent flavor. There's no variation. So the parents are going through this, like, even before they put anything on the table, they're having this internal turmoil and then thinking, oh, will I just cook them something, like, simple? Because I'm not up for the battle today. But I love that you shared some really practical tips there about just putting the one thing, like, you know, just having that one bit of safety there that they can go through, but that it's not about whether they eat it or not. It's exposure to it.
Sharon Collon [00:15:23]:
It's just them seeing it repetitively before they, you know, might decide to try it or not. But doing it in a no pressure approach, what do you think that that pressure that we all grew up with, you know, like, you eat that before you finish that, you know, before you. Or you're not getting dessert, you know, all of that stuff. What does that do?
Steph Geddies [00:15:44]:
Yeah, look, the pressure is a really interesting one, because essentially, the pressure is something that is kind of what the parent is projecting onto the child.
Sharon Collon [00:15:53]:
Right.
Steph Geddies [00:15:54]:
And so what we're really doing there is we're disconnecting or we're distrusting the ability for that child to trust their own body. Okay. And learning to trust your own body and trust food around with your own body and its hunger signals is such an important thing for children to have. Now, what I often, you know, talk about is imagine an adult these days when we go to eat a meal we've grown up with. And I think particularly our generation, we've grown up with a lot of diet culture, right. A lot of really bad messaging around nutrition, to the point where now when we go to eat something, we're thinking things like, does this have too many calories? I shouldn't be eating carbs or fat's not good for me. And we're making up all these essentially made up food rules that we've just learned throughout diet culture. But we're thinking all of these things, and that overrides our ability to actually eat intuitively with our body.
Steph Geddies [00:16:49]:
Right. Until our body can actually tell us, oh, I'm actually feeling full now, or I'm feeling hungry, we've completely disconnected the ability to do that with all of this diet culture and messaging and food rules that we've, you know, made up in our heads. But we need to remember that children, it's much more simple because they haven't been exposed to all of that yet. So, you know, it's much more like, I'm going to eat a food. Either it tastes good or it doesn't taste good, or I'm full now, or I want to keep eating now. Yeah, it really can be that simple. So what we don't want to do is come in and override or disconnect their ability to do that and to tune into their body and eat intuitively. And so by adding that layer of pressure and saying things like, you have to finish your plate or just three more bites or, you know, all those things, which is coming from such a good place because we generally are just concerned about how much our children are eating.
Steph Geddies [00:17:40]:
We just want them to thrive, but we have to understand that it can have longer term impacts on their relationship with food. We know that applying any kind of pressure for them to eat can have that kind of negative association with food and can lead to disorder eating behaviors later in life. So it is really important that we kind of get on top of it early. And it's really hard, but you don't have to be perfect at it. You know, I think this is the biggest thing to remember for parents. Give yourself a bit of grace, because it's not how you grew up, it's not what, you know, this might be very new to you. And just understanding, okay, once I serve food, I don't actually have to talk about the food at all. I don't have to talk about eat more or eat less or anything like that.
Steph Geddies [00:18:24]:
I just have to let my child understand their ability to listen to themselves and listen to their hug nuts and goals. So I think that is the biggest thing with pressure, just like, picking yourself up on it, and as I said, you're not going to be perfect. There will be occasions where you just. It becomes too much and just go, just three more bites, or you just say those things. But the more you can pick yourself up on it and the more you can practice other things to say or other things to do at the dinner table, which can encourage them to try more foods or eat more in general that aren't in a way that's pressuring them, the much more success you'll have with those strategies.
Sharon Collon [00:19:00]:
Okay, I've got such a parenting question now. So say this fictitious family has sat, the child has eaten the safe foods, but not any of the other food or they're perceived safe food and then not any of the other food. But then dinner is over. You've cleaned up, you're now getting ready for bed. And I don't know if your kids do this, but my kids, as you're putting them to bed, do this, like, and now I would like to chat about the meaning of life as it's bedtime and request the waters and request things. And that's when they throw out, I'm hungry. And you're like, hmm, we've just done all that stuff and now it's bedtime.
