Does my child have sensory issues with food? With Kirsty Porter. Food For Kids Podcast

Joanne (00:00)

On today's episode, we're looking at how our children's senses can affect their desire and ability to eat and what it can look like when your child has sensory issues around food.

Joanne (00:23)

Hello and welcome to the Food for Kids podcast. I'm Joanne from the Foodies.

When we're talking about fussy eating or why children can be hesitant with new foods or why they might have a limited number of accepted foods, there are a whole lot of underlying issues that come up, some of which I discussed a few episodes ago in the episode about why children can be picky. One of those reasons which can be important for some children is around sensory issues with foods. So that's ways in which overwhelm of different senses can make eating difficult and this can be in lots of ways that aren't obvious at first glance.

For this topic, I'm talking to Dr. Kirsty Porter from Nutrition for Kids in Northern Ireland. Kirsty is a registered children's dietitian with over 15 years of experience, and she specialises in supporting fussy and sensory eaters. Kirsty even has a specialist programme about sensory issues in partnership with an occupational therapist or OT for short. In the context of children's food, occupational therapists work on the physical mechanics of eating, so all of the motor skills of chewing, swallowing and the muscles in the jaw and face. And then in their programme, Kirsty works on all of the family dynamics, the meal time environment and of course the nutritional side of things. Because of this long standing focus on sensory eating issues, I thought she'd be a great person to ask about this topic. So let's get to the interview.

Joanne Roach (01:50)

So Kirsty, what does it mean to have a sensory issue with food and like, how would someone be able to work out if that's what's going on in their child's eating rather than something else?

Dr Kirsty Porter (02:00)

So sensory eating issues with children around food can be in terms of the difficulty they have processing the way that either food feels or smells or even sounds. So eating isn't just about eating actually the food, which I think often people focus on the taste, but there's actually eight senses. So for some kids then the way foods feel in their mouth, how it smells or even the way it looks on a plate can make it feel very overwhelming for them or even threatening and that's where the challenges come from.

So for some parents listening to this, you might notice signs like gagging or spitting out food due to the texture. Extreme preferences to certain textures. So in clinic, I have lots of children who only eat dry or crunchy foods, or avoid multiple texture foods, or say they'll only have liquid versions of foods or wet foods or the opposite. They might avoid entire food groups. They can get very distressed at mealtimes or even refuse to sit at the table or they want to have the same foods on repeat. So that's the main difference with sensory challenges is that their reactions tend to be consistent around the sensory properties of food rather than your child's moods or preferences.

If the resistance is strong, ongoing and it's not swayed by things like hunger there's more likely a sensory component at play.

Joanne Roach (03:13)

So if a child is consistently gravitating towards a certain kind of texture or look and you can see those patterns that might be a bit of a clue towards the fact that it might be a sensory issue.

Dr Kirsty Porter (03:24)

Yes, very much so. And you've tried lots of different things and nothing's actually helping. And over time, the problem just keeps getting worse and worse. And then the worst case scenario is where kids have the same foods on repeat. It's a thing called food jagging but then they start to reject that limited range of foods that they have it becomes even worse.

Joanne Roach (03:40)

Okay, when people talk about my child will only eat beige food, that's because beige food has predictably probably got a crumb on it, probably has some crunchiness, probably soft on the inside. And it's that predictability of the texture, even if it might be a different brand, or sometimes people really want the same brand over and over again, don't they? Because, again, it's really predictable.

Dr Kirsty Porter (04:00)

Well that's it potentially, yes and the thing will be as well because of those kind of beige foods like most of them are carbohydrates so they fuel your kid's body with energy so that's why they like them and then that predictability but also because most of those foods are more processed they're easier to chew so they require less effort so that's why in particular like younger kids like toddlers that tends to be their preference so that might be a sensory issue in itself. They're easy, they're predictable, whereas the sensory profile, it's more than that. So exactly as you said, like parents will say to me, Kirsty we only have one brand of sausages, one brand of chicken nuggets, they don't eat one type of chips. know, it's that kind of thing, no, if you try and deviate or change it, or if the manufacturing changes how it's made and what it tastes like, it's an absolute refusal. And they'll have meltdowns because they know that those foods are different.

Joanne Roach (04:46)

And that's in terms of taste and texture, But What other sensory things can come in I think as parents, we tend to focus on what's on their plate. And we don't necessarily think about all the other sensory inputs. So what else can come into it?

Dr Kirsty Porter (04:55)

Could be the smell of foods as well in that kind of environment. So if you're kind of sitting out and eating your dinner, that's near where the food's been made. So particular things that people say to me, if we cook fish, it's an absolute nightmare. Our child just has a meltdown because they smell it, they don't like it. So actually it's the smell around foods as well.

And then go back to those eight senses. So how they view the world around them and how they process things and things like their stability. So actually for them, if they're not sitting upright, supported in a meal time, like so in an appropriate chair, they start to then fatigue because they're having so much energy and effort to kind of keep themselves upright. And that's where then the food refusal comes and that kind of, want to get out of here. I want them to escape the meal time as quickly as possible.

Or even some kids you'll say, oh, they're so badly behaved because we can't get them to sit down and they're running around, not stopping, but that's because for them if they're overwhelmed, that kind of regulation is that how they control things. That's how they feel safe. So for them sitting down being forced to not move for a long period of time is their worst, their worst fear and their worst environment. And that's why there is those meltdown at meal times and they will not come to the table and they won't eat

Joanne Roach (06:04)

So it's a way of them being able to process and deal with the sensory overload that they've got is that if they either move or don't move or sit in a different way, it enables them to at least shut down some of that overload.

