Terrible 2's and food

[Lilypie]

I've never thought of DD (2 years) as a fussy eater but suddenly she wont eat without a battle.
A general meal time looks like this:

DD : (after 2/3 spoons of dinner) "Finished, no more"
Me : "Are you sure, you've not eaten much, you'll be hungry"
DD : "NO MORE! Down!"
Me : "Okay" (take bowl away)
DD : "More! More! Dinner! Dinner!"
Me : "You DO want more?"
DD : "More dinner!"
Me : "Okay, here you are" (give bowl back)
DD : "No! Don't want it!" (bowl often then thrown on the floor)
Me : (try to spoon feed her myself)
DD : (tantrum)

So I'm a bit at a loss what to do, I obviously dont want to leave her hungry but I'm obviously not dealing with this right.
I've started to take her first "no" as gospel so she'll learn that if she turns food away it means she gets nothing but I feel so cruel.

Can anyone who's been through the terrible 2's advise me on this?

I've had this recently with a normally fantastic eater. I think that, like with most things with 2 year olds, if you make it a big deal, it will become a big deal. You could just ignore it for a bit and start talking about something else, so you get out of the loop and then go back to it. If this doesn't work, just let her get down and make that the end of mealtime. She may be a bit hungry later but if you really want to, you can bring forward the next meal a bit.

Remember, no 2 year old ever starved themselves to death!

hmmm

for every spoonful she eats, put a spoonfull at the side of the plate....even 3 spoonfuls is allot of grub in a tiny tummy.

Only make a tiny bit and i mean tiny.
Then when it is all eaten..you pleased, she eaten hehe happy

Try this....
you "dont you dare eat THAT bit..nononono...dont dare"

she "giggle gobble"

or

you "i want that bit, its for me, dont you eat it..."

pretend to try to eat

she "giggle gobble it up"

Great game.

My garbage guts 2.4 DS is beginning to go the same way with food. After all this time I'm worried as it was going so well. I put a little Bob the Builder next to him when he has his Weetabix. I make Bob try to take some fo the food and DS shoves it into his own mouth instead, laughing away...I didn't want to get into the routine of making it a game, but he needs his brekkie.

I'm going through it at the moment - sounds scarily familiar actually. I ask dd if she wants a certain thing - she automatically says no, then says yes, then when it's in front of her she says "don't want it".

I've concluded that it's become part of her trying to assert her independance (it's happening at other times too).

So, I've decided to make her a meal that she usually eats with no problem, put it in front of her and leave her to it. If she says she doesn't want it I tell her 'ok then, but that's your dinner/tea - nothing else' and then we carry on eating. We just don't let her make a big thing out of it. If she doesn't eat it I reassure myself she can always have toast and fruit or yoghurt for supper.

I'd advise that when she says "no don't want it!" next time, just say 'fine' and then get on with your meal.

Honestly since we started this approach (only a few days so far!) mealtimes have been much calmer, and dd is still getting enough to eat.

hth

dissle I like that game, going to try it tonight I think

Breakfast is the only meal we dont fight over, well, a bit at the end when she cant decide if she's finished or not.

I love the idea of "i want that bit, its for me, dont you eat it..." but DD loves it when I eat her food, she loves feeding me. She'd gladly watch me eat her whole dinner and think it was great!

I've tried the doll feeding game and it used to work... she's wise to it now.

I've just got to say that please don't give in and give them something if they refuse the meal. It's true - they never starve themselves and soon they'll learn that that's their meal and they need to eat it. It's flippin' hard to take the food away and chuck it out (or eat it in my instance!) but they need to learn.