No, no, no!
If I’m honest, it was probably my son’s first real word. And it comes up more and more often now as he, aged one and a half, crashes outward into ever-broader spheres of life.
His awareness used to be limited to what lay in front of him. If he couldn’t see a cookie, a ball, or a swing, it didn’t exist.
Now object permanence is well established, and he knows what the world can offer. He often chats to himself before falling asleep at night. Over the baby monitor I hear “Dada! Bike!” (he has a seat on my husband’s bicycle now, and a helmet he loves dearly), “Bairplane!” (he was the only member of our family with warm feelings about the air show that recently roared over our house), or “Up! Down!” (dreams of the playground, perhaps?).
With this knowledge come preferences and strong opinions. He has books he loves and books he loathes. He has favorite foods (pasta, cheese, croissants, yogurt, any kind of fruit) and foods he reliably rejects (whole beans and most leafy vegetables, to my chagrin). In between is a large group of foods he sometimes relishes and sometimes abhors, according to no pattern I can discern. Though I know it’s normal and age-appropriate, I struggle not to become frustrated with picky eating.
I strive toward the advice, nearly unanimous in my circles at least, to offer him a variety of foods and react neutrally to his choices. The idea is to avoid letting mealtime become a power struggle, since young people—like all people—are deeply invested in what goes into their bodies. As in so many cases, if you get into a head-on battle of wills with a toddler, you will lose. So I serve him whatever I’m eating, sometimes in modified form—cooked a little softer, spiced a little less, chopped a little smaller—sit with him at the table, and try to end my involvement there.
That’s the goal, at least. In reality, it’s nearly impossible for me not to mind when he takes a bite of vegetable-stuffed quesadilla, lets out a dramatic full-body shudder, spits it out into his lap, scrapes his tongue with his fingers to remove any remaining shreds, and yells at the top of his lungs, “NO! PEACH!” Or when, in a peaceful seaside restaurant, he wrenches a chunk of haddock out of his mouth and flings it at my face. Or when I set out a bowl of grated carrot salad (often a favorite dish) for his first course and he becomes so irate that he not only refuses to let the fork pass between his lips but tries repeatedly to swat my bowl from my hands.
So. We had spaghetti alle vongole, pasta with clams, for Sunday dinner this week. It was a new dish for my son—we just moved to a coastal town with much more fresh seafood available in the farmers’ markets than our former, inland city—and I was excited to introduce him to a new flavor but uncertain how the rubbery texture of the clams would work for his small mouth. I steamed the clams with garlic and white wine, tossed them together with the pasta, shells and all, and sprinkled parsley over the top. Then I scooped out my son’s portion, cut his long noodles into short, manageable pieces, extracted a clam from its shell, and diced it. He only has half his teeth, after all, and his utensils regularly miss their mark.
My husband and I set to work with gusto, twirling spaghetti around our forks and prying clams out of their shells.
Our son, meanwhile, chewed skeptically on a small piece of clam and spat it out with that good old full-body shudder. I sighed. Then he studied his parents carefully and twirled his little fork in his chopped noodles before lifting it hopefully to his mouth. Of course, the short strands didn’t coil as he envisioned.
“You can use your fingers, honey,” I said, a little testy.
“No, no, no!” He pointed at our plates.
“It’s the same thing you have, sweetheart.”
“More!”
So I gave him one of my discarded clam shells to explore. “That’s where the clam lives, inside the shell.” He explored the hinge with pleasure, then tipped the shell up before his mouth and extended his little tongue.
“More!”
“You have a clam on your plate already, honey. Want to try another piece?” I pointed to the diced pieces.
“No, no, no!”
So, gritting my teeth, I gave him a clam. To my great surprise, he grinned widely, slurped the garlicky brine, yanked the flesh from the shell, shoved it whole into his mouth, and chewed calmly and concertedly for several minutes before swallowing. Then he repeated the process four times. When all the clams were gone, he twirled some long noodles around his fork, navigated the wobbly edifice to his mouth, and chomped with evident pleasure.
Fair enough, kid. They do taste better that way.
Seeing him delight in his grown-up dinner was humbling. Despite all my principles about avoiding “kid food,” I had still offered him a childish, inferior version of our special dinner, thinking he was too young to manage.
Again and again, he prompts me to treat him as he is today, not as he was yesterday or as I expect a child of his age to be. Again and again, he challenges me to step back and let him show me what he is capable of. And again and again, I struggle to trust his choices.
At the playground I watch with my heart in my mouth as he climbs the ladder unsteadily and launches himself headfirst down the slide, landing with a happy thump. At home he proudly sweeps crumbs from beneath his chair, carries the dustpan to the garbage pail, pours tea for us both, and scampers off for a rag to wipe up the drops.
Does he need help? I can’t help myself from asking.
“No, Mama, no!”
Soon, I hope, I will learn how to listen.