Just turned 4 DS1 - hollow legs - how can he POSSIBLY eat this much????

[Jackaroo]

So, I'm laying myself open to a ticking off because I will lay bare DS's diet, which is OK, not fabulous.

He was four last week, but the size of an average 6 year old, 3'9"/115cm tall, about 4 stone/23kgs, size 11 feet etc etc...pretty slender build.

he never seems to stop eating. Here is a sample day:

6.30/7am - 1 - 2 rounds toast, with butter and honey or marmite

8.30am - bowl of cereal (oatibix) (1oz-2oz?) lots (quarter of a pint?) of full fat milk

10.30am - if at home, a sandwich made with 2 slices of bread (this is wholemeal or multigrain btw) with cheese or ham in it), or maybe a muffin if we've made some, and an apple.Morning break at nursery sounds fairly mixed, sometimes jam and bread, sometimes porridge...

midday-1pm - at home - a sandwich if not had for breaktime, otherwise maybe some leftovers from the night before. At nursery, cooked meal, spag. bog etc - they say he always has 2 helpings....I guess child sized.

4-5pm - crackers and cheese/couple of plain biscuits/fruit/or all of htese!

6pm - full meal - ie 4 fish fingers, 4oz jacket potato, lots of peas/carrots/green beans/sweetcorn. Or rice with all these veggies and some mince/ham/cheese something protein.

Although this sounds fairly varied, these are pretty much the only foods he will eat easily, so at the moment I rely heavily (new baby etc etc, not on top cooking form).

Also, big glass of milk at bedtime (7pm)and sometimes more bread!

None of this includes the incidentals of more glasses of full milk, dried fruit, fruit etc etc.. or even sweets etc which crop up from time to time

So, ridiculous quanitities and he has a tapeworm, or normal for a growing boy??

Not a ticking off just an observation that he eats lots of carbs and sugar in the morning (toast, honey, oatibix) and that won't necessarily sustain him all morning meaning he's eating quite often - so if he had stuff that didn't raise blood sugar levels so high (all that GI business) he might not eat so frequently. Plus he seems to eat lots of bread between getting up and lunchtime! In an ideal world I wouldn't give DD bread to eat twice or 3 times in one day, but it does happen, I just try not to do it too often.
Hope this helps. I only have one DD at the mo, number 2 due in December, so I've no idea how much of my own advice i'll be following when I've been up half the night!!!

Good point - I do know though that the GI is based on the overall meal, so thought that the full fat milk would temper it a little.. and am still not sure it would make an impact on what he's eating 10 hours later...? I try and make sure there is protein/a little fat with everything he eats precisely for this reason, they are also relatively high fibre, which I think it not necessarily indicated in young children as it fills them up too much to eat anything else... but its not working with him...

Also, it could just as easily be apple and cheese first thing as the toast and honey (I'm actually trying to keep him off honey and jam, but the alternatively is marmite - he doesnt like P butter)...

Maybe go back to the porridge he used to have more of (yes, definitely a victim of the new baby thing), see if that's better..

BTW I'm also not a fan of too much bread, but if not that what else can I give him to give him energy throughout the day...? Not sure...

Bloody hell. I'd kill for your problem. I have the exact opposite. DD 8.4, 128cm, 22kg and fruit/veg phobia. She has said she's hungry three times in her life so I remember the occasions. I'd go down the porridge route for breakfast, I know it is a slow release food because dh has it every morning. Good luck.

my ds(3) eats all the time ,always has done but my oldest son is 11 yrs old and is 4stone 12 pounds??
they are all made differently

I know kreecher, I was loathed to post as I know the problem is usually the opposite; it's not so much that I see it as a problem (although it does my head in sometimes) just I wanted to check just how normal this is (or not)....

candy - I assume you're saying 11 years old and only 4st etc etc? Yes, that is helpful to know you have so much variation in one family.

I reckon it is fairly normal to have kids with helathy appetites, both mine have. I was reassured by my sister the other day though when she reckoned her friend's kids ate even more than mine! As candyfluff says, they are all different.

Yours sounds like my DS (7 on Friday), when he was that age, although he has eggs (scrambled or poached) on toast in the morning more often than cereal. Whether he has eggs on toast or cereal, he can always manage 1 or 2 extra rounds of toast as well....

When my DS was 4 he was in age 7-8 clothes.... He is tall and chunky bit not what I would call fat....

Hope this reassures you

Thanks mami it does :-)

did i upset you jackaroo?
sorry didnt mean to just to say that i have 3 kids and they vary so much fromeach other so theres no normal iyswim

Porridge definitely a good one as oats have slow release of energy. I think the thing with GI is that good protein / carb balance is the key and milk is not as high in protein as other sources so may not be enough to counter the sugar in cereals like oatibix etc

Instead of bread you could try oat cakes (plain ones), rye bread (dd loves that dark stuff that comes ready sliced in thin slices), ryvita - topped with cheese or meat or fish, plain yogurt and fruit, veggie sticks with dips like hummus or guacamole, nut butters (if he doesn't like peanut he might like almond or cashew), soups made with veggies and pulses (you can blend them if he doesn't like lumps) - although right now you may not feel like cooking up huge batches of home made soup, understandably! Dried fruit has huge amounts of sugar so not great in large quantities if eating alone rather than with protein like cheese etc.

anyway i am definitely not an expert but my best friend just completed a 3 year nutrition diploma so i have recently been drilling her for info, as in this pregnancy i have not been able to stop eating! She has talked a lot about balancing blood sugar to regulate appetite hence all the above info which has come from her!!

thanks - candy you definitely didn't upset me, I wasn't being sarcastic! It really was useful to know! Will be interesting to see how DS2 goes...

Country - I do in fact know all this stuff myself, and regularly go back through my checklist to see if I can change anything.. unfortunately have not been able to find oatcakes here (Oz), he can't eat yoghurt - casein problem, which is OK with small amounts of hard cheese though, before anyone asks... :-) We have a wonderful milk here that he can drink by the gallon thank goodness...

soups - yep, used to have those, but not in the last 3 months.

Only eats raw carrot if grated...

BUT - will try using more avocado (he eats it every week already, but no harm it upping it), and find some ryvita...and the other nut butters.. thank you (and I really mean it!)

He is the size of my fairly slim 6 year old and doesn't eat as much.

my 6 year old would have 2 or three rounds of toast and a banana for breakfast, a round of sandwiches, a couple of little scotch eggs/chicken drumstick, a 30g wedge of cheese, carrot sticks, cucumber and a cake for lunch, snacky (small choc biscuit etc)thing on the way home, and a woman size portion of food for his dinner, plus toast or cheese or cereal for supper. Plus half a pint of milk taken throughout the day.