Fussy Eaters (merged)

never_enough

One of my friends has a dd that seems to survive on thin air at home, she rarely eats anything for dinner. My friend finds it very demoralising to have cooked a nice meal that just sits there not being eaten, although her other children all eat well. She was advised to just ignore it & hope that dd will eat once she wants to. As previous posters have said a child is unlikely to starve themselves & as long as otherwise they seem ok don't worry too much.

jellyhead

The dietician told me she sees plenty of children who WILL starve themselves, although they are usually autistic or dyspraxic.

My 13 year old has felt hungry twice now, over the last month or so. I hope that means he's worked out how to tell what hunger is, and won't spend his adult life forgetting to eat

pickle

Try pepperami and cheese sticks, yogurts , anything high calorie that they can snack on. I do this as the meals are always a struggle.

PolishBigSpender

debtfreein4years wrote: »

Seriously dont give in. as people have said he will be getting all he needs so maybe cut down on a snack and although this is mean, he eats his dinner or he doesnt get anything else to eat for breakfast or lunch till it has been eaten. have you tried a reward chart. for each new piece of food that he trys he gets a star and when he has x stars he gets to do something special with you as a family.

good luck and dont give in.

That's really cruel. I was a fussy eater when I was a kid, but my mum would just cook me something I liked. The worst memories ever are the ones where someone is trying to force me to eat something I hate. I think the ladies in the nursery stopped doing this after they told me I wasn't allowed to leave the table until I've eaten the spinach... and it ended with me throwing up all over the floor.
I grew out of this and now I eat almost everything - apart from spinach

To the Original Poster - don't worry, he won't starve himself, one day he'll start trying new food as well and all will be well.

jellyhead

The dietician told me the worst thing you can do is turn food into a fight, because the panic, fear and sense of battle about to commence (hence the child wanting to win against you) will take years to undo.

I ended up so stressed I started to force feed my toddler, and of course he just vomited over me and ended up even more frightened of what abuse I'd force upon him next mealtime, so the panic never went away.

Relaxing was the best thing I could do, and she was right.

JBD

I quite agree with the last two posters. I can remember as a child being made to eat things that made me feel physically sick. My parents were so poor that they usually could not offer a choice but I was able to give my children something else if they really hated something on their plate. You would never try to force an adult to eat something they hate so why would you try to force a child.

sansp

Please bear with me this is my first post:

I have problem with my 3yr old daughter's eating habits.She is a fuzzy eater.She goes to nursery mon-fri from 9am to 12pm.Most of the days she wouldnt eat anything.I give her oats,different cereals,pancakes,toast etc for breakfast and lunch would be pizza,chips,rice and fish etc..That is the normal menu.Though we are vegeterians I even tried sausages,ham etc..but she wouldnt eat any.She was always like this..If she eat for 3 days then for the next 1 week she wouldn't eat much.But even that time she would drink milk.Now for the past 4 days she is hesitant to take milk as well.I tried different flavours.
Other than that she is a normal active 3yr old.I have no issues with her development.Please can someone guide me on this.Any breakfast/dinner recipes welcome.

ps:excuse me for any mistakes in the post.English is my second language

fernliebee

We are also vegetarians and I find my daughter is similar in that she will eat well for a week then eat very little for a week.

I have heard that with small children, rather than trying to fit all food groups into 1 meal, it is better to look at their diet over a fortnight. If you write down what she has for two weeks you will prob see that she is getting all she needs, just in bit's and pieces.

I am a firm believer that children will eat when they are hungry, and as hard as it is for us parents, we need to trust that as long as we offer them nutritous meals each day, we are doing the best we can to feed them well, we cannot physically force them, they will eat when they are ready. I would also say that children grow in spurts, so sometimes they need quite a lot of food, and will eat well, other times they are not growing/ developing as much so will need less energy.

If she doesn't want to drink her milk you could make cheesey pasta/ cauliflower cheese etc and maybe she would eat that?

Small children really don't need much to get by, some can seemingly live on fresh air. Stay relaxed, make her sit at the table with you while you eat and just give her her meal, and let her eat what she wants. If she doesn't eat much, fine, but then don't let her fill up on junk/ sweets in between.

I would also say that if you are truly worried, maybe you could give her a multi vitamin tablet each day just for peace of mind.

It is a very common concern with small children and rest assured that they mainly grow out of it, especially when it is not made into a big issue.

And your English is good, I would never have known it was your second language!

fsdss

drinking too much of whatever will supress the appetite

try making food more "playful" for her. i did this with a slightly older child recently, who had 'inherited' eating problems from mum, and it was successful.
we made pink soup (vegetable soup with a fresh beetroot wizzed in) with a dollop of cream to make it pinker., same with mashed potatoes

spinach in mashed pots to make it green etc. bright colours of vegetables were on the side and dressed the plate as a picture., sweet potatoes in mash were a hit too.

we made home made pizza with the child decorating it as a car using the veg.
rice can be coloured with veg (we found some purple carrots and also boiled them in the rice).

rhubarb stewed and sweetened with orange juice was a favourite with the younger ones and served with custard.

home made flap jacks, with raisins (or chopped nuts providing no allergies are there), home made muffins with veg in (courgettes, banana's, carrots) are usually devoured in our house and of course, allow them to help you make them.

if i think of any more i will re post

Becles

Could you let her help make her food - even if it's just stirring things or putting things in a bowl/pan for you. I've found mine eat more if they've helped to prepare things. My daughter is only two, but will stand on a chair and as I chop veg, she puts the pieces in the steamer basket and things like that.