My 18 month old won't eat? AIBU to be concerned?

[thatmakesmehappy]

My 18 month old boy has always been hard work when it came to eating. We started him out trying puréed veg and fruit, which made him gag. Then we tried finger foods, which he tried tiny bits of but never really ate much. He gradually tried a few more bits, but was a very slow process, and even then we had to hide fruit and veg in smoothies or mash it in with potato! We got to about a year old and he was finally eating bits of small meals.
After a spell of eating really well (just having whatever we had) at 18 months he has now decided he doesn't want anything but cheese and fromage frais.
Meal times have now become a distressing experience for all of us and we are concerned about how little he really is eating.
We offer all sorts of foods! Fruit, veg, fish, meat, pasta, potato, rice, bread...the list goes on! Homemade, ready meals, and even things that were his favourites like fish fingers and mashed potato are being rejected.

At first it seemed to be an independence thing, and he ate a bit more when we let him feed himself, but now we give him the meal and his cutlery (and help where necessary) he just flings it around.

If we were to bring out biscuits or cake or chocolate, he'd be all over it, but put a meal in front of him, and he'd rather just play with it and cry until we let him down.

We've always eaten together at a table, so it's nothing to do with the high chair and him not liking it, as we've never done different.

Family and friends tell us that 'a healthy child won't starve themselves' and that we should withhold the things he actually wants until he accepts the meals, but AIBU to be concerned that he really won't eat a thing? Anyone else experienced this?

How are you reacting when he wont eat?

We started out by trying to get him to try stuff, and making a massive positive fuss over him taking a mouthful, but that stopped working. So now we just ignore it. Leave him with the plate of food until we finish eating and then take it away if he's not eating/crying.

Sounds like my ds at that age. I resolved to cover up his untouched meal and as soon as he said anything regarding hunger that plate with food came out again. If he rejected it went back to its cover without a fuss until he asked again. He was only presented with this food until he gave in, think he only ever went to bed hungry one night, he has never done that again. We did this for awhile, maybe a month or two to break this developing bad habit. Years later he knows he has try food before deciding if he likes it or not and often has to try more then once. Dh is super picky with foods so I am nipping this in the bud one food group at a time.

Did you start that straight away Shifty or was he older? DH and I eat a very varied diet, and DS sees us eating all manner of fruits, veg etc. We're completely out of our depth here and just haven't a clue what to try next.

I'd remove cutlery as he maybe associates it with undesirable foods and just completely remove the biscuits, cake and chocolate.

Put a selection of food on his plate and he will help himself.

You just need to carry on doing what you're doing. No pressure. Provide the food and let him decide whether to eat it or leave it.

Still provide the sweet as well as the savoury but obviously don't increase the quantities to compensate for him not eating savoury.

Don't talk about the food - just carry on having nice sociable, relaxed mealtimes.

You could serve the food in serving dishes and let him choose what goes on his plate. Don't offer, wait for him to ask.

The only other thing to try is letting him play with food when you're preparing it. The more he gets used to the texture and the smell, the easier it will be for him to choose to put it in his mouth.

This is normal and will pass if you can continue to leave him to it. If you cajole, reward, etc, it is likely to go on for a lot longer.

Have you attempted letting him eat off your plate/handing him bits you're eating if he shows an interest?

Worth a bash, my (uneducated/ignorant/baseless) theory is babies and toddlers have a well honed self preservation instinct and some kids struggle with the responsibility of their own food iykwim?

Plus don't forget his stomach is still small he may just not have a massive appetite. Is he still drinking regular milk?

disclaimer - this self preservation instinct does not extend to flinging themselves into danger at every other opportunity

Forgot to add - I noticed a definite drop in dd's enthusiasm and appetite around the same age. They start to slow down in growth so it makes sense his appetite might have wained a bit.