Sharon Collon [00:19:39]:
What do you do?
Sharon Collon [00:19:39]:
Are you a fan of feeding them then, or are you a fan of making them wait?
Steph Geddies [00:19:45]:
Look, it's a really interesting concept, and I think it's one that I have learned a lot from with my own child. Because when I listened to, you know, what the experts were saying, it was around, you know, this is what's on the menu tonight. You don't have to eat it because there's no pressure to eat, but this is all that's on the menu. And if you're not going to eat what's on the menu, that's all there is. Dinner tonight. The kitchen's closed after this. Now that all sounds really great, but what I found was when I applied that practically, I went to my son. Okay, that's fine if you don't want to eat anything else tonight.
Steph Geddies [00:20:16]:
You know, that's all. It's on menus. Kitchen closed. Dinner's over. Off he goes. And then I'm sitting there going, but, oh, my gosh, he's Billy eating anything today? Like, what if he wakes tonight? What if he's not growing? Well, all these thoughts go on in your head, right? And then you second guess yourself and think, maybe I should just give him a snack before dinner. But I think what you need to think about is the particular situation of that child and that day. What's actually happened for them that day? Did they actually eat a really great breakfast and a pretty good lunch? And they've had a few snacks, so at dinner time, they're actually just not that hungry.
Steph Geddies [00:20:47]:
They maybe got most of their calories in earlier in the day, and that might be the case. And you can then trust their ability to listen to their own body and tell you that they weren't hungry, and that's it. And if they did ask for something later on, look, maybe they are a little bit hungry, but maybe they're just stalling bedtime too, right?
Sharon Collon [00:21:05]:
So hard for parents.
Steph Geddies [00:21:07]:
So that's when you can be pretty confident and go, you know what? They've actually eaten really well today. I'm confident that I don't need to feed them anything else tonight. And if they are saying that they're hungry, we'll just go, oh, great. We're going to have a really big breakfast ready for tomorrow morning.
Sharon Collon [00:21:20]:
Love that.
Steph Geddies [00:21:21]:
And then the other option is, okay, but maybe they actually haven't had a great day of eating. I know for my son, when he goes to kinder or daycare, he actually doesn't eat very much. So on those days I say to myself, well, what's happened today? Maybe you don't actually know how much they've consumed if, you know, they're being fed at a daycare or something like that. So you might go today. I'm not that comfortable with them not having anything else. Right. So there's a few options there. You might just want to go, okay, you finished your meal for now, but you might get a bit hungry later.
Steph Geddies [00:21:49]:
I'm going to keep your dinner here, and if you get hungry later, you can come back and finish your dinner. So that could be one option. Another option could be going, okay, well, the meal's finished now and you complete the meal. It's all done, off they go. But then you feel like you still want to give them something. I would just allow enough time between, maybe it's just half an hour or 20 minutes, if that's all you've got, just so they don't make that association of, okay, I know, if I don't eat my dinner, I'm going to get offered something later on. Yeah, you want to make sure there's a bit of time in between that they kind of forget about it. And then you could offer something a bit later and it might just be something that's a little bit plain and boring.
Steph Geddies [00:22:25]:
So it's something that they wouldn't necessarily be excited to eat so that they don't start to go, oh, I'm not going to eat this now because I know I'm going to get ice cream later or whatever it might be later that they love. It's going, okay. I know that if I don't eat that, they don't really think much happens because they don't make that association. But later on they will get offered something. And this is a little bit plain and boring. It's something that's still nutritious, something that you know they'll accept, but it's not overly exciting for them, you know, and they're just a couple of strategies, but there's lots of different ways you can go about it depending on your child. And I know one family, their approach was they had older children, so they could kind of understand that concept a bit more about trying new foods or not. And, you know, if they weren't willing to try and have what was presented to them at the table, there was always, no matter what, hummus and vegetables on offer in the fridge.
