— Jessie Lease

Yeah, there's a whole book on that and I wrote it, but it's called, uh, yeah, there there's no, but seriously, I, so I've spent a lot of time researching and teaching about feeding kids and I always say they don't show up to the table with a different personality, you know it. And so there are different eating personalities and temperaments that kids have. So there is no one solution how, and so I take it in baby steps. So, and, and this is all written in Be Sugar Addiction Now for kids or the picky eating solution to find out how to work with your individual child. Because first and foremost you wanna make sure they're not on the spectrum, they're not neurodivergent. 'cause then you're dealing with something that you need professional help. Um, kids learn to like sugar, uh, when they're, they're offered it to them. So usually when they get out of the house and they see that all their other little friends are having a lot of it, I definitely am a big proponent in unique. Our stomachs have just a certain amount of room and you need to fill it with the healthy stuff first before you can have the stuff that doesn't promote health, but is super tasty. Um, and I differ with traditional dieticians like in the eighties, um, that were really, you know, put all the food in front of your kids and they decide what to eat. That only works with one eating personality that does not work with the other eight that, um, are in this book. But if you have somebody who can do that, absolutely. I don't know many adults that would choose broccoli over something sweet. And so I break the sugar addiction up into different parts based on, so you, most people get most of their sugar, uh, from sugar sweetened beverages. And then, you know, then you have your treats and then you have stuff that's added to food. So you find out where your child is at the moment, maybe they're drinking three things a juice a day, or if they're routine they're having five things of soda. So you set up a plan with them and they can get stickers or something else depending on how old they are. And you just ask 'em to make one small change per week. So I would say we're gonna, you know, decrease the amount of juice by half a cup a week and, and just these small changes and then get rewarded. That is the best way to have children change their eating habits and they can't see. And, and modeling's always there, right? So if mom and dad or you know, whoever is bringing them up is eating a ton of sugar, that speaks volumes. That's what they're gonna do too.