Interview with Paul Gratkowski: Picky eater grows up to go from obesity to fitness, learning to like veggies along the way

Nov 4, 2010 by Anna Migeon

This year will be the third year in a row that Paul Gratkowski, 44, will bike over 10,000 miles.  Today, he’s obviously in great shape. He also now loves eating healthy. But Paul grew up as a picky eater, and ten years ago, he was “on the road to an early grave,” as his doctor told him.

He started out young, biking a lot, and made some epic bike trips in his 20s, including going from Los Angles to Boston in 42 days, averaging 82 miles a day. But he couldn’t keep it up once he hit his 30s.

“I had to come to terms with the fact that my body would not allow me to continue to smoke and drink and to eat poorly, and to exercise at that level,” he said. “The booze, bad food, and cigarettes took over and I ballooned up to just under 300 pounds.”

I asked…

The Codependent Mom: Feeding Your Child’s Food Addiction

Oct 17, 2010 by Anna Migeon

When your baby started to scoot around the house, you probably changed your decor. You moved breakables or dangerous items out of reach. You covered your electrical outlets.

You may have also cleaned up your personal act in various ways to make a healthy, safe, positive environment for your dear baby.

You kept careful watch over your little one, and with a sensible combination of environmental adjustments, vigilance, and training of your baby not to touch those dangers that couldn’t be removed, you made your house a place where your darling could play and learn and enjoy freedom and safety.

You limited your child’s choices, without offering dangerous fun in order to get her to do beneficial things. You wouldn’t, for example, say she could chew on the electrical cord if she would play with her blocks first.

You wouldn’t…

Push or Pull? When picky kids pick your dinner to pieces

Oct 5, 2010 by Anna Migeon

This question came recently from a reader, Rosie Kate:

“How do you deal (or not deal) with a child who picks through food for ingredients he doesn’t like?  My five-year-old son went through an ‘anti-onion’ phase, in which he complained about bits of onion in his food. I told him to quietly remove them, but not to be rude about it.

Now it’s zucchini (of which we eat lots because we have lots in the garden, of course!). Same rule applies, but it kinda bugs me (I’m making sure not to let him know that, though, because then it would be a control game).”

So what would you do?  The normal, intuitive response to this situation is generally to find away to…

When healthy kid foods pose as junk food

Sep 3, 2010 by Anna Migeon

Then today I read a mom’s recommendations on how to buy better-for-you packaged stuff so kids can feel like everybody else at school. The key is that it be in real, store-bought packages with attractive logos and brand names. If we can fool kids into thinking they’re eating the processed junk their friends eat,…