Steph Geddies [00:23:14]:
And that was just their kind of backup and their strategy. So I think it's good to just kind of tune into your children, into the situation of the day and be confident, you know, be confident in your choices. You're looking at all the different things, ticking the boxes and going, nah, I'm confident in this choice. And then moving forward, tackling another day after that.
Sharon Collon [00:23:32]:
Love that. Love that I was. I asked my son, what do you want me to do when this happens? And because I noticed that you're asking for more food right on bedtime. And we negotiated that it was actually like a warm drink. He could have a warm drink. That's like our one thing that he's allowed. Like, he's not, we're not. But I do love the idea of bringing dinner back out, you know, because then it's a test of whether they're actually that hungry.
Steph Geddies [00:23:58]:
Yeah, exactly. And, you know, that's a good way to show them, teach them things even about, like, food waste and what's good for the planet and all that sort of stuff as well.
Sharon Collon [00:24:07]:
So tell me about the parents role in here, because I have a funny story. Like, my best friend, she has lots of sensory issues with food and she pretty much her parent, like, her mum would always cook her a separate meal. She would just. She doesn't have ADHD or anything, but she would, like, pretty much grow up on just chicken and salt sandwiches. That was her, like, that was it. And I was talking to her about when she feeds her kids because she's got. She's much better these days, but she does, like, a weird face as she's feeding her kids. Like, she does this, like, feeding her kids because she can't help it, because her face is really expressive, but because she is, like, mildly repulsed by food, she's still feeding her kids the food that she, you know, she's being really great and giving her kids this variety, but she can't lie with her facials about how she feels about the food, how much do what the parents do impact what the kids.
Sharon Collon [00:25:06]:
What's happening with the kids?
Steph Geddies [00:25:07]:
Oh, look, your friend might not be happy to hear this, but a huge impact, huge look. She's doing such a great job in that she's still serving them the variety and all of that. But when you think about what might be happening there, potentially before the kids even got that food near their mouth to try, she's making faces as if the food's gross and disgusting. Of course, she can't help it, so there's just some things that she might have to work around there, but that's what can happen. You know, the kids can so easily pick up on what you're doing, and modeling is one of the best ways to get your children to try new foods. And I'll give you an example. This is also bringing into a concept around fun and games at the table to try and get your kids to try new foods, which is just so, so effective and has been so great for my children. But one of the ways that we were trying to encourage our kids to try new foods was they had, we were having chicken skewers one night for dinner, and my eldest child, who's the fasciata, he really struggles with the texture of meat.
Steph Geddies [00:26:05]:
That's one of the things that he struggles with, really chewy things. So, of course, I put it on the plate as part of the family meal, thinking very unlikely he'll try it, but exposure is everything, so put it on the plate. My other child, who's generally pretty good, pretty adventurous with his food, but it can be hit and miss with him. And what I noticed was, after we'd put the meals down, give them some time to navigate the meal themselves and eat what they wanted off the plate, both of their chicken skewers were still sitting there untouched. So hubby and I was sort of like, okay, well, let's take this opportunity now. Once they've had some time to eat what they want to eat and have control over their meal, let's take this time to play a little game and model some behavior for them. So we picked up our chicken skewers, and we started having a sword fight with our skewers at the table, and we're sort of having a bit of a fight. And then my husband goes, I'm going to take a big bite of my sword.
Steph Geddies [00:26:52]:
And he picks it up and takes a really big, exaggerated bite of his chicken skewer. And, of course, what happened straight away, both children, even the fasciata, pick up their chicken skewer, have a little fight, and take a big bite of their soy, right? And then the adventurous eater went on to eat most of it. My fasciata went on to have maybe two or three bites of it. But, you know, in a world where he was previously rejecting that food for probably a good two years up to that point, that was huge. He'd actually not only been comfortable enough to pick it up and play with it because that still counts as an exposure to that food, but then he felt comfortable enough to actually take a bite and two more bites after that. So, you know, that's just such a great way that modeling, but also bringing in a bit of games and a bit of fun into it, can really have such a big impact on them. You know, encouraging them to try the new foods, but without that pressure piece to it, you know, we're not pressuring them, we're just showing them a fun way to do it.
