Toddler refusing to eat

Bitsy_Beans

Sorry if I shouldn't be posting this here but just wanted some advice.
My toddler who is 2.5 years old has started refusing to eat foods he happily had, mainly his cooked dinners. I thought at first it was just meat he'd gone off but he won't even eat mashed spuds with veg and gravy.
He has one mouthful and refuses to either spit it out or swallow it.
We don't make an issue about this as it would turn into a game with him but I just wondered if anyone had any tips or suggestions on how to get him to eat this again as I am wasting a great deal of food and I hate sending him to bed on an empty stomach.
My H wants to try bargaining with him to get him to eat but I am not keen on going down that route, nor do I want to start offering him lots of alternatives.

Hope this is a short phase he's going through :eek:

bravobeastie

Its a phase

My daughter (now 7) went through it and caused me no end of stress and worry, and my son (almost 4) is still doing it lol

No child will starve itself so he'll eat soon enough. Maybe try giving him his main meal at lunchtime?

Does he drink much milk as this can also 'feed' him.

Don't make a fuss if he won't eat, offer him smaller portions and if he won't eat, just take it away and leave him. By making a fuss you are giving him attention.

Lol, i'm an expert on fussy eating kids

grade15

you try eating some of it in front of ur toddler and say..mmm very nice..

Bitsy_Beans

He only has a drink of milk at bed time. He doesn't drink it during the day so at least I know it's not that filling him up!

I am going to try switching round his meal times. At least if he refuses lunchtime he won't be going to bed on an empty stomach as what he would have lunchtime I know he eats.

Bitsy_Beans

grade15 wrote: »

you try eating some of it in front of ur toddler and say..mmm very nice..

Yep we do this already - has no effect
We try and eat together as much as possible and talk about how nice the food is etc.

System

as said before its a phase just try not to turn it into a battle of wills, let him play with his food make funny faces etc ,he ll soon come around.

hobo28

As others have said, at his age he will not let himself starve. Making an issue out of it will also be counterproductive.

My advice would be to just put the meal down and eat it as normal. Don't make special mention of the food over and above whats normal. Don't make a fuss if he doesn't eat it. Once you've all finished, ask him a couple of times if he's finished because you'll clear up if he has then bin it.

But also ensure between meals he's not having snack, sweets, crisps etc. No thick drinks like milkshakes. The idea is that he will be hungry at mealtimes. Certainly no dessert of snacks after if he hasn't cleared his plate.

Above all, don't worry. The more you make it into an issue, the more it will become one and the harder it is to overcome as he grows. Kids are observant and will tap into your fears very quickly and use it against you!

morganb

As above; with DS1 he became V. fussy and yes, I did turn it into a battle. However, DS2 gets his dinner; if he doesn't eat it, he doesn't get anything else, DS1 is now a model eater and turns round and says 'tough if you don't want it, that's all you're getting, this isn't a hotel' to DS2 ... wonder where he heard that ...

I do totally understand where you're coming from, though, as our basic instinct is to nurture our children and this means making sure they're eating their meals ... but he wont' starve!!

Ishtar

We're still going through this phase with my three-year old. It's quite worrying, but she seems to be thriving, so we are sure she must be getting enough to eat.

Some days she'll eat everything, other days she seems to survive on breadsticks and not much else! We are also trying not to make an issue out of it, but it's really difficult given her past weight issues - for no apparent reason she lost a lot of weight and dropped two centiles when she was 6 months old (health visitor seriously thought I was starving her :mad:).

Recently we assessed her day to day diet and found that a few extra snacks had crept in...once we stopped these she (briefly!) started eating more at meal times. What does seem to work is telling her there will be no more food until the next mealtime unless she eats up - don't quite know why, but it could be that she likes her mid morning/afternoon snack.

D.

mrcow

My two year old went through this - the wasted time and food drove me nuts!

In the end, I stopped making a deal out of it. He got one meal, (nothing that had taken me loads of time to cook I hasten to add!) and if he didn't eat it, I scraped it in the bin and he got down from the table.

He never did starve to death, and now, at the age of six he eats absolutely anything he's given.

I gave him frozen veg, so there was no long preparation and it was all boiled up in the same saucepan. I also bought some ready made fresh mash so I didn't even have to mash it. I figured that if he's going to turn his nose up, at least I haven't slaved over it lol Omelettes were great as they only took a couple of minutes and I stuck veg etc in them.

The phase didn't last long, but I do know parents who have indulged their kids with this type of thing, and they are still having problems years later.

geekgirl

I once knew a woman who had 7 children and she used to make 5 different dinners a night. This carried on till they were adults, they stayed at home a lot longer than most of the people I knew, I wonder why????

Kids will not starve themselves. Just make sure all of the food offered is good stuff and not sugary or too fatty and anything they do eat will do them good. Also as others have said offer dinner and if they don't eat it leave it at that.