oh another eating thread

[jennyh]

Hi

We have a 16 month old who is an ok eater but doesn't eat a lot and has always been a bit difficult, lets just say not a natural eater. She often throws wobblies, there are lots of things she wont eat etc, nothing new there I am sure. The issue I am having is that I fell into a trap of using lots of distraction methods to get her to eat when she was weaning as I (wrongly in my opinion) worried too much about quantities etc. Given my time again I would do things a little differently but my current dilemma is that I worry she doesn't engage with her food and mealtimes and want her to learn abuot her foods as she is at a very inquisitive age.

She sits at the table and I usually sit with her although rarely eat myself other than a few bites here and there to encourage her. She has always had toys to play with, drawing, tv on (lots of demands for 'choo choos' every mealtime and food has been secondary to the other activities around her. She will often take cutlery and play with the food, try and feed herself etc and she will feed herself fruit/pasta/finger foods etc using her hands but she gets bored after a couple of minutes and then wants to do something else and either I am lucky and she opens her mouth to me feeding her or she clamps shut and refuses to eat anything and gets frustrated. Then after the meal she often makes demands for snacks and breadsticks etc so I know she didnt eat enough.

i really want her to start enjoying her meals and making enthusiastic noises when she has things she likes. She does love fruit and will often ask for pears,apricots and raisins and eats them with lots of excitement but savoury is always more of a drama and really I just feel sad that she can't be bothered to look at the food or investigate it. I have always encouraged her to feel all her food, and try to feed herself most things but she is so used to doing all the other activities that she has very little interest.

Any tips on what to do?? I have tried to stop giving her the toys/turn off the tv etc but she gets so irritated after a few minutes at the table that she is trying to escape the chair and throwing a tantrum and so the mealtime is over before its begun. I wander if anyone has come across some sort of ingenious plate or something that has fun pictures or something that encourages them to eat the food to look behind etc? She is quite bright for her age and is very good at imaginative play, she spends ages playing 'house' with her teddies etc and can articulate herself very well with words so I hope that maybe I can actually try some sort of tactic to teach her about how food can be fun without just throwing it around and eating nothing (as we have had with most foods when given to explore).

Also tips for good foods to engage them a bit more? She has got molars and is good at chewing most things but I tend to usually spoon feed her things like chunky veggie pasta, risottos, eggs and beans, mild curries etc. She gets bored feeding herself after 2 mouthfuls and then goes hungry filling up on rice cakes an hour later.

Oh wise forumites, please advise!

[Fuschia]

I would give both of you a break from having major expectations of dinner time.

Plan instead for 3-4 snacks between breakfast and bed time, and package them up in an interesting way. Have a teddy bears picnic. Try her with some cucumber sticks, mini sausages, grated cheese wtc on some toy plates, with her teddy.

Lay out some foods in little bowls near where she is playing for her to try

Hand her a sandwich when sheet into the buggy to leave the park

That sort of thing

[jennyh]

Thats a good idea, I suppose because she goes to nursery 3 days a week I got bogged down in thinking she had to be more routined and eat when they eat and she did seem to naturally fall into a breakfast/lunch/tea structure and is generally hungry at those times. She is a very good eater at nursery and I imagine this is down to being around all the others. I will try and eat something with her as well and make more of an effort to show her food is nice and fun etc. I think I have just been lazy!

To be honest I do beat myself up a bit because I feel like I was always too militant about food and got quite worked up and obviously she will take that anxiety from me. Just want her to have a good relationship with food and so will definitely give us both a bit of a break. She's no tiny thing so it wont hurt her to lead us a bit with what she wants and if she eats less. I will try your ideas for sure, I did actually bring her dolly to the table a couple of times and we took turns in feeding the dolly and each other, we both seemed to enjoy that.

[Fuschia]

Many toddlers are really fussy, but the human race hasn't died out yet! The whole cooking/feeding thing is a bit of a microcosm of parenting I think... So much bound up in the whole process but at the end of the day, you can only offer the food, not force her to eat it.

Good luck!