Sharon Collon [00:27:45]:
I love that. And I love. I love the idea of kids serving themselves with, like, tongs and things like that. My kids love, like, picking things up with tongs and, like, choosing things themselves, which I think is lovely. Like, and it's just novelty, really. Like, it's novelty at the end of the day, which is great for the ADHD brain. And I love the idea of this, of, like, the fight with the chicken skewers as well.
Steph Geddies [00:28:11]:
Yeah. Doing meals where kids can actually serve themselves is such a great one. And particularly kids with ADHD, like, there's that ability to then customize the meal for how they like it, do you.
Sharon Collon [00:28:22]:
Know what I mean?
Steph Geddies [00:28:23]:
And it gives them that control over the meal, which can be what they're really sort of craving sometimes. So giving, like, a family meal where it's, like, kind of just served on a big platter. Last night we did turkey burgers, so everything that could possibly go in the burger and the buns and the turkey was all put on a big platter. I gave each of my kids a mini set of tongs, and they could pick and choose themselves what they wanted to have, you know, across the meal. If there was any stage where I thought maybe I could give a bit of encouragement for them to try something else, I would pick up a bit of lettuce, and I went crunch really loud, and I was like, did you hear how crunchy that was? And straight away, they both picked up a bit of lettuce and crunch. See how crunchy it was? So, you know, that sort of thing. Giving them a bit of control over the meal, I think makes them a lot more comfortable so that they can pick and choose what they want to try. And knowing that even if they don't try those foods that you've put out there, that still counts as an exposure.
Steph Geddies [00:29:16]:
It's still in front of them, they're still watching you eat it. And so that's still really helpful and really beneficial for them.
Sharon Collon [00:29:23]:
So many great tips in there. Now, one of the things that I love doing in this podcast is talking about all the different professions, because for parents in general, we're all very, like, we're getting exposed to all different professions, like psychologists, psychiatrists, developmental pediatricians, you know, like normal pediatricians, like all these sorts of things like that. I would love to know, you know, you're a culinary, nutrition, nutritionist. What's the difference between that or a nutritionist and a dietitian?
Steph Geddies [00:29:50]:
Yeah, that's a great question. And so it can come down to the regulating bodies. So essentially, a nutritionist isn't necessarily a regulated term. There is like a gold standard. So I'm considered a registered nutritionist. So if you're seeing a nutritionist, that's what you want to look for, a registered nutritionist. But nutritionists tend to work in the preventative space, so we're looking at preventative health, whereas dietitians is a much more regulated term, and they can work in the clinical or the treatment space, so they can essentially treat medical conditions with diet, whereas a nutritionist would be more in the preventative end of the spectrum. But you can also find clinical nutritionists as well, which is a different degree altogether, but they work kind of very similarly to dietitians, but more in the clinical space.
Steph Geddies [00:30:41]:
And in terms of if anyone wanted to go and seek help from a professional, particularly for your children, and any difficulties you might be having, you'd be looking at a pediatric dietitian. That would be your best place to go. Or you can also seek help through feeding therapists. Now, feeding therapists that might also encompass things like an occupational therapist or some people like that are also trained in food therapy. So they're kind of the two avenues you can go down. But yeah, if you are having any concerns around, you know, nutritional deficiencies, growth and development, or anything that would be seen further on from just kind of your typical, you know, fussy, selective eating, then definitely go and see a pediatric dietitian.
