Parents of toddlers with eating disorders...

Oh zombie thread sorry

The fussy eater dc I know through friends and family turned out to have food allergies and intolerance- I am also relatively fussy and have ibs - I would test for food allergies etc

Hi is there any update please ?

@OR101 hi I know this is a very very old post but do you have an update on your little one?

Thanks for the link @Sirzy- these look like so much fun. I'll definitely be trying these.

For the sensory side of things sensory bags (www.thechaosandtheclutter.com/sensory-bags) can help because they get used to touching the textures without the mess side.

Ps. Must add, mine hates messy play and having his teeth brushed (I have to almost sit on him to brush his teeth) so I'm assuming it's a sensory issue in our case.

Thanks for starting this thread OP- I've been thinking it's just me who's been struggling and hating mealtimes with my 2 year old. I hate, hate sitting with him and trying to get something in his mouth- it can take almost an hour to get mine to eat a slice of toast. He's recently started storing food in his mouth without swallowing- something called pocketing which is driving me insane.

Mine isn't just going through a phase, sadly. He resisted food/new flavours as a baby too and just didn't show any interest in food. I hate to force food in his mouth which I feel bad about but if I hadn't, he wouldn't have eaten anything. I used to dream of having a baby who'd happily and willingly open his mouth when being fed. We exist on a restricted diet of a few key foods and mine refuses to try fruit, vegetable or chicken. He'll have anything that's wet and thick (pasta in tomato sauce) and yoghurt but only if I feed him. I come from a culture where mums feed the children so I'm lost between doing that and teaching him independent eating skills. Following this thread closely for ideas.

One of my daughter's is a selective eater. She was terrible as a toddler but we have fatally increased what she eats although still restrictive. I'd say try not to put any pressure on. Give safe foods but also our other foods alongside, this increases their familiarity and makes it more likely they will try it.

My eldest at 2 would eat any fruit, yogurt and only one type of jarred pasta, no "real" foid. No sensory concerns etc I have to admit at my wits end I only offered them these foods but made myself nice smelling/colourful dinners. We are together and eventually curiosity got the better of them and the asked for my food, I took their bowl of jarred food away and gave them a bowl of what I was eating. It took a long time and was pretty wasteful but they eat most things now. I don't think there's a simple answer though, give a few different tactics a proper go and hopefully you will get there x

I’ve just seen the rest of your thread, I’m so sorry, it’s so hard isn’t it.

This is a marathon, not a sprint(as you’ve gathered by now).Until you have clear guidance, please do not think twice about doing whatever works for you and your family. Long term, whether you eat together, separately, standing on one leg is neither here nor there. As long as he is eating something, that’s all you can do. This is like worrying about what wallpaper to put up when you need to deal with the house subsiding. It’s nothing by comparison. Just. Let. It. Go. Your mental health will be better for it. As will his ..

All the other stuff you mention, the grubby hands etc. , this is so indicative of sensory overload/sensory differences, yes absolutely get cracking with a referral.

Glad the thread has helped, and keep posting if it helps.

Sadly there are no overnight quick fixes or easy answers but just having people listen and take you seriously helps massively. Hopefully the weigh in will be reassuring

The advice from @Gancanny is exactly the advice we had from our health visitor for our 2 year old who used food as control and became underweight.

Also to put out self serve food in bowls on the table rather than directly onto the plate. don't offer alternatives, after 30 min or so say dinner is over and take the food away.

Not to say a word about food during the meal and stay seated together. Be really strict with relatives too, my parents would stand behind her high chair and constantly fuss over her food, cutting thing up, asking if she wants more, saying how delicious it was, it was really stressful for DD and would ruin the meal.

Get them involved in food prep, even if they don't eat it themselves

Offer an extra "supper" of a food they will eat before bedtime (for us that was porridge, cereal, toast, rice pudding) so that she was getting the calories needed and also helped her body get used to larger portions of food

Took several months but eventually DD began to try more and more and eats regular amounts of food now. Now at 6 she is branching out to mild curries, halloumi, more veg.

It's so stressful when you're going through it, but hope this post gives you a bit of hope for the future that you will get through this

@Gancanny you have suggested everything that I was going to suggest and written it perfectly.

I'm a paediatric nurse and have worked with a lot of dieticians and children with food issues and this is everything that they recommended. You choose the food and offer it to eat and they choose if they eat it. No pressure, no just try this or getting them to try a little bit. No offering alternatives. This is the hardest one to stick to because you just want them to eat something. The more you push food onto a child the more they resist and food becomes a battle. You often have to offer a food up to 20 times before a child even tries it, so keep offering new foods alongside the safe foods that you know your child will eat. Also try not to let them go for more then 3hours without food and if they refuse the food let them know that there will be no more food until the next meal and then stick to it.
Also a toddlers energy intake needs are lower than a babies and so the amount they eat naturally drops around this age.

