lost it at dinner time with my 15 month ds. sick with guilt

[mfea]

DS. being extremely picky with food atm. I served up up lasagna, mash, sausages with skin off, and finally toast. All rejected. He wanted nothing. I threw the plate on the floor and shouted at him. He looked scared and upset.

Later on in the bath he had yogurt and cheerios.

I feel sick to my stomach. I really shouted, albeit briefly. And then I quite roughly copper him out of highchair and put him on the floor.

I do not deserve my precious boy.

Any advise or shared experiences would be hugely gratefully received

Quick question.... if my son does not want his food, should I really just tidy up and wait until the morning?

Genuien question, there is no 'tone' there.

He is 15 months old. I thought that tactic may work with older children, but is it appropriate with this age?

Reason I ask is that it has crossed my mind to do that, but at 15 months old I did not think he would be capable of grasping the concept that if you don't have x then you will have nothing until the morning.

However, if it has worked for some of you, then I shall certainly give a try.

and agree with chipping too, make sure each meal has a good proportion of things you knoiw he will/is likely to eat

I woudl give him 20 minutes to eat it, not making a fuss, and if he hasnt then with no tone, just take it away

Megs advice very good

But youre not punishing him by taking away the meal, he's not intersted in it so he's not playing a game with you that 'needs' to be punished for

Young children are very basic in their neeeds- eat when they are hungry, sleep when they are tired

My DS was often fussy at the same age at teatime and would barely eat a mouthful. I always made sure he had a big beaker of milk before bedtime and that would see him through until the morning.

mfea I think in his case it isn't a "if you don't eat this there will be nothing else"
because he isn't doing it to get a reaction or because he wants to go and play or whatever

he is doing it because he simply doesn't want to eat! he either isn't hungry, in which case he won't mind waiting til breakfast. or he doesn't like it in which case just give him more of the bits he does like, or he is coming down with something and again if that's the case then he won't want anything to eat later anyway

nothing wrong with offering a small snack, or extra milk at bedtime though

You are all so incredibly kind, thank you.

So touched that you have said about being rough. It is that dimension of it that is particularly painful to recall. I spend my life watching over him, trying to stop him from falling off the bed or trapping fingers in door etc., and then I go and roughly manhandle. Totally perverse.

O'k I will try your suggestions. At the back of my mind I worry about him not sleeping well because of hunger, but so be it.

IME, you can only try and see what happens mfea

if he wakes in the night, he may be hungry, he may not be, but i'm sure if he does have an empty tummy, it won't be enough to stop him sleeping for one night. it won't take many occassions before he realises when is a good time to fill up.

You were not excessively rough with him - he looked surprised because it was unusual, not because it hurt him. They are rufty tufty little things. I bet you have been far rougher with him when playing! We have all done the 'pulling them out of the highchair/buggy and dumping them unceremoniously on the floor.

Does he still have milk at night? If he does, he'll fill up on that and eat a big breakfast if he's hungry. If not I'd give him a drink of something then offer something not messy that he can have in his jammies (toast/crackers/rice crackers) but he may still not want it. I'd try altering his meal time first though.

Feeding offspring is an instinct - it's how we are hardwired. We have to make a conscious decision to accept that they will not starve themselves and they know their own bodies and we need to stop trying to over ride that.

You are probably reading too much into his behaviour tonight and he's probably just tired or coming down with one of the bugs going around. They have short memories - especially after lots of cuddles and cheerios in the bath :)

I do sympathise, having 2 crap eaters.

This is a great book, really helped me with those awful struggles: Child of Mine: Feeding with Love and Good Sense by
Ellyn Satter

If it's any consolation, despite being really poor eaters, my 2 are healthy, energetic and strong. I think we over-estimate how much they need. Just keep offering and don't take rejection to heart!
Xx

Much sympathy, have been there too with dd who lived on fresh air at that age. Extremely stressful as was so worried about lack of weight gain and growth - she was a tiny baby and very little as a toddler. I agree with everything Chipping has said - she is absolutely right children will not starve themselves. DD was a very poor eater until she was about 3 and then going to nursery really helped - now she eats well, actually has fairly "adult" tastes in food, is nearly as tall as me and has huge feet (she's 12). Your little one will NOT starve himself and don't be hard on yourself - we've all been there as it is frustrating and worrying.

Sympathies - my DS used to be a fairly rubbish eater, he has recently improved. I used to do the "Silent Scream" in another room, do a dance of frustration and scream fuckingeatyourfuckingfuckingdinner but silently.

Now, prompted by DH, I just serve up food to him and leave him to it. He eats a million times better if I'm pottering about. If it's really bad the telly goes on.

If he leaves it, I know he is getting some milk before bed and 9/10 times it means he's coming down with something.

You have my big sympathies - eating and food is a very very emotive area.

I'm with the 'he might be coming down with something' school of thought. Every single time one of my dcs has totally refused to eat, tyey have come down with a temperature or thrown up in the next 12 hours! He will fill up on milk at bedtime ifhe wants, but don't push him to eat if he is not hungry. They really do know what they are doing at that age!
(and don't beat yourself up, just notice the triggers and try to walk away)

DO NOT put a lot of effort into a toddler's food. It is not worth the angst. 15 months is probably just starting to get picky and it could go on for a few years, so you need to find a way to relax about it now. Easy food doesn't mean bad food, just quick to prepare or left overs from your meal. If he doesn't want it, at 15 months I would offer toast or yoghurt or banana. If he still doesn't want it, he is probably not hungry. Robyn Barker (The Mighty Toddler - great book) says toddlers often will only eat one decent meal every two or three days - true in my case.

