feeding a chubby 1.5 year old...do I just give her what she wants? say no?

[mamaesi]

I have always just given my baby as much food as she wants. I make almost all of it from healthy fresh ingredients, except for a few of those ella's fruit pouches as a snack if she is freaking out on the bus.

She is in the 98th percentile for weight and 75th for height, but my husband and friends and family keep commenting on how big/fat she is and keep asking what I feed her and telling me to stop feeding her so much.

When do children need to be restrained? Do I say no when she asks for more food?

I give DS Ella's pouches - the fruit ones - he drinks them a bit like a smoothie. They're easy to give on the go.

I have a similar dilemma, my 19mo is on the chubby side. We've basically stopped giving her the lardy stuff (cheese etc) as snacks. She just has oatcakes or fruit now. And normal meals. I wouldn't be hugely worried at this age, I think just keep an eye on it and they should start to slim down in the next year or so.

OP, my DD is 18 months, 14kg and 86 cm tall. She has a lovely pot belly and a bit of chunk on her thighs and arms. She has been walking since 11 months and basically never stops moving. She has breakfast, morning snack, lunch, afternoon tea and dinner plus 300ml of cows milk every day. She is in the 97th centile for both height and weight. I was a bit worried about her weight as both her dad and i used to be obese. Talking to the GP about it i was told that so long as her height and weight are tracking along the same centile then it would generally be fine. That said she went through a patch right before her last growth spurt where she seemed to pack on the weight for a coupe of weeks then she suddently shot upwards and is now back in proportion.

Young children are natural grazers so like little bits through out the day.

I give unlimited fruit/veg throughout the day but only offer very occasional biscuits/ice cream etc over a week maybe once or twice I find my DD self regulates well.

However she has been in the 98th centile for both height and weight since she was born and is just very tall and perfectly in proportion.

I've always just fed healthy snacks on demand, my DDs are now 8 and 10 and they are horrible if their blood sugar gets too low. Oat cakes, rice cakes, fresh fruit - all great, try to go for slow release stuff that will keep them going. They have 3 meals and at least 3 healthy snacks a day, sometimes more, and they know they are allowed to help themselves to fruit.

And as has been said before, don't worry about the chub - it will go away between ages 2 and 3 as long as the diet is healthy and your LO gets plenty of exercise.

The last thing you want is to make an issue of food by making it 'forbidden'.

I have a 7 month old who never stops eating (my older child has never had much of an appetite) and when I asked the health visitor yesterday she told me to carry on feeding my baby as much as she likes as she will regulate herself.

When my son (now 6) was young, we had worries about how little he weighed. He was in and out of hospital with numerous chest infections and I'm sure his low weight did not help his immune system. At one stage, the GP prescribed special milk to increase his weight. He is fine now (still very slender though) but I can tell you that being on the other side is horrible, when you can see your baby's ribs and you are constantly encouraging them to eat.

It sounds like you are offering a healthy, balanced diet (and I certainly wouldn't worry about the fruit pouches). If your DD enjoys her food then that's a great thing and encouraging her to enjoy an active lifestyle (getting outside with a ball, walking, playing in the park) will be far more beneficial than restricting her food in any way. As I've already said, a healthy and chubby baby/toddler is far nicer to see than a skinny one lying in a hospital bed.

Good luck and try to appreciate the fact that your little one obviously enjoys your cooking! :-)

I feed healthy food on demand. The only exceptions are if I've just put eczema cream on DS's face and don't want it wiped straight off, and I do sometimes limit the number of raisins he eats at once because the effect on his nappies is pretty grim.

He's 99.6th centile weight (height is in proportion) and lovely and chubby. He's bf on demand too, multiple times a day. He doesn't get as much exercise as he should though.

Agree with Rita re. protein foods - perhaps instead of giving her rice crackers and fruit, you give her some cheese, or whatver nut-based thing you think you can give her without choking. Personally i can't stand peanut butter (disgusting stuff) but it's very good as a protein food, spread on crackers or bread. There are other nut butters as well (almond is nice); there is also Nutella of course but that has chocolate and sugar in too so you might not want to go there. Cheese spreads on crackers = another option.

Instead of feeding her whenever, stick to 3 meals and 2 snacks a day, spaced reasonably evenly.