Dr Kirsty Porter (06:07)

Yeah. Yes, so it's about creating those sensory friendly meal times when I work with families, I'll be like, right, what are your main kind of challenges with each of the senses? So they do like a wee checklist and then we'll create a profile to say, right, they have this heightened sense of taste, they have this heightened sense of smell. So this is how we can do it the meal times to kind of change that environment to make it more friendly. And that would be where you'd have like regular breaks or letting them kind of be active before, during and after the meal. So you kind of tailor towards your own child, because every child is different in terms of the senses and how they react in terms of that heightened or that lowered response as well.

And I think as parents, you want the best for your kids and you want your kids to eat. And your ultimate goal is I want my child to try a new food and you're so focused on that. There's hundreds of steps to get before that. so we need to create that safe and that comfortable environment. So actually my priority when you work with kids is making sure that they're not feeling overwhelmed, meeting them where they're at and getting them comfortable around food. And once you do that, that's the game changer, but it's very much a step by step approach.

Joanne Roach (07:18)

If you're a parent and you're listening to this and you're thinking that sounds like my child what would be the first thing you would suggest that parent to do this week with their meals?

Dr Kirsty Porter (07:26)

So my best advice would be take the pressure off immediately. So it's also my experience that's fundamentally where meal times are going wrong and getting your kids to try new foods is that pressure. So take the pressure off immediately. So what that means on a practical basis, so at your next meal, sit down with your child, offer the food calmly and let them decide if they want to eat the food. And even if they don't eat a bite, that's OK, because you're starting to build trust again. And then outside the meal times, there's lots of things that you can do.

So actually, my experience when I work with parents is, we're going to do lots of things and it's away from the dinner table initially. So my big thing, and I know you're passionate about this as well, Joanne, is playing with food together. So things like simple things like finger painting with yogurts, making food art or playing pretend games with toy foods. That's the game changer is getting your kids comfortable around foods away from the meal time and creating that calmer, more relaxed meal times where they want to come to the dinner table and they're not feeling the sensory overload. So they will, when they're comfortable and when they're ready, start to try new foods.

Joanne Roach (08:28)

Okay so it's just really rolling it back to how can we make mealtimes a place where everybody wants to be before we start worrying about actually the food that's being eaten.

Dr Kirsty Porter (08:37)

My parents are quite surprised whenever I'm like, your homework this week is you all take turns picking songs and you play a song before you start that signals that that's the mealtime's coming and you play it for 30 seconds and you have fun and you dance it off. And actually it transforms the mealtimes because everybody's relaxed and they're having fun and they're not dreading coming to mealtimes because they’re not going to hear mum and dad being like come on now one more wee bite, come on now try this and all of a sudden they're like what's going on here and they start to be like okay this is okay I'm not going to have pressure and actually we're just sitting together we're enjoying food and actually they start to become more comfortable. Now this isn't overnight but over time they'll start to try foods when they've overcome their fear.

Joanne Roach (09:18)

I like that idea of bringing some music into it because that's focusing your energy onto a different sense as well, isn't it?

Dr Kirsty Porter (09:24)

That's it. But there's also kids like with sensory challenges, probably most common ones would be neurodivergent kids, and actually for them, noise is a big no-no for them so they can't cope with lots of background noise. So actually for them, it might be then, you know, they need earphones on.

So then I have a dynamic where I would talk about family fun nights. So you'd have like, you'd pick a different country of the world. You pick a food that's quite popular in that country but you still have your kids safe foods alongside that and then you kind of do some research. So tell us about the top foods in that country, how do you say mum and dad and that and then you put on like the colours of the flag and again you pick the music so I'm obsessed with Korean and Asian food at the minute so I'd be like I love K-pop so I'd be like put on BTS or you know whoever you like and all of sudden they're learning something new together as a family, having fun and it totally changes the dynamics of your meal time because it's like a fact finding you're exploring foods but there's no pressure for them to try but they can still be part of it.

Joanne Roach (10:18)

That sounds really fun, I like that idea. So if people want to find out more about these suggestions that you have, I'll put all your links in the show notes, but don't you actually have a sensory eaters program for people who think this might describe their child.

Dr Kirsty Porter (10:31)

Yes, yes. So because I've come across lots of different families that I want to help and actually because one-to-ones can be quite expensive for a lot of parents so I work with Grace, a lovely OT. So whenever it to sensory challenges around food, I kind of focus on the nutrition kind of aspect and then Grace, the OT is about how to do sensory regulation, how to get your children prepared when they're going out for meals outside of the home, for instance, So we've created an online program and it's actually a self-paced step by step program So it's all practical, it fits into busy family lives, it's all simple small steps that you can do to help overcome your challenges that you're facing.

Joanne Roach (11:08)

That sounds great. I'll pop a link to that in the show notes.

Joanne (11:15)

I hope you found a couple of good tips in there to try out. I like how Kirsty makes us think about observing the pattern in their children's behaviour to try to see what might be the source of over or under stimulation and then trying to find a way to allow them to balance themselves off so that they can come to the table being relaxed enough to eat.

So I think you can look at that example of figuring out whether your child needs energetic music to run off tension or headphones to reduce stimulus, and you can apply that idea to other senses too and indeed to the whole eating environment. Of course, Kirsty's suggestions of making mealtimes more lighthearted and bringing the food exploration work away from the table is right up my street. If you think some of this sounds like your child, then I'll put Kirsty's links in the show notes. She has a separate specific Instagram feed just for sensory eaters content, as well as her program that she mentioned. So do go and check those out.

I hope you'll have found something useful in today's episode and I'll be back next time with another one and I hope to see you then, but in the meantime, happy sensory eating!

Chapters

00:13 Introduction

01:50 What do sensory issues with food look like?

03:40 Why children might like beige foods

04:46 Other senses involved in food, other than taste

06:16 How to tackle sensory issues

10:18 Kirsty's sensory eaters programme

11:14 Summary and outro