You've had some great advice about feeding him. With regards to the being rough, it doesn't sound like you actually hurt him and you apologised and made up for it with cuddles. Not being a perfect parent is actually a really important part of children growing up, seeing that people make mistakes and then put them right/make up for it. It also means they take those little steps towards being independent, a tiny bit at a time. So don't beat yourself up, being a perfect parent 100% of the time is bad for your child...

tryingtoleave I'm glad that you said that about them eating well every few days. I noticed this. My kids eat so randomly that I now look at the whole day/weeks food, and make sure it is balanced. It is impossible to give them a balanced meal. My son (2) once ate 7 apples in one day

I've also noticed that they will go mad for something at my Mum's house, so I rush out and buy some but the next day they refuse to eat it

yyy to recall - DS one night ate about 10 blueberries and I silently rejoiced. He has refused them ever since.

I can't remember the name of the book but I got a couple of good tips from one which have helped me:

• Toddlers won't eat if they're thirsty. Try just giving a bit of water if they're not eating; then they may just eat the food! (Not too much water, don't fill up the tummy with that.)
• Toddlers won't eat, even if hungry, if there's too much food on their plate. It's offputting. Try much smaller portions, you can always put more on the plate if they finish up.
• Toddlers won't eat if they're not hungry. Like s/o else said, we choose their mealtimes, not them! Last night my DS refused his dinner, so we just let him have his bath and a play, but left the food out. He came back and ate a lot of it later.
• Let them take their time. My DS took nearly an hour to eat his dinner at that age. Lots of patience and yes playing with the food, periods where none is being eaten. Then he'll come back to it.

Not saying these ideas lead to perfection in toddler mealtimes - but they have helped us a lot! HTH.

I have been here too. My dd1 was and still is a terrible eater, she is only on the 0.4th centile too so this just increased my obsession with trying to make her eat. I would put huge amounts of effort into what she ate, this made the frustration that I would feel when she wouldn't even take one spoon even worse. Like you OP my happiness was totally dependent on whether or not she ate that day. One day when she was around the same age I got so mad I threw her bowl on the floor and it was ceramic and broke. I am still ashamed of myself almost two years later. she was seeing a specialist who advised as Cybbo has to only offer the food for 20 mins in a low stress environment, you don't want the child to associate food with stress. No distractions and don't keep offer food throughout the day if he refuses, which I used to do. My dd2 isn't great either so as much as possible I serve finger foods, ie, homemade fish fingers (batch made the frozen), pasta and sweetcorn, you know so you don't have the added stress of trying to feed them , let them do it. It does help me to keep calmer when I am not trying to get my younger one now to open her mouth for me! Good luck.

pmsl...all these posts made me giggle.

Christ we're so fucking precious these days. WE'RE HUMAN!!! we are human!!! whoever started this crazy trend of thinking that we're developing spirits on our way to enlightenment and that the only way to get there is to behave like a nonchalant android 24/7 needs shooting.

You are a good mother for shouting at your son - he was being a little arse wipe so let him know that in a natural way. What would you rather have? your children never seeing a true response?

Don't forget that whilst we're raising our happy, contended little cherubs in an environment of perpetual calm and reason there are, all over the world, little children being born who will have to become soldiers. They will have to stab, shoot, punch to death other humans to defend what is theirs. So, unless you intend to change the world and make us peaceful creatures (not going to happen, we're top of the food chain) you'll have to reconcile yourself with the fact that your child may witness things in his or her life that might not be nice.

In short - get over it.

clarrykitten - read the bloody thread will you please, before you post dismissive and offensive posts.

i really shouted at my fifteen month old son. why? because he hit me? swore at me? intentionally smashed something? No! because he didn't eat what I wanted him to eat. That's it.

And then i roughly pulled him from his high chair and dumped him try firmly on the floor. the poor love was absolutely stricken, and rightfully so. No one deserves that kind of treatment. not an adult, a child and sure as hell not a baby.

i am not some sort of mother earth creature who will never shout at her children. However i am profoundly concerned at your attitude, not just condoning shouting and rough treatment of a baby, but actually encouraging it.

this was an incredibly helpful thread for me, when i was feeling utterly rotten about my loud, aggressive and rough treatment of my darling boy. and yet you think it appropriate to wade in with your less than helpful comments

Clarrykitchen, I don't think there is anything wrong with reflective parenting and with wanting to be a good parent and role model. Yes there are some children born into terrible situations both abroad and at home, that doesn't make any of us losing control and going bananas any more acceptable. We are adults, we are talking about babies here. My dd didn't know what the hell was going on and was visibly shaking, as Mfea said because she wouldn't eat her dinner. Anyone I know with small children would be ashamed of themselves for this kind of behaviour. It shocks me that you think that this is ok and actually think that they deserve it.

errr...didn't actually condone throwing babies against the wall simply that if a mum has a good old 'fuck off you little shit bags' rant at her kids from time to time it can only do them good. Christ you lot are highly strung.