To think my 4 year old is very messy

[Sweetashunni]

I know this is AIBU but posting for traffic, I’m really just trying to gage what a normal level of clumsy/mess is for a 4 year old.

DS has just turned 4 and the mess he makes at dinner is no better than when he was 18 months old. He holds his knife and fork loosely and drops them on the floor every single meal, usually twice. He waves them around and drops food everywhere. When he takes a mouthful he just shovels it in so it goes all down his front. Pushes food off the sides of his plate and onto the table. After making an unholy mess at dinner tonight he was having yoghurt for pudding, either lost his grip or kind of flung it (hard to describe) and it went all down my leg and on the dark carpet. After every meal I have to hoover and clean the floor as well as the chair - it’s that messy. It’s every single meal time, and I don’t just mean a few splodges on his top and table, I would expect that.

YABU - this is normal
YANBU - this isn’t normal

He’s my first. No special needs. Thanks

Funnily enough I was wondering the same thing tonight!

My 3 year old (in fairness turned 3 last week) is SO messy! He always needs changing after he's eaten, the table and floor probably see most of it and it's just a horrendous mess every time!

I have no idea how normal it is, I'm sure you'll get some people say it's completely normal and some people saying 'teAcH hIm hOw To EaT prOpErly'

No I don’t think this is normal. My 4.5 yr old has severe dcd, amongst other disabilities and even he can make 99% of his food from his plate to his mouth without spilling, or dropping any all over himself/floor.

My daughter is 4 September and evey meal is messy, she can make a mess of any meal!

For reference, my just turned 3 year old is no where near this messy. Usually all food stays on the plate, she can't use a knife but she can use a fork or spoon reliably. So today - She ate porridge this morning without spilling any down herself and there was one tiny splodge on the work surface when she had finished. She ate dinner tonight using her fork, all food stayed on the plate and she didn't spill any down herself. I didn't have to clean her chair or the floor. Something like spaghetti I would expect a bit of mess, or rice, but to be fair my DH might spill a bit of rice off his plate still

Any possibility he's hyper mobile OP? Alternatively Is he distracted at all, TV, tablets etc?

How would I know if he was? No distractions, we sit up to the table, no screens.

It sounds within the realms of normal to me but then both parents are regular sporters of ‘dinner medals’. 🤷‍♀️

it’s worth bringing up hypermobility or dyspraxia with his nursery/teachers and they can give you (most likely) a pretty experienced opinion and keep an eye out for any other evidence if either.

Other than that I think your immediate problems are best addressed by adjusting the environment he’s eating in to make clean up easier whilst he’s practising. There is a chance he’s just not bothered enough by the mess to try and be neater - word to the wise my dd positively relished cleaning up her own mess (doesn’t now mind) and it was in no way any sort of consequence!

It's quite hard to know when they are little to be fair but often low tone, poor core strength, double jointed, a little 'floppy'. As they get older poor handwriting, clumsy, fatigued.

One of mine was like this. They were later diagnosed with dyspraxia.

Does he go to nursery? Maybe ask them how his eating skills are there compared to the other children?