Help, 20 month old DD won't eat!

[Blatherskite]

I had it easy with DS. He ate pretty much anything from the start and with the exception of obvious cheese (ie not melted in/on something) ,raw tomatoes and curry, he still will now at 4.5

20 month old DD is a whole different matter and I have no idea what to do.

She eats breakfast well, in fact the first thing she does when we get downstairs in the mornings is to stand at her high chair and call to be lifted in. She will then happily devour between 1 and 2 weetabix normally so she is obviously hungry. From then on it gets harder.

She won't eat sandwiches or soup or quiche or any of the usual lunchtime things, she turns her nose up at salad and dip. If I give her something she does like - today we had noodles and spring rolls - she'll eat a very little bit then stop. Same with dinner. She will eat pasta with a tomato-y/bolognese sauce, beans or pretty much anything 'Little Dish' make but apart from that, she just pashes it away and refuses She used to love baked potatoes with cheese and beans but even that got pushed away yesterday, her previous favourite of quesadillas got refused last week too - she's getting worse and I'm panicing.

She must be hungry because when I call "dinner" or "lunch" she comes running and stands next to her highchair ready to be lifted in but then she'll take one look and turn her nose up. She must be hungry as she's only eating breakfast everyday!

Today I made plain, pan-fried haddock, boiled new potatoes, brocolli, asparagus and some purple cauliflower - all reasonably bland and easy to eat. I even gave her a blob of ketchup to help it go down but bar dipping her fork in the ketchup a few times she ate nothing. Then comes to argument between me and DH - I think she's too little to understand that she must eat her dinner to get a yogurt for dessert (although we do say this to her - repeatedly) and he thinks she's just waiting for the yogurt and shouldn't get anything if she won't eat her meal. The latter is how we work it for DS but he's almost 3 years older and so has more understanding of consequences. He thinks the yogurt fills her up just enough so that's all she wants. We refused her the yogurt today and let her down from the table but then she just cried as DS got his yogurt because he'd eaten everything on his plate and she wanted one too. I have tried giving other 'desserts' but she won't eat fruit either. She's eaten it in the past but very, very rarely, that usually gets pushed away too. On the odd occasion she does eat, there are lots of smiles and "Good girl"'s. If she's not eating, I usually leave her to it while I eat my food and then try to spoon feed her myself when I'm done - although this never works.

DD is also a very early riser (5.30am-6am) and I worry that not only is she too small to go without anything but that by not even giving her a yogurt, we risk her getting up even earlier because she is hungry. Beditme is about 7.30-8pm for both children.

All this is compounded for me by the fact that DD has always been tiny. She stuck to the 0.2 centile line in her book all the way up to a year. She's still wears 9-12 month clothes (she's just beginning to fit a few 12-18 month bits) despite being a few days off 20 months old. I'm just worried that she hasn't got a lot of weight to loose. I'm also worried that she's not getting enough nutrients in her diet of weetabix and mid morning smoothies. She's still dirtying at least 1 nappy a day so something is getting through, I'm just not sure what.

I have no idea where I've gone wrong or what to do next. Please help Mumsnet.

Sorry for the long post, I just wanted to get as much as I could think of down at the beginning.

Well the boy was at the childminder today and ate like a horse. Had his usual weetabix in the morning, then some toast, then by 10am was asking for lunch. Still no veg though...

DD ate a tomato pasta sauce by the forkful today! We always serve her pasta, tomato sauce, meatballs and cheese in separate piles on her plate, and she eventually eats most of it, by picking up each piece of pasta, dipping it in the tomato sauce and eating it. Today, she used her fork to scoop up the tomato sauce!

She's also had homemade carrot and coriander soup for lunch, half a nectarine with breakfast, a plum mid afternoon and another plum and a few strawberries with her dinner.

Glad the booster seat is going well - we've found using a sideplate rather than a plastic plate is helping - she likes to be the same as DH and me it seems.

