Food.

The other day I found myself defending myself and Owen in regards to his feeding difficulties. This person insisted that Owen *could* eat every food (meats, whatever), he just chose not to because he is "playing me" and "being bratty". Needless to say, I don't have contact with this person anymore (and neither does Owen). We don't need that kind of negativity in our lives.

Anyway.... so tonight Owen and I made spaghetti. He hasn't eaten it recently, for whatever reason, but he was really excited about it today. I made sure to make it *exactly* how he likes it (bow-tie pasta only, homemade sauce- Grandpa's recipe, of course). He helped with everything and was really excited. So I put a plate in front of him, he sat down and then I went outside to pick some basil (I use fresh basil in mine and Jason's sauce for lasagna we'll eat tonight, I use dried for Owen's because he won't eat the sauce with fresh basil). Anywho... I come back inside and see Owen sitting at the table, frozen, looking like he's going to vomit. I calmly go to him and ask what's wrong. He starts searching frantically and finally locates his napkin beside his plate. He spits out a piece of chewed up pasta and tears start welling up in his eyes. I asked what was wrong. He said "The spaghetti is.... mama it's..... it's...... it's sticky". He tried really hard to find a word to describe it (first time he's done that.... GREAT progress!). I asked if he wanted to try another piece, maybe the next piece will be better. Repeat with another piece. He was so upset that, for whatever reason, his spaghetti didn't taste "right" today. Tears started welling up again which, of course, made me start crying. Noone wants to see their kid in pain- physical or otherwise. I don't think he's ever been this upset at not being able to eat something.

I don't even really know why I posted this. Free therapy, I guess? To prove that I'm not insane? That he's not really "playing me" or "being bratty"? To prove that he really does have a medical condition that is keeping him from enjoying foods like most of us do. We've made huge progress with his food, but we still have a long way to go. We did add chocolate chips in recently (which he now loves and begs for!) and flavored applesauce. He won't eat the premade flavored applesauce but he LOVES the applesauce Jason makes. Jason takes jello mix (the powdered stuff) and mixes a little into plain, no sugar added applesauce. Just enough to give it a little flavor change (and it changes the color ever so slightly). Owen loved the peach. Jason recently made watermelon and he's loving that. I think he likes the flavored applesauce more than the plain now!! It's kinda funny because he won't eat flavored applesauce you buy at the store. But if you buy the plain applesauce and mix jello into that container he'll down it like there's no tomorrow.