Dreadful toddler mealtimes - at wit's end

[porpentine]

I know this has been done to death but I've read through lots of old threads and I still can't work out what to do.

DS is 23 months. He's always been an intermittently fussy eater but over the last month it's got worse and worse. I realise this is a pretry normal developmental stage, but it's driving me up the wall... When confronted with a meal not including the limited range of food he likes, he demands cheese and bananas with tears. I'm torn between not wanting to consistently offer these instead of his original food (because then I can't see that he'll ever eat anything else) and not wanting to make meals the awful, awful battleground they currently are. I can't deny a hungry child food - but surely if i only offer cheese, bananas, pasta (plain or tomato), toast with poached egg or honey (acceptable menu items) he'll never stop being fussy?

You can deny him food...but that's not really what you're doing...you just offer him what's for lunch and then don't give in re the bananas and cheese...if he doesn't eat what you're giving him then he's not that hungry and will make up for it next meal.

He won't consistently refuse food until he's ill or starving...he will eventually eat what's on the plate within reason. I'm a big believer in not making them finish the plate if they're full...but I won't bend on them demanding their current fave every mealtime. I have one DD who eats anything and one who at 5 is still fussy...she has phases...she often won't eat what's on offer...but I don't replace the meal...I tell her to try a bit of it and then if she eats SOME of it, she can have some yogurt or banana...then later, she's usually starving and eats whatever's going.

Cook a meal, put it on the table, eat together. If your child doesn't eat, don't offer anything else until the next meal time/snack time. Eventually they will realise that's the way it is. If they don't eat, they go hungry. Also, don't make a big fuss about food.

I have 3 children who are very good eaters, who all eat salad/olives/spicy food etc. I've never forced them to eat anything but they all know there is no other option if they don't eat what I've prepared. One doesn't like coleslaw, one doesn't like spinach and one of them doesn't like icing on cakes (!) but I still use these things. If they don't like it, they just leave it.

It really is normal. My theory is that they are programmed to become hyper conservative at this age - if we were living in the jungle they would be mobile but clueless and if they weren't hyperconservative they would be picking all sorts of dangerous fungi etc up to eat. So they are programmed to stick to the limited range of what they already know. [Disclaimer, this theory is backed by no empirical evidence whatsoever!]

Make sure he is hungry at mealtimes, then put it in front of him, perhaps always including a small piece of cheese for him to get going on and avoiding him having a paddy right at the outset.

If he doesn't eat it, he doesn't eat it. Don't make a big fuss. Keep putting it in front of him. Let him have yoghurt or sth for pudding as normal.

If he is starving at bedtime then give him toast etc.

My DS wouldn't eat fruit etc. I just kept giving it to him at the same time as I gave it to his elder sister. Mostly he would just poke it then leave it. After several months he has started picking it up and eating it too. The key is to keep the emotion out of it - you have to behave as if you couldn't give two figs about whether he eats or not. And do whatever you can to manage his emotions - always provide plenty of distracting things at the table to take his focus off the food - always sit down together and ask him questions, or even stick a song on sometimes, or something like that. If you put it down in front of him then hang around in silence while you hope he eats it, there will be an "atmosphere" before you even get off the ground. Try and get the focus and the emotion elsewhere (do you have an elder child? often they can be good for these purposes!)

My problem with my DS (similar age) is not fussiness but his refusal to sit at the table for longer than 3 mouthfuls. We ignore him and have loads of fun at the table. He soon gets bored and comes back!

Hi there. I'm no expert but I thought I'd reply as I've done plenty of 'battles' with under 2s on food. I say battle, but Cold War is probably a more apt analogy- you don't want to show your anxieties or let them manifest is submission to his will! This is a slow game of patience.
I fully agree with previous posts- toddlers don't starve themselves and you must not give in and prepare something new. Things I've found successful include:

1. Plan something new with something established, eg pesto pasta rather than plain or tomato. The pasta should be the familiar shape. Build up from there.

2 cook together. Or pretend cook the item you want him to eat and serve it to favourite teddy/doll/ car(!?!- my ds reckons cars eat too) then serve up the real thing

1. Try reading to him whilst eating- sometimes the distraction of the story means they forget to protest- especially if hungry.

1. Limit snacks. Nothing for 2hrs prior to meal.

1. I Definitely agree with suggestion to eat with your little one. As much as possible.

1. Serve veggies first, like a starter then have a familiar main. Build from there.

Most importantly, don't panic. Your little one will get there eventually. If you're worried about nutrition make your tomato sauce a 'hidden veg' sauce and pack in things like spinach and carrot before blending to a smooth red sauce.

Sorry for essay. Hope this helps.

This is all really helpful, thank you. Sounds like I'll have to get a bit tougher about it. I just feel so awful saying no when he's begging me for bananas with tears in his eyes (I know it sounds melodramatic, but it is! He is!), and I find it hard to defuse the emotional tenor of the situation in those circumstances. No snacks before meals is probably also a good idea; again, I just feel crap holding the fridge door shut against a noisily weeping toddler... But I suppose you're right, he won't starve. And it is getting worse - trouble with the porridge this morning, which we don't usually have - so I shall crack the whip.

it's awful when they are sobbing but really it's no more or less than a tantrum although it looks more traumatic than that. In fact he's not an orphaned child in the Philippines - he just wants a banana rather than the other lovely thing you've made for him. So you treat that the way you treat any other toddler wilfulness which is ignore, ignore, ignore.

As other posters have said, put the food out and let him eat or not eat. If he doesn't eat it gets taken away - no begging/cajoling/train goes in the tunnel stuff. Repeat at next meal and next meal, repeat to fade...

