milk with lots of iron.

[bumpsnowjustplump]

gHello all

I have a ds of 18 months who is very hit and miss with his diet. He has been known to go days without eating and sometimes will only eat fruit for weeks.. It really is a struggle. He has never drunk milk apart from when I breast fed him which I did up until he was 14 months old. I stopped as he was still feeding every two hours and it was killing me... Since then he has had no milk at all, I have tried everything EBM in beaker, formula in beaker, bottle everything has failed.. I have been so worried about his iron intake due to his faddy eating!!

Today I bought a bottle of Hibb growing up milk instead of pouring it into a beaker I put a straw through the foil top and gave it to dd who made a real fuss of how nice it was to try and get DS's interest.. AND IT WORKED.. he is now happily drinking it ... The only thing is it is £1 a bottle and I cant afford to keep buying this.. But on the other hand he has not had milk for 4 months and he is at the moment not eating veg again..........

Does anyone know of any other milk drinks or other drinks that have a high level of iron and calcium in them that I could try that are a bit cheaper?

ps his weight is fine so dont need to bulk him up just want to ensure he gets all the good stuff he needs....

So new to all this as DD eats everything all the time.....

He is 18 months old and is going days without eating? Do you mean nothing?

Buy the formula in powdered form and give to him in a straw cup? Buy him and DD matching new cups for their yummy milk?

what about the drinkable yoghurts? I also stick a straw through the foil lid and the kids drink them through that.

MUMNWLONDON sometimes he will go through a whole day and all he will have is:

Couple of spoons of cereal for breakfast
a quarter of a sandwich minus the bread for lunch with some fruit after
and a couple of spoonsfuls of dinner

He is not always like this. Some weeks he eats non stop and will eat everything I put in front of him.. But other times he wont eat a thing... We have been to dr and hospital about it but they are not worried as he is fine in everyother way and his weight is fine... They just told me to put vitamin drops on his food to compensate for the times when he is not eating so well. But I cant find any that contain iron or calcium...

I didn't know they did todler milk in powdered form that is a great idea thank you..

and thank you Seona actually one of the things he will eat all day long is yoghurt..

Loopy that is a great idea about a food diary, I will give that a go and see. When he has a good week I always think that we have turned a corner but he will always have a couple of bad weeks after it, and its during these times that I forget about the good week and I guess i blow things out of proportion.. But he really hasnt drunk any milk for 4 months since i gave up bf so dont want to miss this oppertunity due to cost..

I think the previous poster meant powdered infant formula, which will still have more iron than normal milk.

If he eats yoghurt then that has calcium in it, at other times, what about cereal? Try it dry as a snack, maybe with some raisins? They tend to be fortified with iron. My toddler loves baked beans, they have iron in too.

Red meat also has iron so maybe something with minced beef - spag bol, cottage pie etc.

Sympathies as my 23 month old eats like this as well. I'm lucky in that he will still breastfeed so I know he's getting some nutrients! Being badgered to stop/cut down by my HV but in all honesty he doesn't eat any more if I do that anyway. So I'd rather keep feeding him and just know he is at least getting some goodness from the bm if he's on hunger strike!

Yes am pretty sure toddler milk including HIPP comes in powdered form which would be cheaper - yes refilling bottle a good idea but also buying special milk straw cup might work.

If you then prefer for him to drink cows milk you can gradually reduce the formula etc but cows milk low in iron.

I think you need to look at keeping a food diary, It's not important what they eat each day but what they are eating over say a week or two.

DD was deffantly like this some days' she'd hardly eat anything then other's I counldn't seem to feed her enough. I think it's quit normal toddler eating behavier.