I dont think it's uncommon for young children to go through this, its currently an ongoing battle for my SIL. It helps not to put pressure on the child, and dont make a big deal if they don't eat. Just keep offering a variety of food, apparently offering small poryions can help. Making food available throughout the day can apparently help as well as the child can graze when they feel like it

DD has always been a picky eater (and didn't want to wean at all), so I've been there.

Is his weight OK? If it's OK, then present him with a range of things (at least some of which he's eaten before) and leave him to it.

If his weight gives cause for concern, then you need to look at alternatives (e.g. a lot of cheese!),

You sound like you're handling this much better than we did - for what it's worth, when DD went to nursery (age 3) we asked them to just give her the food other children have. To start with she simply went hungry (we were collecting her at 1, so not a full day); by the end she'd eat some of most meals (e.g. just the rice if the meat had sauce on it). So some children will starve themselves.

Thanks everyone, will give the suggestions a go! Anything is worth a try.

We haven't tried putting the food in serving dishes and letting him chooses. He's really independent so would probably love that!

Will also try letting him pick from our plates, as we've just always let him have his own.

He has a cup of cows milk at breakfast, although at the min he's favouring smoothies over cows milk, but always has 1 9oz bottle of formula milk a day at bedtime. Otherwise he has water.

Sheepy his weight has always been borderline as he's super tall for his age, but I don't think he's losing weight in comparison to his height, iyswim? He's just constantly growing and in 3-4 clothing at the min even though he's 18 months!

On the plus side, with the amount of calcium he's consuming, he'll have mega strong bones

My son went through a stage of eating nothing but tortilla wraps with honey. He's a bit better now, but in times of stress will revert back to 'safe' food. Just always make sure that he has something on the table that you know he'll eat, and let him choose what he wants. My son would starve rather than eat food he didn't like - the old "they'll eat when they're hungry enough" just isn't true.

He was around your sons age, we never made a fuss and just kept it easy for him, small selection on the plate, small amounts and all separated as he was very aware if the food was touching each other. He is eating like a starved wolf these days, so is the opposite of what he was. The idea is to eat the food served, this is the food we are eating and he did not need to eat everything. If he liked something more he could have more of that if he tried something he wasn't certain of one the plate. Just trail and error really with patience 😉

My son is 21 months. Between 18 and 20 months he berely ate anything. Breakfast cereal was always popular and potatoes. Not much else. I just took the food away and didn't make a fuss. I also stoped giving him unhealthy snacks, if he asked for a snack I gave him fruit, About 3 weeks ago his eating started to really improved he now eats most things (veg is still a bit touch and go) I think it's just a phase.

DD drank a lot (and I mean a LOT) of milk, so her weight was always OK. As it was toddler formula, we were able to get lots of vitamins in, so I didn't need to worry about nutrients. She should also have super strong bones. However because she'd struggled so much with weaning, I wasn't willing to push hard. Plus she'd never eaten at all well to start with - her food diary at 15 months records that in a typical day she ate 4 cheerios and 1/4 of a cracker, and that represented an improvement on a couple of months earlier...

Thanks everyone! I feel a bit more reassured that it's not something we did to start this off. When things don't quite go right you overthink everything and then worry 😂 typical first time parent feeling!

Your job is to provide healthy food. His job is to choose what & how much to eat.

I'm sure you've heard it before, but diet matters over a week not a day. If you really write down everything he eats over the course of a week, he's probably getting most of what he needs (you mention smoothies, so fruit etc).

Try to relax, apply no pressure, continue serving what you would but make sure each meal has easy components he can choose to try or not e.g. Pasta Bolognese with grated cheese, served with salad, can come in many "parts" so he can choose plain pasta with cheese and a bit of cucumber, for instance. Most family meals can be served this way.

What's important is not to panic and serve only the yoghurts/fromage frais etc because you're worried about his nutrition. Letting them fill up on what they consider "safe" to the exclusion of everything else is how problems begin. Just keep offering and try not to worry (easier said than done I know, but it's important not to stress over meals).