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help! toddler meal times

2 replies

Sunflower999 · 02/09/2015 19:12

My lovely boy is nearly 19 months, very cute and gorgeous, but mealtimes have become a real struggle. We have reached the (unplanned) stage where mealtimes consist of me putting food in his mouth whilst passing him a never ending stream of toys to play with. This started because a few months ago he stopped eating for 3 weeks and lost weight and I was desperate to get him to eat again (saw the GP and everything ok). So now he's got used to having toys to play with whilst eating and unless he's distracted/entertained he gets bored very quickly, makes a fuss, wants to get out of highchair etc. And we're on a very small loop of things he will eat, anything suspicious looking (which includes anything new and all fruit and vegetables) get flung on the floor and when I say no or we try to discipline he just thinks its really funny! Health Visitor's approach is very much that we-all-need-to-eat-as-a-family-all-the-time-cook-one-thing-and if-he-doesn't-like-it-too-bad, but its not practical for us to all eat together all the time and if I only gave him what we have he wouldn't eat anything. I've tried taking him to places where he can see other people eating but that hasn't worked because he's been too distracted and just wanted to get down and explore. I suspect we might need to go cold turkey and have no toys, but I don't want mealtimes to become a battleground, they're stressful enough anyway and I'm not tough enough to watch him not eat. Any advice much appreciated! xxx

OP posts:
sliceofsoup · 02/09/2015 19:16

Do one thing at a time.

First get rid of the toys, but give him the food that he likes and will eat. Also stop feeding him. His entertainment should be learning how to feed himself, not playing with toys.

Then once you have that sorted you can try to introduce new foods and tastes.

Sunflower999 · 03/09/2015 14:27

Thank you, I think I need to man up and be a bit stricter re removing toys. I just know he's going to make such a fuss and won't eat, but think it's got to be done. When we have friends round he doesn't need toys etc but when it's just me and him he's bored!

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