foods that help digestion

My girls used to be very regular when we were on baby jar fruit: they split a jar of pears, peas or peaches and were good to go.
But now they aren't eating jars anymore and refuse many foods with fiber. I can get them to eat berries of all kinds, which helps a bit, and they like black bean enchiladas, but Sarah is having some constipation issues most days and refuses to eat most things that would help. She also refuses to drink apple juice (not good for them anyway, I know! I've tried watered-down, and straight juice, but she won't drink it.)
Any foods I am missing or any tricks of something to sneak into her breakfast? They are drinking a lot of milk and are huge cheese eaters. That's not helping, I'm sure.
Breakfast is usually toast & scrambled eggs, a few berries OR French toast and a few berries. She doesn't like apples or bananas.
She will only eat 2 or 3 peas or green beans at a sitting, and refuses baby jar veggies of any kind now. She will occasionally eat strawberries.
Asking ped tomorrow, but thought there might be some good tricks here that I don't know about.

 

Grapes always help my munchkins!

 

Juice, oatmeal (in the form of cookies also ), dried fruit and raisins, fruit (grapes, tomatoes etc, except bananas).

Basically avoid the BRAT diet. That's Bananas, Rice, Applesauce, Toast. Good luck!

 

Raisins! I actually have to limit the amount of raisins my girls get, because they'd eat them all day/every day!

Grapes as pp mentioned.

Peaches and pears also work.

Fig newtons

And if it becomes a real problem, see if she'll eat a jar of baby food prunes, that always worked for my girls when they were littler.

 

My girls are pretty regular and eat their fair share of grapes, mandarin oranges, raisins and canteloupe. They have three servings of fruit each day. With breakfast, afternoon snack and with dinner.

 

My cousin spoon feeds her toddler sometimes and she sneaks in veggies by putting them on the underside of the spoon. I always thought that was pretty smart. Never done it myself though.

Dried apricots seem to work pretty well.

 

Someone said Oatmeal which is a good one. My boys would always eat raisons and they loved pineapple. My kids did better with canned fruit than the fresh stuff...whatever I can get in them!

Cindy

 

I love dried apricots, but have to be careful with my consumption because they are so 'helpful with digestion'.

I use a lot of whole wheat in my baking (pancakes, dough, bread, muffins, etc). You could make some bran muffins (add some flax seed, wheat germ, etc)

We use a little watered down apple juice for good measure during constipation episodes.

I still keep baby food prunes on hand and mix them up with oatmeal or add them to yogurt for a quick fix.

Good luck, hope your little ones are feeling better soon.

 

My dd gets horrible constipation on a regular basis.....she has a laxative the pedi prescribed, but I try really hard to keep it under control with what she eats. Also, dairy for her is the main culprit. She does drink goat's milk, which helps, but she just LOVES cheese & I have to try really hard to limit that. A few other things I give her are:

prunes (cut up)
dried cherries
pears
pearsauce

 

Pears actually work better than prunes and pear juice is actually tasty esp mixed with apple. Try frozen juice pops
or pear puree on top of pancakes for breakfast. You could puree the pears and add it to the pancake mix too.

Figs are fantastic. Figs in oatmeal with raisins & you will have no problems there.

 

Agree with pp - try substituting whole grain products (bread, pasta, etc) whenever you give them.

 

Ditto everyone else. Whole grain products when you can. Oatmeal is great and so are raisins. I was anxious about the whole raisin thing until daycare started giving them so I figured I could at home...they love them. Pears or pear juice are good for constipation as is lots of water too.

 

Blueberries have always cleaned my kids right out. We avoid feeding giving them to them unless we need it.

 

Thanks for all the suggestions. We actually do lots of whole grain and blueberries already, and she will no longer eat baby jars (tried to give her baby food prunes and she rejected them. Ditto on pears). Pedi said dried apricots, dried prunes and that I could give her benefiber too. So we will try those options, and raisins too. She won't eat oatmeal either... too bad, they used to love it & had it every day for breakfast!
I read on another site that you can sprinkle wheat germ on their food too. I like the bran muffin idea - we do a lot of pumpkin bread and banana bread, they really like those.

 

I was going to mention the wheat germ. I mixed it in DD's oatmeal for months....and months. Then I would dip each bite in yogurt to make it taste better.

Apparently, any fruit that begins with "p" is considered a pooping fruit (at least that's what we call them!): pineapple, pears, prunes, plums, etc.

Somebody mentioned it already, but mandarins help.

Corn helps.

We have a diet very rich in beans. These are easy for lunch, too. Black, pinto, kidney beans are staples around here.

I have to watch her poops to make sure that she doesn't need to skip some of her favorites like bananas, cheese and applesauce. If I see pellets, she has to avoid those for a couple of days to soften things back up.

Who would have thought that kids would equal a new fascination with poop? :laughing: