2 year old refusing to eat main course

[sniggle]

My 2 year old has always been a greateater but is now refusing to eat her main meal. She just wants yoghurt and fruit! I think she is possibly getting more teeth and has a mouth ulcer. However she will eat crackers and cheese at random time so am wondering is it sore moth and teething or is she just being stubborn? Any help would be appreciated - don't want to get into giving in to her - but if it is her teeth don't want to be cruel!!

i am having this problem too. i am just presenting it to her. if she doesnt eat it it goes in the bin and there is nothing else until the next meal....that is happening A LOT. it also happened with dd1 but she is fine now. a phase i am assuming!

My DS went through a few phases of this for a couple of weeks at a time at around 20-24 months - I generally gave in and let him have a yogurt (no sugar in the "little Rachels" my first yogurt ones) or a fruit puree as didn't want him to go hungry and, like you, wondered if his teeth were bothering him. He got over it eventually, although wil rarely eat yogurts now! (Often won;t have pudding now, infact, unless it's ice-cream which I try to restrict to no more than a couple of time a week.)

Should add, I always offered him a main course first which went in te bin more often than not, but did occasionally get nibbled at.

Hi I had the same problem and mine was just stubbornness. So we presented each meal and if she spat it out or pushed it away we took her out of the high chair. I also started to only give snack at set times of the day to ensure that she wasn't just full from grazing all afternoon. It took 3 days of her crying each time we took her out of the high chair. In the end all I had to do was recline it and she would then fuss and then eat all of her meal. Sometimes we would put her back in and take her out up to 5 times each meal but it worked. In the end she knew that she either ate what was on offer or nothing. (mine to wanted yogurt & fruit only)
Now she quiet often does not eat her main meal, for what ever reason I don't know. I ask her if she wants to hop down and she will nod her head. So at least I know it is her choice. However she also understands that there is nothing else on offer until she eats the main meal.
I might add this was easy for us to do as she never woke in the night hungry unlike friends of mine who did the same.

I hope this helps.

dd has gone through this phase. If she doesnt eat it, there is no dessert, which is rare anyway, and nothing until the next meal. If it is tea time meal, and she doesnt eat it, she gets offered a slice of toast half hour before bed. More often than not ds will eat his meal and dds.

Even if it is being stubborn I don't think a battle of wills is the way to go - if you offer healthy pud like youghurt and fruit what's the point of restricting that?
A 2 yr old still has a small stomach so looking at their meals as 6 small meals might help- my snacks when my twins were 2 were just mini meals like carrot sticks, cheese chunks and toast.
You can still include them by giving them a very small portions of the main meal, and then by the time they get to about 4 they'll be having larger portions at the 3 main meals and smaller snacks.
I ignore what actually goes into their mouth and concentrate on conversation - that takes the pressure off.

I would just like to clarify my main meal in response the above post. I agree that a main meal should not be huge and my battle of wills was only 3 days luckily, however my main meal is where she will eat meat etc which I think is important in a balance diet. I like Luckykady74 do up a little platter of veg, meat and cheese etc. She still then has the pleasure of picking what she wants and loves the variety of what is on offer and loves finger food. Again it is no great loss if she doesn't have her yogurt as I make sure she had one at another snack time earlier in the day.

Again I hope this helps.

I have this from time to time with my DD who is 2.9. What I do is ask her to have one bite of each thing on her plate, and if she doesn't want any more after that she doesn't have to. She understands the rule now and is happy to just try everything. Often once she has tasted it, she wants more but sometimes she just doesn't want to eat. If she's genuinely hungry later on, she can have bread and butter or fruit (as much as she likes; I give her nice brown bread and I don't think filling up on fruit now and again can be too dreadful for anyone). I also let her have a slice or two of cheese occasionally instead of the protein bit of our main meal if that will encourage her to eat the rest.

Yoghurt and fruit is a perfectly good thing to eat, though, so try not to fret although I know it is hard. If she's having a bit of carbohydrate in some form too, then it's really a pretty reasonable diet, especially for a two year old. They are notoriously fussy!

Don't let her fill up on the starter!

well how many courses does she have??

My 2 yo goes in phases, some days she is happy to eat, others she really doesn't have much interest in food at all though she will always eat fruit and yoghurt oh and breakfast which is her fave meal of the day.

I really wouldn't worry too much, I tend not to get too wound up over this eating business.