[GCOakley]

I read a wonderful book called My Child Won't Eat by Carlos Gonzalez, which was really interesting on unpacking some of the psychology around parenting and mealtimes. It was a bit more for parents who are worried about the amount of food their child eats rather than how they engage with their food, but it had some good advice for how to make mealtimes a lot less stressful. He does suggest trying to eat together, even if not every day, just so kids can see you enjoying your food. Basically, as Fuchsia says, a fussy toddler doesn't mean a fussy girl or woman later on, so best to take a deep breath and try and relax around mealtimes.

i found a link to the book in case it's useful for you http://www.amazon.com/My-Child-Wont-Eat-International/dp/0912500999

happy eating!

[Fuschia]

This is quite good

http://www.askdrsears.com/topics/feeding-infants-toddlers/feeding-picky-eater-17-tips

[jennyh]

Thank you both, great links and suggestions. I am going to start tomorrow afresh and see where it takes us! will also get a teddy cookie cutter for sandwiches as it is one of her favourite words!

[dillydale]

My eldest (4.5 year old) is a mega picky eater...and always has been since he was weaned. I beat myself up about it for years. He was also at a childminder from he was 9 months old...and she couldn't do anything with him either. My 2nd child (who is 16 months old), eats everything and anything. And I haven't done anything differently with either of them.

I love the comment from Fuschia about the microcosm of parenting...it's so true, people are getting obsessed with things like this. I have friends that have told me the only reason my 2nd child eats better is because I am more relaxed about it 2nd time round. This is a load of crap (basically). If anything, I had way more reason to be anxious about the 2nd child as he has a health issue and I watched him v carefully.

Truth is (and purely from my own experience..i can't speak for others), i think our children are who they are. Some are good eaters, some are bad. Some are good sleepers, some are bad.

On the upside, my eldest child now eats a whole range of stuff that he wouldn't do before. He's still a scrawny wee thing, but he eats relatively well now.

To sum up, I think if they're hungry they will eat. Healthy Ssnacks are a good idea if you can't get them to eat with you at mealtimes. Eventuallly your child will come round to eating better as time goes on.

For the record, none of the gadgets worked for me. I have the smiley face plate, all sorts of utensils, the lot. Just didn't work for me.

What I did notice though (when he was about 3 yr old), he was eating things at friends houses that he wouldn't normally eat for me. I realised that some of his issues were a psychological thing with food...and moreso, where i was involved...almost like he had one over on me. That is basically about the same time I started relaxing about it all.

hope this helps ...I feel your pain.

[bobby's bear]

Whenever possible I will eat with my 22 month old and eat the same as her (we went down the baby led weaning route which I found really positive) and I find when she sees me eating she is much more inclined to get on with it. I am also happy to let her take food from my plate which seems much more exciting for her than eating her own (identical) food sometimes. I also find with me eating I am then getting on with my own dinner and not watching every mouthful she puts in her mouth and putting the pressure on. I tend also to try and be relaxed about how much she eats on the assumption she wont starve herself to death and tend to say things like 'not hungry today, that's ok lets get down' instead of offering her umpteen other things to try or trying to coax her to eat.

All that said I suspect I am just lucky to have a pretty good eater most of the time and very little to do with me!!

[Saffron]

jennyh Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Hi

>

> We have a 16 month old who is an ok eater but

> doesn't eat a lot and has always been a bit

> difficult, lets just say not a natural eater. She

> often throws wobblies, there are lots of things

> she wont eat etc, nothing new there I am sure.

> The issue I am having is that I fell into a trap

> of using lots of distraction methods to get her to

> eat when she was weaning as I (wrongly in my

> opinion) worried too much about quantities etc.

> Given my time again I would do things a little

> differently...

Really, really, don't rethink the past too much! In hindsight we often find ourselves saying we would have done things differently, but the truth I suspect is that you were doing damn fine job in a difficult situation!

> but my current dilemma is that I worry

> she doesn't engage with her food and mealtimes and

> want her to learn abuot her foods as she is at a

> very inquisitive age.