Sharon Collon [00:31:24]:
Amazing. Thank you so much. Now, I always love to finish off the podcast with a couple of really easy things that parents can try at home. What would be a couple of easy tips that we can try this evening?
Steph Geddies [00:31:36]:
Okay. I think the first one would be the no pressure environment. Something that you can try tonight at dinner would be feeding your children and trying to just sit back and let it play out. So not trying to talk about pressuring the food or anything like that. Ask them questions about how was your day? Or, you know, who did you play with today? Or what was your favorite thing about today. Have conversation that doesn't evolve around food. I think that would be one really good thing to try. I think the second one could be, try and play a game.
Steph Geddies [00:32:05]:
Okay. If you want to get them to try a new food, try and come up with a game. You know, it can be, like I said, like we did the chicken skewers. It could be something even like stacking cucumbers, you know, can you stack your cucumbers really high, remembering that the result doesn't matter so much? It's the exposure that counts. So even if they don't end up trying the food or eating the food, that doesn't matter. The fact that they felt comfortable enough to touch the food and stack it up, then that's really beneficial. So I think a no pressure environment and perhaps trying a game or two at mealtime could be things that they could definitely go and try tonight.
Sharon Collon [00:32:39]:
Love that. I just love. Yeah. That even the idea of stacking the cucumbers is great. And that's my key takeaway, the exposure element. I wonder how much I've been really lucky with food stuff with my kids because of, like, because I've got three boys. Scarcity has come into it, so they're like, I don't want him to have the last lot. So, like, they, like.
Sharon Collon [00:33:01]:
They kind of like fighting over it. Yeah, it's kind of gone the other way. I wonder whether that's avoided some of the foods.
Steph Geddies [00:33:07]:
Possibly. Possibly.
Sharon Collon [00:33:09]:
Because the only thing that's more important to them than food is, like, that their brother doesn't get it. So, like, that's overridden some of it.
Steph Geddies [00:33:17]:
Well, I think that's hopefully worked in your advantage, then.
Sharon Collon [00:33:20]:
I think it has. I think it has in this occasion. Now, thank you so much for your time today, steph. That has been so full of practical tips, and I'm sure that our listeners at home will love it. Now tell us where we can find you, and, you know, and so we can look you up and. And see the beautiful work that you're doing.
Steph Geddies [00:33:38]:
Sure. So my website is body good food, and you'll find a heap of different recipes on there. So if you're looking for a bit of recipe inspiration for your family meals, you can find that there then on Instagram. I'm nutritionist Steph Geddes. And that's where I share a bit more of an insight, I suppose, into my journey, feeding my children and sharing lots of those sort of practical tips that we've talked about today.
Sharon Collon [00:33:59]:
Amazing. And now, what's your course that you have?
Steph Geddies [00:34:02]:
I have a new course at. Yes. It's called the Family Food Plan. And it is essentially, it's a three week program. You get a full three week meal plan with all your meals planned out for you. Shopping lists, everything. But there's a masterclass series that helps you to learn how you can serve one meal to the whole family. So it's kind of elaborating on a lot of the stuff we've talked about today, but just going that little bit further and, you know, understanding how can we actually embrace family meals? Even though we might not have children that are accepting of family meals at this point, how can we learn to serve one meal to the whole family so that we can, you know, simplify things and reduce the overwhelming exhaustion of meal times?
Sharon Collon [00:34:39]:
Love that so much.
Steph Geddies [00:34:41]:
Thank you, Steph. Thank you for having me.
Sharon Collon [00:34:43]:
Thank you for listening to this episode of the ADHD Families podcast. If you loved it, please share it on your socials. I want this to start a conversation about ADHD. If you want to make this mum do a little happy dance, please leave a review on iTunes. If you would like to know more about what we do, check out the functionalfamily.com. i truly hope that you enjoyed this.
Sharon Collon [00:35:08]:
Podcast and you use it to create.
Sharon Collon [00:35:11]:
A wonderful, effective, joyful life with your beautiful children.
