Children that are allowed to eat/graze constantly?

mummyroysof3

Mine have 3 meals and maybe 1/2 snacks of a biscuit/fruit. Feel like I'm in and out of the kitchen all day without them eating more. I am sure they eat enough though.

peachyprice

pigpen wrote: »

gingin.. none of them have sugar on cereal, they never have. Apparently according to my 86 y/o gran I am depriving them lol.

Mine neither, sugar on cereal was never presented to them as an option, what they've never had they don't miss.

JemmaM91

I feel like I'm starving my son now lol

He is 15 months and all he will eat for breakfast is either 1/2 a bowl of porridge (if that) or a slice of toast.

I've tried giving him lunch around midday but he won't have none of it

And for dinner he'll have 1/2 a jar of baby food. Half a small bowl of what we're having or on the odd occasion fish fingers/chicken nuggets and smilies (the only meals he will actually finish )

For snacks he'll eat maybe 1/2 a biscuit, he won't touch fruit.

He drinks around 3-6 bottles of milk a day.

I just can't get him to eat. Although he is quite chubby (91st centile).

I think I have the opposite problem to everyone else/

Dinosaur_Train

I meant to say thank you everyone for your replies; it's been a really interesting thread hearing everyone's different opinions and how you work mealtimes/snacktimes in your family.

notanewuser

JemmaM91 wrote: »

I feel like I'm starving my son now lol

He is 15 months and all he will eat for breakfast is either 1/2 a bowl of porridge (if that) or a slice of toast.

I've tried giving him lunch around midday but he won't have none of it

And for dinner he'll have 1/2 a jar of baby food. Half a small bowl of what we're having or on the odd occasion fish fingers/chicken nuggets and smilies (the only meals he will actually finish )

For snacks he'll eat maybe 1/2 a biscuit, he won't touch fruit.

He drinks around 3-6 bottles of milk a day.

I just can't get him to eat. Although he is quite chubby (91st centile).

I think I have the opposite problem to everyone else/

I recommend you read "My Child Won't Eat". Toddlers need far less food than you think they do, they won't always want to eat or eat what you give them. But as long as he's not lacking in energy you've not got much to worry about.

DD has never had jarred food - she has eaten what we've eaten from 6 months on. I've never given her smilies or chicken nuggets.

But with 3-6 bottles of milk a day, your boy isn't going to want much in the way of food! I never limited DD's, but I never expect her to eat much if she's ploughing through milk!

valk_scot

JemmaM91 wrote: »

I feel like I'm starving my son now lol

He is 15 months and all he will eat for breakfast is either 1/2 a bowl of porridge (if that) or a slice of toast.

I've tried giving him lunch around midday but he won't have none of it

And for dinner he'll have 1/2 a jar of baby food. Half a small bowl of what we're having or on the odd occasion fish fingers/chicken nuggets and smilies (the only meals he will actually finish )

For snacks he'll eat maybe 1/2 a biscuit, he won't touch fruit.

He drinks around 3-6 bottles of milk a day.

I just can't get him to eat. Although he is quite chubby (91st centile).

I think I have the opposite problem to everyone else/

Might be the milk that's filling him up so he's not hungry? I vaguelly recall something about this in my NHS baby book, the suggestion was to only or mostly give milk after a meal so the child is hungry for the solid foods. Kids can get hooked on milk and less keen to try or eat other things but as they get older they need to eat a wider variety of foods to get the right amounts of vitamins, minerals and especially iron. I might be a bit out of date (youngest is 11!) of course but if you're in with your Health Visitor for a checkup, it might be worth mentioning.

Mrs_Imp

JemmaM91 wrote: »

I feel like I'm starving my son now lol

He is 15 months and all he will eat for breakfast is either 1/2 a bowl of porridge (if that) or a slice of toast.

I've tried giving him lunch around midday but he won't have none of it

And for dinner he'll have 1/2 a jar of baby food. Half a small bowl of what we're having or on the odd occasion fish fingers/chicken nuggets and smilies (the only meals he will actually finish )

For snacks he'll eat maybe 1/2 a biscuit, he won't touch fruit.

He drinks around 3-6 bottles of milk a day.

I just can't get him to eat. Although he is quite chubby (91st centile).

I think I have the opposite problem to everyone else/

Have you been borrowing my son??

Don't worry too much about the fruit - some people don't like the texture of any fruit. I know several. We always give him the option of fruit, and he'll pick it up and say 'yum yum yum' but he won't eat it.

We just try not to force the issue. He'll decide in his own time, and in the meantime we're keeping mealtimes relaxed.

Gillyx

Agree, that's a lot of milk for a 15 month toddler. Offer milk after food I'd say to get him used to the idea that food is filling. Also with the stuff he doesn't like, try and put it on the plate with 2/3 things he does like, and keep putting it there, if you don't make an issue of it he may just try it one day

My child won't eat is a fascinating book, I was recommended it by another MSE mummy and it really helped me through a bad patch with food and almost the minute I relaxed and offered more variety he really seemed to pick up again.

With fruit, my LO isn't keen on apples/bananas/oranges. He much prefers mango, pineapple, melon, berries.

I.e the chicken nuggets etc, we had chicken goujons tonight, I covered the chicken in crushed cornflakes, with some garlic salt and onion salt mixed in and a teeny bit of cayenne pepper. He loves them and I know they're all chicken with nothing added. We had home made wedges and stir fried veg with it.

Lola888

That is a lot of milk, my LO is 13 mths and she will be breastfed in the morning and has an 8oz bottle in the evening. She's usually have some cheese or yogurt or some sort of dairy in her food. She'll usually have 1 slice of toast and some fruit for breakfast or a pancake with fruit, some of my breakfast cereal as she likes to scavenge!

Lunch will be pasta/potato/rice based with yogurt or fruit. She is usually offered a biscuit or something for a snack like a packet of raisins or some more fruit. If I eat at a separate time she'll come and steal a bit. She has access to a drinks bottle all day long which she can swig from whenever she wants. I occasionally give her some cake or chocolate, but only a few chocolate buttons or a few mouthfuls of cake. There are days when I think she is a bottomless pit though and she will eat and eat.

She loves pretty much anything, but her favourite are small items like raisins, peas, sweetcorn. She will systematically eat every pea on the plate before she moves on to the "real" food!

Purleygirl

Crikey 250 quid per week on food for a family of six, that's unreal! Too much sugar even if it's from fruit, is not good for you, dried fruit is loaded with sugar. There's six in my family, my kids are teenagers/twenties, I spend approximately 90 euro a week on food, about 76 sterling. That's it, we can't spend any more, it's tough but we manage and everything has to be cooked from scratch. I can't dictate to my kids now what they can or cannot snack on, but as we have no processed food, snacking would be a piece of fruit, carrots and dips, cheese and crackers, or toast. The choice is limited for us. I think letting kids graze creates problems for the future in terms of their health, plus it's so much easier to eat one meal, at the table.