He won't starve himself - they can sustain being hungry much more easily than we can, but eventually he will eat just enough to keep himself going and you build from there.

Good luck!

My DS went from being an eat-anything baby to a hugely fussy toddler. After a few weeks of mealtime battles I lost patience and told him it was eat what was on offer, or starve. (I did make sure to always offer him something appealing, mind you!) He gradually got over himself and now is a pretty good eater (though still suspicious of anything he hasn't seen before, which is fair enough). We also say that he can eat fruit or raw veg bits whenever he likes - even right before a meal - and he has his own little fruit bowl down low in the kitchen, and veg bits tub in the fridge, so he can help himself whenever he wants. I think he likes the control he has in that regard.

I agree with posters who have suggested to offer your DS a little of what he likes as well as the other food, so that he's got something familiar. You could also try getting him involved in the food prep (though I tried that with my DS and he loved getting the food ready, but still wouldn't eat it, stubborn little bugger).

And definitely don't make a drama of it. Offer the food, if he refuses, leave it there for 20 mins or so and then clear away. No discussions, no cajoling, no bargaining.

Normal healthy children do not starve themselves to death

I disagree with most here. DS goes through fussy phases and I let him eat what he'll eat. I'm not going to waste food giving him things I know perfectly well he won't touch or make mealtimes a stressful occasion by trying to get him to eat things he's not into at the moment. I have seen him go to bed supperless or lunchless on too many occasions (and had to stand the awful behaviour that resulted) to make a fuss about his eating.

Cheese, bananas, tomato, pasta, eggs, honey and bread is actually a pretty decent diet for your DS. You can get other veg like courgettes, peppers and mushrooms into a tomato sauce, you can give him different sorts of bread (DS is a bread-fiend and we get through bagels, wraps, pitta bread, naan - all kinds). Wait a decent interval (several days, or better weeks) before you casually stick something else on his plate and see if he tries it.

I see the thread has reiterated precisely the division I am having within myself... I agree that it feels a bit mean to deny him fruit; wouldn't feel as bad if he was asking for crisps or similar I don't think.

I do think that acting as if it's a matter of complete disinterest to me whether he eats or not is really good advice though. I tried that this evening (having been dreading dinner all day) and it was actually much better and less stressful for all of us. He sort of picked at the tomato and yoghurt elements of the meal, chosen to be at least reasonably toddler-friendly, and that's all, but no-one got upset. He usually eats breakfast and (ever since I started giving him pasta 'salad') lunch to at least some extent, and it was really helpful to remember what many people have said, that he actually doesn't need to eat THAT much food. I also cut down on afternoon food - he got pretty shirty about that, but I distracted him - and I think that helped a bit too.

Everyone's views are really helpful, thank you, and I feel SO much better (as does he I'm sure) having avoided a showdown this eve.

OP, I am all for avoiding showdowns. I feel I get plenty enough of those as it is, without voluntarily adding to them!

If it's any consolation, my DS (now almost 4) will now eat random, "adult" stuff such as olives, gherkins, Stilton, pate and chiu chow chilli oil (don't ask). But he's still not keen on seemingly unconnected things like mashed potato, raw tomatoes, baked beans or bread. (And he's capable of eating his own bodyweight in crisps and biscuits too.) At one point, when he was roughly your DS's age, he wouldn't eat any meat - not even mince - no fruit other than bananas, no vegetables other than carrots. The only protein I could shoehorn into him was cheese, milk and very well disguised fish in cheesy sauce. I used to feel so guilty that he wasn't getting a decent diet, and thanked my lucky stars that he liked orange flavoured vitamin syrup.

I'm with Ladyintheradiator personally. We all eat together, she gets what she gets but I always try to make sure there is one thing she likes. Since the awfulness that was 13 months (which was dry pasta, cheddar and fishcakes only), i had a policy that if she didn't try there would be nothing, but if she tried and didn't like she could have bread or toast and butter. I have only had to make bread and butter twice since then and she's now 2.7. Incidentally, other than that absurdly fussy phase she has always liked olives, curry, goat's cheese, all sorts of sophisticated stuff but she is still a fussy eater. She won't eat fruit except mango or the odd banana if she is starving and only recently started eating pieces of meat.

That sounds good that you managed to show nonchalance OP.

Even if he just pushes something around his plate and tastes a bit that all "counts" in the familiarisation process. Once he's done that 20 times you never know he might eat a bit!

God it's a long haul though isn't it! Good luck x

Well done OP. A lot of it is taking the emotion out of food and that's what you are doing. We all set such a lot of store by our children eating properly and healthily but today's children are not the same as generations ago - they are mostly not in danger of illness due to malnutrition, living in cold, damp homes and fighting for every calorie. But we still feel the same sense of panic when our children don't eat as our ancestors did.

Also all the messages about healthy eating can be overwhelming and we feel we are absolutely failing if the children don't eat 5 fruit and veg a day every day - I think it's a long term project and my priority (personally, this is just my approach) is to get the children eating reasonably normally first - just not having fear over food, being open to trying foods and being interested. Most toddlers are not open but that's the long term goal, I think.

As long as there is no underlying psychological condition or physical condition, I really think you can step away from the table. Keep providing a range of foods and let him find his own way. I read a really good phrase about this once - you decide what and when they eat, they decide if and how much.

And I think the fruit thing is a bit of a red herring (!) actually. The fact that what he wants is actually good for him is beside the point. The point is that bananas have become something he's insisting on as a way to assert control. It's also good for him to run around in the garden but there's a time when he gets to do that and a time when he doesn't because you have other things you need to do. You wouldn't worry about bringing him in from the garden so don't worry about the fruit thing either. If it's time for fruit, then fine. If not, then eat what's on the table, or don't, and try again next time.