Right well our only safe meal - breakfast - seems to be off the menu now too

She won't even have her Smoothie so our one regular source of fruit is gone too.

She's grumpy and irritable and irritating so she's obviously hungry but won't eat. I'm totally lost and ready to just sit down and cry

Has anyone mentioned the milk?

I only ask because my ds1 (v fussy eater) would happily drink 2 cups of warm milk morning and night and when I mentioned to his paed that he didnt eat much he told me to cut down on the milk.

It worked!

He is now 8 and still has a warm cup of milk morning and night BUT just 1 cup and not full (about 2/3 full)

HTH x

She doesn't have milk every day Becaroooo. I mostly use it to top her up if she's refused dinner and up until last week, it wasn't affecting breakfast as she was eating 2 weetabix every morning.

This week she's having just a couple of mouthfulls

Ah, I see.

I know my ds2 doesnt have milk (makes him sick) and he has always eaten more than ds1 at the same age IYSWIM?

Are her molars coming through do you think?

Its not going to comfort you at all but 2 is a very common age for dc to start food refusal both mine did, even foods they loved up to that point.

She's just gotten her bottom canine and I can see the top one on the same side ready to pop. Time to get the teething beads out again I think and hope that they help

Custardo may have been a bit blunt - but she is right. There seems to be too much worrying and making an issue over kiddies eating. There will always BE an issue as long as a mum makes it into one !
A child will not starve to death. Don't get worried about whether they eat something or not - Offer them their dinner and if they do not eat it just remove it and offer nothing else until the next meal. Its as difficult as you make it yourself !

If that were even partially true Davsmum, then surely my style of parenting would have turned out 2 fussy eaters when in actual fact, after DS decided he liked raw tomatoes after all at the weekend, his 'Don't like' list now consists of just Curry and chunks of Cheese.

And if you'd read more than just Custardo's posts, you'd realise that most of us are offering dinner and taking it away uneaten with no alternative. The reality is that a truely fussy child will not eat even if hungry and that a hungry child is grumpy and won't sleep and makes life hugely difficult for the rest of it's family - even if it isn't starving to death.

I can assure you that it is way more difficult than I make it myself.

I don't see why you worry then ? ALL children are different. Your style of parenting may not produce any issues with one child - but the same style can produce issues in another !
Of course a hungry child may get grumpy. As for it making life difficult for every one else - How ? Kids get grumpy - it affects you or others as much as you let it bother you
You may not offer alternatives - but are you allowing snacks in between meals ?

All I know is - the parents I know who worry about their kids eating seem to have an ongoing problem with fussy eaters - and the ones I know who do not make an issue of it or overthink it etc - have kids who just eat their meals.
I think I would be a fussy eater if I had someone monitoring my meals and my reactions to everything put in front of me.
Once kids go onto solids - its trial & error and the less you stress about it - the smoother it goes.
It really is the reactions of the parents that affects how a child eats. I made all the mistakes with my son and was insistent that it was 'him' My son improved when I stopped making it an issue.

"As for it making life difficult for every one else - How ?" Seriously? Christ, if you need to ask then you'll never know.

Yes, seriously. A child cannot make life hell for anyone who will not tolerate a child doing so. I dunno,.. sometimes people on here allow a child far too much power. What on earth do you expect when you have a child ? An easy ride ? Its par for the course that children will get grumpy for all sorts of reasons. Whether you allow that to make life hell for everyone is your choice.

Oh for god's sake.

This is a SUPPORT THREAD for parents of children who are truly fussy eaters (as opposed to 'refusing to eat a few things just to try your patience for a while' which most toddlers do, and that is NOT what we are talking about here).

'What on earth do you expect when you have a child? An easy ride?'