>

> She sits at the table and I usually sit with her

> although rarely eat myself other than a few bites

> here and there to encourage her. She has always

> had toys to play with, drawing, tv on (lots of

> demands for 'choo choos' every mealtime and food

> has been secondary to the other activities around

> her. She will often take cutlery and play with

> the food, try and feed herself etc and she will

> feed herself fruit/pasta/finger foods etc using

> her hands but she gets bored after a couple of

> minutes and then wants to do something else

Hey, a couple of minutes is brilliant. :) Sometimes food issues are more about perspective than about the actual food. One thing I've noticed about the parents of fussy eaters vs non-fussy eaters, is that the parents of non-fussy eaters often aren't phased even when their little ones do have a fuss. So on the whole, some of the non-fussy children I know can be fairly picky and fickle about food, but their parents just don't let it get to them.

Easier said than done, I know! Personally, we've had some days where Little Saff would only eat pate on toast, and other days where she'd only eat olives and oranges.

> and

> either I am lucky and she opens her mouth to me

> feeding her or she clamps shut and refuses to eat

> anything and gets frustrated.

As suggested by a very enlightened friend of mine... try giving her the spoon to feed you sometimes. Then take turns feeding each other. It's novel for her, and it helps you gain an understanding of her world.

> Then after the meal

> she often makes demands for snacks and breadsticks

> etc so I know she didnt eat enough.

Ah well, nevermind. I have the distinct impression that lots of children do this. As long as the snacks you're offering after meals are of decent quality it really doesn't matter. 16 months is still very young. There's plenty of time to grow into a 3 course meal with soup spoons and linen napkins.

I dispair of ever teaching any table manners around here. Seems Hubbie is always starting w/o me, then jumping up to watch football before I've finished. So of course Little Saff thinks she can jump down anytime too. Husband's manners at his mum's house are great. However, I caught him at our home table telling off our 2.5 yr old to use her spoon instead of her hands... all this while Hubbie's elbows were both on the table and his mouth full. Sob.

For what it's worth, I think you're doing a great job. xx

[jennyh]

Thanks Saffron, great advice and comment. I appreciate your message of goodwill! I think you are right that my attitude to her eating is definitely a big contributing factor. Yesterday we made more fun out of breakfast time and then at tea time I actually gave her a plate and sat down with my own plate and started eating, she looked at me like I was bonkers and waited for me to offer her some, after a minute or so she started to eat herself. Didn't last long but then was happier for me to pop bits into her mouth whilst she did her usual drawing! Will keep trying to keep an open mind about it all and see where we go.

Funny what you say about your OH, mine genuinely has no real interest or understanding of what our daughter eats or how. Occasionally he will do a mealtime but has never shown much thought in what she is having, making sure it is balanced, seeing if she actually eats it, does she get enough dairy etc. We probably balance each other out well! I have left the Picky Eater article open on the computer in case he decideds to take a look at it, won't hold my breath!

[mrs f]

I'm not being funny Jenny, but I've seen Bess' thighs..... that girl is a GOOD eater!

just give her some food and if she doesn't eat much that's OK... she has reserves!

she will soon start eating how much she needs without you feeding her

[jennyh]

Ha yeah I know Ali, just being picky as always! Wouldnt be parent if I wasn't over-thinking something though eh? And you've also seen her dad and his thighs...poor girl. I did think about Corwin & Bess' post paddling pool dinner at the weekend, I do sound a bit bonkers in retrospect but sometimes you can't help trying to improve something that requires no intervention at all! T

[MichelleT]

Second the recommendation of My Child Won't Eat.

[Sanne Panne]

Bit controversial in modern UK/American parenting maybe but if there's something my kids tell me they don't like that I know they happily eat elsewhere I will cook it at home, give them a small portion of it (together with something I know they love) and if they don't eat it I just tell them to stay at the table until they finish it. This is for things I know for sure they like but just refuse to eat at home. So far I've never had to do this more than twice with any single food and after that they have always gone on to happily eat that food any time and still feel completely free to tell me when they truly don't like something (e.g. when I serve a completely new food I will ask them to try one bite and if they don't like it they don't need to eat it and I won't be remotely grumpy about it). So it's not like I scare them into eating whatever I serve them.

I know, it's controversial but it seems to work for us. They love dinnertime and eat a big variety of foods. I think you can't start this before age 3 though. And if you have a very stubborn child it may be a bit of a time consuming exercise ;)