Help with 18 month old eating

[Namechangemum100]

Looking for some reassurance regarding DD eating.

She was very slow to wean, and still at 18 months is barely eating a thing. For example, today she has eaten half a slice of toast for breakfast, refused all lunch and just had a bottle before her nap, then she ate a few pom bears whilst at the zoo and has refused to eat any dinner. She will have her usual bottle before bed so probably averages about 10-15oz of milk a day.

She feeds in the night maybe once a week.

She is a healthy weight.

She is offered food at every meal (today's food is a bad example of the types of food she eats, i promise its usually more nutritious and don't want that to take the focus away from the problem).

I just don't know how to encourage her to eat more or whether I should just go with the flow?

She turns her nose up at pretty much everything bar toast, fish fingers, bread sticks, strawberries and banana. We try to give her new foods most days, but nothing makes a difference.

Just the way she is or am I missing something?

Today since she has refused dinner she will be going to bed with just a bottle as she screams in her highchair and short of force feeding her the girl just will not even entertain the idea. I can't not give her the bottle at lunch or before bed as she will have virtually had nothing all day.

Please help!

My twins are also 18 months and go through phases like this (although I appreciate a phase is very different to never having eaten). When they're like it I usually revert back to Ella's kitchen fruit and veg pouches and work out way back up. Have you tried those? Or Heinz baby porridge, that usually goes down well.

What she is eating sounds okay, and fairly balanced so no panic there, but I understand you want more variety.

Have you spoken to the health visitor? They might have some pearls of wisdom or even just reassurance.

Its been a while for me but my youngest was tube fed for a long time and we were told it would be really hard to get him to eat.

Every meal time I would put all kinds of stuff on his plate and then I would clean it out of his hair and off the floor and we would start again at the next sitting.

All around me people were losing their minds about whether he was eating enough (And he WAS thin) but I just kept going with letting him rub yoghurt and ham and raisins into his ears, hair and down his bum crack ....

Eventually though some started to go in and I was clearing up less and less... he started to eat in his own time and today there is no tube...

He is still lean, and he eats 24/7... a grazer rather than a 3 meals a day type.... he also seems to be naturally drawn to an atkins type diet... he eats meats and cheeses but has no interest in breads or white carbs....

I suppose my message from my experience is keep patient. Try not to let your anxiety be readable ... and they do get there.

Good luck x

Are you sitting down with her and eating the same meals? I'd make it low key (hard when you're stressing about her eating!), serve everybody the same thing, let her eat herself and at the end of the meal, clear up whatever has happened and offer fruit, banana, Greek yogurt.

Good luck!

Have you let her try to feed herself, as independence can play a part in it.
Does she eat if you just put it on a plate as a snack in the living room and not in her high hair, just thinking maybe being she hates being restrained?
Does she only go in high hair when the food is ready, so she's not in their waiting, then bored by time the food arrives? It's heartbreaking and frustrating when they won't eat, it's so worrying. Sorry non of these probably help but hope it gets better soon.

It's a totally normal phase (though not all toddlers go through it) so try not to worry.

You might like the book My Child Won't Eat, by Carlos Gonzales. Or Ellen Satter's Division of Responsibility in Feeding, which you can see online: www.ellynsatterinstitute.org/how-to-feed/the-division-of-responsibility-in-feeding/

I also had a very, very reluctant eater and he wanted to breastfeed all the time and people told me this was the problem. It wasn't - if I restricted his milk he just became distressed and ate even less. He was not being filled up by milk - he would let me know this quite clearly in the middle of the night! When he did finally start to eat at about 22 months just suddenly overnight with absolutely no fanfare, he didn't drop or change his milk intake, and continued to feed regularly for another year. I don't think the milk was ever the problem and it was probably filling some nutritional gaps.

I got so desperate that I tried stupid things like letting him fill up on ridiculous amounts of crisps (so he would "learn to be full" ) and letting him eat in front of the TV. None of it worked, it just created more bad habits/expectations which are still there and he is 9 now!

I think it can be their personalities. DS is still much more of an eat-to-live personality. He doesn't love food and he's not particularly interested in eating unless either it's something particularly delicious or there is nothing else interesting going on.

We tend not to eat with her because she eats at unusual times.

She is usually up around 530ish and has breakfast at 630, its way too early for me and I just can't stomach it until later in the day.

She has lunch at 11 due to early waking and her nap starting at 1130-1, so again, too early. Dinner is usually at 430-5 as she is in bed at 630 so again, too early, plus having dinner with my husband in peace once the children are in bed is my little peace of sanity for the day.

We have tried letting her pick at food rather than restrain her in the highchair, it does tend to be more effective, but I worry that it's not instilling a good attitude towards eating and would rather she eats in her chair.

Anyone elses children not follow a 3 meal a day pattern, as if she had it her way she would snack through the day but I don't allow it as I felt it wasn't the right thing to do, I'm now rethinking that though and maybe I should just let her eat when hungry and forget set meal times?

@bertiebotts your post is very reassuring and I will definitely but looking at that book, thank you so much :)

It does help IME if you can sit with them while they eat even if you just have a cup of tea or something and a little snack. At this age they very much like to copy you and it's easier to enforce "It's mealtime now" if people aren't off doing other activities.

I don't think there's much problem with a grazing approach though if you can handle the mess - it is a bit more natural for toddlers in fact, and you can transition more to proper meals by about 3 (at which point she'll likely have more of a routine in terms of nursery etc.)

@bertiebotts...I personally don't have a problem with the mess caused by snacking, I'm pretty relaxed about peanut butter fingers on my windows so perhaps I should go back to this approach.

Yeah so maybe it is the restraints of the high chair but yes I agree with keeping good eating practices, and not making a rod for your own back in years to come.
As previously said I think it's really important at this stage to eat with them as mimicking /copying is how they learn at this stage. Surely you could manage a piece a toast or a snack at lunch like a bit if fruit and yoghurt if it is going to help your child's development and progress