I hope this helps as it can be so stressful when they are picky and refuse to eat.

This sounds really tricky OP, I understand exactly why you are so worried and hopefully hearing some other's similar experiences has helped. I was going to suggest 'social feeding' (not sure if that's the proper terminology) as in my experience teaching really small children, they often eat more varied foods when they see other children eating it too. But I see that you've tried that at nursery and it hasn't helped.

You sound like you're doing a great job and FWIW I would do exactly the same thing as you in your position, it sounds like you need support from a dietician etc.

Perhaps as he won't eat lunch, you could try leaving a little plate of picky foods out including his wotsits and maybe one or two other similar things that he could just wander up to and munch if he wanted? Perhaps just dry toast or something really bland at first. I'm just wondering if he can slowly become familiar with the look of different foods without having it so close to him in his highchair that it feels overwhelming, he might eventually want to try?

I don't know, Pineapple. I just didn't read the comment made by theboldtype deserves so much hatred.

I can go the other way, I can say what she says is bollocks from my own experience. But does that help anyone but to make her feel bad? She never said she force the food until it was eaten, even it started to get mouldy like some pp said their parents did.

Tbh, I don't know what parents with children with no specific issue goes through. Mine is different from yours. since it involves multiple food allergies. So I think her sharing of her own experience is valid, since we don't know if the OP's dc has any other issue which is causing the food issues. We can only speak from our own experience, what worked for my ds may not work for someone else, but I think there's nothing wrong in sharing my experience.

Pastandpresent. Some things are parental choice. But only reoffering the same meal repeatedly, allowing a small child to go to bed hungry and then the next morning not even allowing a banana when they are hungry is actually wrong. Sometimes a parent feels their need to "win" is more important than developing a childs healthy relationship with food. Its not that she probably meant to be cruel, but it is cruel. Theres tons of information she can look to if she wants to.

It would be like wandering into a thread about noisy children and saying "I just tape up their mouths" or I dont let them eat if they're noisy... or course these things might work but its wrong not to point out on a thread that these are not good things to do to chidlren...

I have a very fussy 5 year old who has been like that since around the same age as yours. He has sensory difficulties with different textures and it's not something he can control. He's been slowly accepting new things into his diet but it's still very limited. Along with seeing your GP I might recommend seeing an occupational therapist as well. It's really hard and I empathise x

The best thing that can happen from these thread is, that people can understand some methods works for their children, and maybe not for others with more complex issues.

It's easy to blame someone who are only sharing their own experience that worked for their children as horrible, just because it won't work with yours.

Yes my ds has issue, and if someone said what I am doing is wrong according to what has worked for them, I would argue. But if someone has simply shared their experience, I can say it won't work for my child, but not to the extent that you won't even do it to your dog. Why need to go to that extreme nastiness?

Most of people are only trying to help. And I can totally see that theboldtype was only trying to help. She wasn't unpleasant at all either. I really wish people stop tormenting her.

@OR101 I've read all of your posts but had to stop reading rest of the thread as the cruelty of feeding a child the same reheated meal repeatedly is just upsetting. Please don't take that advice. I saw a Dietitian for my 3 year old with severely restricted eating & the Dietitian would absolutely not recommend that approach. . My daughter eats dry food only, and beige mostly. Eg breakfast= dry rice krispies, or dry toast, no butter. Lunch/dinner= dry cooked pasta, dry cooked rice etc. I get fruit/veg into her via smoothies. I also freeze those smoothies to make ice pops. The Dietitian recommended to give her what I know she will eat, and put a little of something else on the plate too. Don't mention it, no pressure, just have it available. It has taken over 6 months but she is gradually eating more e.g. yesterday she ate a piece of cheese with her toast, and the day before a piece of apple.
It's exhausting and worrying and I feel for you. I would suggest a Dietitian visit. Consider also what others said about Autism as a possible factor- my daughter shows a lot of traits of high functioning ASD. I haven't sought diagnosis as yet, but Ive worked in the field so would have done level of knowledge.

@theboldtype wow, I wouldnt do that to my dog.

@OR101 that sounds really hard but it's great that you're trying your best and working on it. I agree you should speak to HV for a referral, and the book Getting the Little Blighters to Eat is really good (although it does seem like it may be more than fussiness, the techniques in the book may still help) My dsd is 10 and eats 4 things on repeat - battered chicken nuggets but never breaded, Birds Eye fish fingers, skinny chips and chocolate cereal without milk. Her mum refuses to accept its an issue so there isn't an awful lot her dad can do at this point (we're supposed to have her EOW but she often refuses to come). Its so sad and shes a very unhealthy child - catches every cold going and extremely unfit. I cant help but feel this could have been fixed when she was younger, but wouldn't know where to start now