EATING PROBLEMS. My 17 month son will still not eat anything...

[Louise1970]

Help. My son was breast fed for 6 months then given organic home made puree food for 3 months, then at 9 months he refused all foods. I was told not to give in and carry o feeding him this healthy diet. He refused all food for 5 days. He was waking in the night hungry all the time. By the 5th day and no sleep i gave in and gave him bread, cakes, biscuits, crisps as that was all he would eat. We are now at 18 months and he still will only eat the above. I am coninuing to try the more healthy stuff but nothing is working. He screams, kicks crys and throws it on the floor. How can i change this. I have been told he will grow out of it. But it has already been 9 months. HELP!!!

louise, i have the same problem, DS now 10MO and has taken nothing from a spoon since he was 8MO. he survives on fruit, crumpets, cake, chocolate and crisps. know this isn't ideal but he is sooo stubborn and at least i know that even if it's just a bag of quavers and some chocolate buttons, then at least he has something in his tummy.
am i the worst mother in the world??!!!
sorry, no ideas, but at least i can offer tea and sympathy!

DD used to be a pain. I used to just feed her whatever I was eating, if I had it she wanted it!! In the end she got used to the food and now she happily eats it by herself

Do you have any baby cook books? Annabel Karmels are a bit of a faff tbh and take too long I think but Gina Ford and Lorraine Kelly (!) have some good ones that can be done quickly. Home made chicken nuggets, chips, muffins with good things hidden in them etc.

There is no quick answer for this, you have to get tough and eventually he will learn that crisps etc are no more.

My dd1 has phases where all food ends in the bin and there is NOTHING more frustrating or annoying IN THE WORLD than something you have cooked being refused. But I try to scream silently in the kitchen and bide my time and she does eventually get the message.

I am not holier than thou believe me, there are days when I think 'FFS why do I bother, have a McDonalds' but crisps and choc should be an occasional addition, not a main diet.

Good luck, you will need it unfortunately .

Thank you all so much for your replies so far. I didn't write the whole story as it would take too long. But the jist of it is that i have also been cooking fresh food from scratch hiding vegetables and lots of good things inside, making shapes, cooking with annabel too, but he still will not eat any of it. Then starts screaming etc again. He even dyesects the food until he has got what he wants out of it. So a sandwich will only be eaten if he scrapes everything out of it. All the healthy food i also buy goes on the food. i have discussed this with the doctors and all they say is he has a strong mind and hopefully he will grow out of it. But that does not help..........

Yes it is a pain in the rear isn't it? I spent last night going 'ooooh lovely cheese omlette' and wasted my breath completely . At 18 months I think my dd1 lived on cheese sandwiches amd grapes .

Persevere is the only advice I can give as she is now 2 and a half and will sometimes wolf down veggies and eat bolognaise etc. It changes from day to day.

at 18mths u should be able to do a food deal. Sometimes if ds wont eat his tea[19mths] then i will say one spoon of this for one xxxxxx. I usually find after a few spoons then he will eat all his tea before having his pudding.

otherwise maybe watch tiny tearaways for some ideas as she seems to have a lot of eating prob kids.

If you feed him cakes biscuits crisps etc then that his what he WILL eat

if you dont have any and dont give him any and make sure he has NO MORE than 1 pint of milk (and no sugary squashes either which will give him calories!) a day a WILL eat other foods.

No child has ever starved to death!

Decide that you WILL win, he can eat the 'healthy' foods you give him OR be hungry. Once he realsies you meen buisness, nature WILL take over and he WILL start to eat otehr foods.... but it WONT work if YOU let him have otehr stuff