DS is nearly 3 and ALWAYS hungry. He’s constantly looking for snacks or sitting up to the table to wait for his food (even if it’s not actually a mealtime).
He eats so much and I honestly have no idea if I’m over-feeding him or not.
I try to make sure his diet is fairly balanced and healthy but he has a massive appetite.
If we go to a party he makes a beeline for the snack table, and at the park he’s always there when his friend’s snacks come out.
I do make a lot of his snacks myself because it was costing a fortune and I also wanted to reduce how much salt and sugar he was having.
He’s very, very active (Walks/bikes/scoots everywhere. Does football, swimming and riding lessons every week. Spends a lot of time at the park running around with his friends and climbing).
He’s 98th percentile for height and 65th for weight so he isn’t overweight.
But he just eats so much and I don’t know whether to keep giving it to him or whether we need to cut back.
As an example, yesterday he ate:
Breakfast (7am): 1 slice of brown toast, 2 scrambled eggs. Pot of Greek yogurt with blueberries and a banana. Small cup of orange juice.
Snack (10am): 4 oatcakes with cream cheese, apple slices with peanut butter.
Lunch (12.30): Wholemeal pasta with bolognaise sauce.
Avocado, tomato, cucumber and mozzarella salad.
Satsuma.
Snack (3.30pm): Homemade banana, walnut and date cake.
Dinner (6pm): Salmon fillet, sweet potato wedges, broccolini, baby corn and mange tout.
Coconut milk chia pudding with mango and pineapple.
He drinks plenty of water throughout the day so I don’t think he’s thirsty.
He won’t drink any milk at all, so the only thing he has other than water is one small glass of juice/smoothie with breakfast.
It’s obviously hard to describe portion size, but it’s about enough to cover the bottom of child’s plastic plate from IKEA.
So AIBU to give him this much (and sometimes more if he wants it). I’m very aware that this is a lot of food for such a small child.