advice for mealtimes please.

[swift1]

Hi all,

my dd is 3 in Feb, and is on par with other children this age , she has good languauge skills etc.

The problem is mealtimes. She will sit up , have about 3 mouthfuls and then say shes had enough and will get down.

Im unsure the best way to deal with this. My goal is to get her to eat more , however above all I do not want mealtimes to become a stressful battleground so at the moment i just let her get down.

But am i doing the right thing. she is getting older now and i dont want her growing up thinking that its ok. Should i be using some sort of disciopline if she doesnt eat a sensivble amount? i have a freind who puts her son on the stair if he doesnt eat and that works really well with him.

Can anyone offer any advice. TIA

[NAB3]

I don't agree with the stair for not eating. My daughter is now 3 and for ages she hardly ate enough to keep a sparrow alive. I put a very small amount on her plate and if she said no when I aksed her to eat more I would try and coax her but to no avail. She would even go without pudding rather than eat more. Gradually I have introduced new foods and put slightly more on her plate. As she has started nursery and doing more things she has been eating more. I also ignore her when she said he has had enough. The boys then get their pudding, she asks for some and I just say she needs to eat a bit more and she can have pudding. All very calm and matter of fact. Generally works and she is eating a much more acceptable amount. I have to accept my boys eat more and she is all in proportion. She weighs nearly 2 1/2 stone.

[bexmumof3]

Hi, I have the same problem with my 2 year old she will eat about three mouthfulls and then say she is full or she doesn't like it. But when she goes to the childminder, she eats her out of house and home, it is very frustrating and hard not to get stressed especially when you are trying to feed the baby as well

[USAUKMum]

Is she getting grumpy later because she is hungry?? If she isn't maybe she is just going through a phase of not needing lots to eat.

My DS, 2.5 and DD,5, both go through times when they seem to eat not much.

But 3 bites at every meal is not a lot. If my DS does this, I just say fine go and play, but there is nothing to eat until the next meal. If it is during the week, I carry on eating my meal and half the time he'll come back and eat. During the weekend he doesn't tend to do it much as he knows DD will get dessert and he won't if he doesn't eat.

If he doesn't eat at snack time after school he is allowed a small snack of fruit. Then nothing until dinner time, which is our house is 6:30. And by then he usually chows it down.

As my DH is want to say, "you can lead a child to food, but you can't make them eat." Especially when is sees me going a shade of red

Keep it calm, keep down on snacks between meals.

If it is a recent thing have you thought it might be her last set of molars coming through? As it is about the right time and my DS goes off most food when teeth are moving about.

good luck

[swift1]

im not worried so much about the amount she is eating ,its just about manners really. Should she be allowed to get down and play whil we are all sat up having a meal together? She has an older b and sis and they don tget down.

Now i know she is young but if I dont enforce it now, then do I do it when shes older and has even worse tamper tantrums about it?

[NAB3]

I wonder about this too. I think the kids should all sit at the table until everyone has finished, but why? And who am I doing that for? They tend to finish around the same time but if not they are allowed to get down. We only eat together at weekends as my husband isn't home until 6.30 so the children eat on their own.

[bexmumof3]

My DD is just over two but knows exactly what she wants and when. She will go to my mums and only eat sausages and i find myself asking her what she wants to eat and wonder if it would be better to just make something and put it in front of her. But then I take the risk that she will say she doesn't like it and refuse it i don't seem to be able to crack this one

[curlew]

I try to compromise. The dinner refusenik can't get down immediatly they've had their half a teaspoon - they have to wait and chat in a civilized manner for five minutes or so, then they have to ask properly to get down. AND once down there's no coming back - even if it's a blue moon and there's a super special pudding. AND if the childen are eating alone together, the one that wants to leave the table has to ask the other one to be excused( (yes, I am very old and have very old fashioned manners!)

[swift1]

Curlwe, I agree with alot of your manners, thats how i like my house to be. I wouldnt expect my dd to sit and wait for everyone else as she is only 2, but wanting to get down after 2 minutes and run around and play isnt acceptable to me. But is she too young for me to do amything about it?

[curlew]

I think she is old enough to stay for a little while. How about asking her to tell you and her sibs something about her day? I do a "tell me one good thing and one bad thing that happened today" to my children and any visitors - it quite often starts a conversation they can all be interested in. This has the hidden benefit of helping them learn about social small talk as well!

[swift1]

Thanks curlew i will try that tonight.