Well of course not. However, YOU try going into your beloved DS's nursery day after day for months on end to look at a food chart that reports that he has eaten NOTHING all day. You try every single meal ending with food being pushed away, thrown, rejected - and this since he was WEANED. You try that while all your DS's little friends open their mouths like little birds for plates of healthful food to be spooned in. You try not to worry. You try to ignore when he whinges and sighs and doesn't sleep well and you know it's because he's hungry.

Only a parent with a 'normal' eater could have written that patronising post.

Sympathy to all of you going through the mill, my DS is currently rejecting his old favourite butternut squash - the one veg he will eat :(

Oh and this:

"All I know is - the parents I know who worry about their kids eating seem to have an ongoing problem with fussy eaters - and the ones I know who do not make an issue of it or overthink it etc - have kids who just eat their meals."

shows a frankly impressive absence of logic.

Thanks for your support Music - and hope things improve with your DS. I can sympathise - DD always used to eat mashed potato - but not any more.
Blathers - sympathies re:breakfast. DD doing ok with breakfast (1/2 oatibix and sometimes a piece of toast), lunch - toast and hummous - but refusing supper, unless I do pasta and pesto or fishfingers. Tried pasta with smoked salmon, cream and brocolli tonight and she tried a mouthful then refused. We didn't make an issue of it but she was exhausted after her bath & had a melt down. I don't see how i'm giving her too much power Davsmum? I don't make an issue of it, I do try to stay calm, but if she's hungry it does impact on everyone else! I'm not expecting an easy ride and I have done this parenting thing before - I have an adult DS who I don't recall having any of these problems (but i do know memory can be selective, so maybe i've edited that bit )

FYI, this

"All I know is - the parents I know who worry about their kids eating seem to have an ongoing problem with fussy eaters - and the ones I know who do not make an issue of it or overthink it etc - have kids who just eat their meals."

Is bullshit. I do no worry, I do not fuss, I do not make an issue.
DD's do not eat their meals.

Musicmaiden - Your idea of support is mutual sympathy - Support often comes in the form of blunt truth. Just comparing stories is not real support if its just people all doing similiar things !
I am sorry - but I do not believe this 'hasn't eaten all day' stuff. Kids will not starve themselves. Usually the parent panics to the point of giving them rubbish snacks - to ease their own fears - not help the child. Fussy eaters ( unless there is a serious medical reason ) are created not born.

I HAD a fussy eater. I made the mistake of getting overly concerned and panicking. I truly believed the child had a problem and that I was doing everything I could. It took someone observing me & my ds over a few weeks to open my eyes to what I was really doing -and that was making a big issue out of it and creating a bigger problem. I stopped bothering about what he ate and how often and he changed because I changed.
These problems often start very very early on - and its very easy to convince yourself that the child has a problem when it stems from parental anxiety.

If you say so, Davsmum. You obviously know more about my DS and my parenting than I do.

'Fussy eaters are created, not born' - really doesn't explain why the OP has one child who eats virtually anything and another that isn't eating well, despite bringing them up exactly the same way. It doesn't explain why my DS has never put a spoonful of pasta or rice near his mouth, or even picked up a floret of broccoli, even when he was 6 months old. If it was me fussing over him that stopped him eating, why would he reject all his food at nursery?

I think you may be trying to be helpful. What I do not like is the suggestion that we are somehow bad parents for worrying about what our DCs eat or don't eat. If you had really been there yourself you would be more sympathetic.

How helpful is sympathy ?.... really ??
No one suggested anyone was a 'bad' parent. You have decided thats what I mean because you probably find it difficult to accept that you may be making a situation worse. All children are different. Some are more sensitive - some are stubborn so you may have a problem with one over eating whilst another is more relaxed and laid back. Bringing them up the same makes no difference to that.
Your son may also reject food at nursery because its a habit by now.

I find sympathy massively helpful - to know you are not alone and other people are going through similar.

