thanksgiving "feast"

Turkey, mashed potatoes, some gravy, a roll, and pumpkin mousse. Sounds delicious to me. Unfortunately, Punkin did not agree.

I should have taken an "after" picture. Oh wait, just look above, it would be nearly the same. (He did eat about half of the roll and the mousse.)

Here's Punkin before seeing his plate. Before the tears welled up. Before the red, splotchy face.

You would have thought we were asking him to take a big bite of rat poop the way he reacted to trying gravy. (And besides, he had a choice of potatoes without gravy or with gravy. We compromised down to just trying the gravy on its own.) And he still couldn't really bring himself to do it. He finally did lick some off his fork, but it was so traumatic, I don't think he could even register the taste. I wish I knew why he can't process trying new things... or new things that aren't dessert anyway, because he totally tried that pumpkin mousse with no issues whatsoever.

And, of course, I felt frustrated and guilty for making the whole thing unpleasant to begin with. I knew going in that he wouldn't want any of the foods they were having and yet, I couldn't resist trying to get him to at least taste it. My goal next time will be to completely ignore the food altogether and hope we can all have a better time.

You can't really see it in this picture, but each child wrote what they were thankful for. Punkin's mentions he is thankful for his family. I hope he still feels the same way!