It was the kind of year that feels like it will never end. We had reached the pinnacle, and now we were here to stay. 

But a few months after her first birthday, Karuna began refusing meals. First, she refused the pureed vegetables, then the fruits. She was a bottomless pit for olives and loved rice and daal, but beyond that, she just didn’t eat much. She’s just a picky eater, I thought.

But a few months later, at her 18-month appointment, the standard graph that plotted a child’s weight against their age showed her weight slipping off the curve. She weighed less than 97% of children her age. We needed to do something about it, the pediatrician told us, but we still weren’t too worried.

We started consulting with a nutritionist to see if we could broaden her food preferences and started her on PediaSure to supplement her intake. She’ll be okay, I thought. She’ll catch up. But she got worse.

She stopped eating anything but olives. She became irritable. The nutritionist recommended one bottle of formula per day to supplement her intake, then two, and then multiple bottles per day.