I understand HOW parents could put pressure on their kids to eat, even unconsciously, but I'm almost certain I do not. DS has never tolerated being spoonfed so I always put things in front of him and let him get on with it (or not). I've never said 'go on, take another bite', 'eat it up or no pudding' or any of that. I basically ignore whether he is eating or not and eat my own and chat to him and my DH. I clear away his plate without comment. And he does not really have snacks except maybe some raisins after his lunchtime nap.

Nursery just puts it in front of him and leaves him to it, if anything he will be more ignored there than at home I imagine. He eats a meal at nursery if it is one of the few things he likes, eg bagel and cheese. But most of the food they serve are things he has always rejected from the very start.

He is a stubborn bugger one but I do think it is the food (or his perception of it) rather than outside influence in his case. He also has Glue Ear which I hear can mess up the taste buds.

How is everyone else doing? ConstantCraving, sounds like we are going through much the same! Galena, I am rather jealous, sounds like your DD is doing well!

Music Maiden,
I am sorry if I come across as a bit heartless - Its hard to get a point across in the way I want to in a short post.
Toddlers need to try some foods at least 12 times before they may accept it. It just needs to be put onto the plate and the child be allowed to 'play' with it and squish it about. If they refuse it even 10 times - it does not mean they will not like it. It can be the texture that puts them off. They can 'sense' your anxiety even if you say nothing and believe that you are putting on a calm front.
It helps if you let them be involved in food preparation so they see you handling it - and even watch you nibble at the food before it gets to the table stage. - they get curious.
My sisters son would only eat fish fingers & baked beans until he was about 13 yrs old. She spent 13 years stressed out and she stopped trying to give him other foods when he was about 5 yrs old - just grateful he was eating 'something'

I watched her many times feeding him from him being a baby and she was always expecting problems and talking about it all the time. It was strange that when she had totally stopped caring about it ( she gave up) when he was about 12 that he slowly started asking to try other foods. I can't help feeling that had she not been so concerned about his diet - he may have eaten more many years earlier. He eats like a bloody horse now.

Davsmum, unless you are a paed or other professional you are basing your entire advice on anecdotes. Can you not see why this sort of generalisation is not particularly helpful?

Hi Davsmum, before I started on the mumsnet wisdom I was actually quite chilled. DD ate her meals on my knee (me generally feeding her) looking at books - she ate everything, no problems. Mum and DD relaxed. Then I read on here that that was a BIG no no - i should have her sitting on her own chair, feeding herself and not distracting with a book. It's been downhill all the way since then! Not suprising really as its a change to her norm - but it's been a month now and its still tricky. She asks me to feed her and refuses most things on her plate even when I do. Today she had fishfingers (in her chair) and then refused any more. I sat her on my knee, read, and she ate the beans and mash i'd done with no problems. My DH says quit mumsnet and trust your instincts - he reckons she will gradually start to do it for herself as and when she's ready. You mentioned that your DS was a fussy eater and I'm wondering what turned things round for you?

I put an old faithful (mince and tatties) down to DS for his lunch today. He took one look at it, looked at me, pushed it away and said no. So I told him there would be nothing else and he still said no. I started eating it and making all the "mmm yummy" noises and he wasn't in the slightest bit interested. He was clearly hungry as he was asking for pasta, and I said "no, you have mince and tatties now, there is no pasta" and he started crying. So I then asked him if he wanted a sweetie (no parent of the year awards coming here) and his eyes lit up and he stopped crying. So I said "you eat three mouthfuls of the mince and tatties and you can have a sweetie". So he decided maybe the mince and tatties weren't going to kill him after all and he took a mouthful. Then he asked for another. And another. And then he'd eaten the whole bowlful... Little sod.

So he got 2 smarties. Bribery. Got to love it.

Ilythia.
I am not basing 'advice' on anecdotes. I am basing it on life experience. Its not really advice either - its sharing that experience - the same as anyone else is sharing the details of all the things they have tried.
The thing is - for some reason its what some people do not want to hear. One doesn't have to agree with it. I just do not see the point of having a problem but only welcoming views from those who think the same as you do and are in the same predicament.