Managing mealtimes when one child eats REALLY slowly

[Bubbinsmakesthree]

DCs are 5 and 2. The 2 year old inhales his food. 5 year old will sit staring at his plate for half an hour. 2 year old won’t stay at the table that long, 5 year old loses all focus on dinner if 2 year old has got down to play. 2 year old is demanding pudding and 5 year old hasn’t even started eating.

The whole thing drives me mad. How do you handle a slow eater?

I've done so many different things to deal with this.

First thing is that no one else waits for the slow eater. They get pudding, clear away plates, wash/dry up, and go off and do their thing.

When the slow eater was very young we'd spoon feed him sometimes just to speed things up. There would be lots of aeroplanes flying in, trains choochooing in, etc.

As he got older we tried to get him to focus on eating mostly by reminding him, encouraging him. Again, no one else had to sit and wait with him.

The patience involved was huge. It was so frustrating.

Now he's 14 and he eats faster than anyone else.

He also has ADD, and I think his main problem when he was younger was that he was too distracted by everything to actually eat.

Reading this made me itch. DS3. (sigh). I had to ban him from conversing at the table just to make sure he ate. & nag him as we sat. He's got the hang of it now. One day he'll inhale his food like big teen brothers do.

Nothing, just leave them at the table to finish alone, don’t stress about it.

How big are his portions? I am a slow eater and I think some of it comes from being given too big portions. I think the behaviour became habitual so having a plate full of food when everyone was finished didn’t bother me because it was the case whether I ate or not! It sounds like he is used to being ‘the slow eater’.

Obviously I’m not saying you give too big portions but perhaps if you gave very small ones and just kept topping up? Get him used to clearing his plate. So he is ‘done’ at the same time as his brother because he’s had half the food.

Other tips would be to give him his ten minutes or so before his brother - rush two year old off to the loo or something. If the 5 year old has at least started then he may be more likely to eat at the same pace as his brother.

My eldest is a little like this - talks non stop. No snacks, small portions and keeping the conversation about the food seem to help.

We invested in a sand timer for our slow eater. 10 mins x2 and then dinner disappears. It didn't even take that long to change the behaviour and now it mostly just sits on the table looking pretty

I have 2 like this, both with SN so can't be left alone.

Mealtimes can easily last over an hour and I often lose the will to live.

I have this! Reading with interest!