One DC needs to gain weight, the other doesn’t - how do I manage this?

[Bubbinsmakesthree]

I have two DC 6 and 4. The 6 year old has low interest in food and is quite fussy - as a result he is getting increasingly skinny to the point I think he really needs to put on a few pounds. The 4 year is on the other hand has a voracious appetite, hoovers up anything put in front of him and certainly doesn’t need more calories than he currently gets.

How can I try to bulk up DS6s diet without DS4 getting the too much? I can’t rely on portion sizes as DS6 often leaves food on his plate.

If you have soup, stir some cream into ds6’s portion.
Bagels are quite calorific, especially with full fat cream cheese. Do you reckon your dc will notice if dc6 gets a normal bagel (with full fat cream cheese) whilst the other gets bagel ‘thins’ www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/287853081 with lighter cream cheese?
Hot chocolates: one made with Cadbury Highlights (or similar) which is made up with water, the other made from something a bit richer like Twinings and full fat milk.
Porridge: one made with semi-skimmed milk and the other with full-fat milk (possibly even a dash of cream or condensed milk too) and a spoon of almond butter stirred in.

You could also add milk and maybe cheese to ds6’s mashed potato, and nothing to ds4’s. Neither will realise that the other has something different. Ditto for sausages - regular for ds6. ‘Lean’ sausages for ds4.

What centile are their BMIs?

I'd put their height and weight into the NHS BMI calculator before worrying.
My oldest sits around a perfectly healthy 10th centile on that. Aged 6 he looked like a twig, especially compared to some in his class. But he was healthy, strong and active. If your 6 yr old doesn't lack energy and is healthy on the NHS charts, I'd leave well alone.

@Fivemoreminutes1

You could also add milk and maybe cheese to ds6’s mashed potato, and nothing to ds4’s. Neither will realise that the other has something different. Ditto for sausages - regular for ds6. ‘Lean’ sausages for ds4.

I don't think the OP is putting her 4 year old on a diet PP, she's just saying the 6 year old needs to gain weight...

I would definitely have noticed if my brother had had cheesy mash! I don't think you need to go feeding a 4 Yr old lean sausages or light cream cheese, their diet is presumably fine as is

I'd focus more on breakfasts and lunches as these are things that are easier to make different. So maybe cream in porridge or made with full fat milk, extra butter in sandwiches? Or cream in soup. Maybe give the 6yr old an extra snack? Cheese toasties with a bit of extra cheese or ham? Its really hard to know without knowing what they eat but just adding things like cream, cheese, full fat milk, nut butters, avocado etc. To the 6yr old normal breakfasts and lunches

I’ve just calculated their BMIs - 6yo is 5th and 4yo is 98th!

I know that suggests I’ve got more of a problem with the 4yo than the 6yo but the 4yo is a ‘big boned’ child if ever there was one, has been since birth (not only tall but very broad, huge head, hands etc). Whereas The 6yo has been above the 50th centile most of his life and has been getting noticeably skinnier (but hasn’t grown much lately either so can’t put it down to a growth spurt).

But whether it’s the 6yo who needs more or the 4yo who needs less, they’re definitely at opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of their dietary needs.

If the 6yr old has crossed centiles in BMI, you need a GP appointment.

Has the 4yr old always been 98th? Because that is obese. I'd see the GP separately about him.

If I take them to the GP what will they say? It’s no great mystery - 6yo doesn’t eat enough and 4yo eats too much.

I had to put on weight as a child my parents got some sort of special milkshake powder from the doctors. So I had the 'special milkshake' and my brother had normal milkshake. We obviously didn't know at the time.

Your 6 yr old could have diabetes, for a start. Or something else. Probably not, but 50th centile to 5th is worrying.

I’ll go through what they ate today:

Breakfast: raisin bagel thin with butter and a little honey. DS4 also had half a banana, DS6 didn’t want one. Glass of milk each.

Lunch: slice of toast and 2x scrambled eggs. DS6 didn’t want to eat his eggs, DS4 tried to take them off his plate but I stopped him and encouraged DS6 to eat them. I think DS6 ate them but DS4 eating DS6’s leftovers isn’t uncommon.

Snack: babybel cheese (both had one, only given because DS4 was pestering that he was hungry).

Dinner: 3x homemade pork meatballs, large handful spaghetti with creme fraiche and Parmesan, small handful green beans. DS4 left the beans, DS6 left the meatballs (again I had to rescue meatballs from being hoovered up by DS4). Pudding (really unusual for us to have a ‘proper’ pudding - normally fruit/yogurt) of chocolate sponge with ice cream which both demolished.

DS4 helped himself to a banana after dinner and DS6 had an apple. Both had glass of milk before bed. Other than the milk they drank water only.

Tbh this does not seem like much food at all. If your ds doesn’t eat his eggs then he only gets a slice of toast for lunch. I would have offered peanut butter sandwhich then or ham sandwhich or beans on the side of the eggs.

If my dc doesn’t eat much of something; I will add something else to add fat or protein such as nuts, cheese, beans, avocado, yogurt etc.

If I did not do this, they both would be underweight for sure, as they currently eat loads and are both stick thin. The only pudgy one is my 14 month old baby (but then again all my babies were and slimmed from age 2/3).

I’ve always gone for the ‘present food, they eat it or don’t’ approach to dealing with DS6’s fussy eating. The problem is obviously that quite often he leaves stuff on his plate so gets less than DS4 who is more . I normally try to mix things up so I’m not giving too much that DS6 isn’t keen on (he normally loves scrambled egg so I don’t know what had got into him yesterday), but he’s only really enthusiastic about beige food.

I would take your 6 year old to the GP straight away. If he is in 6th centile for BMI that is extremely low. Are you sure you calculated correctly? My friends dc was in 9th centile and was kept in hospital until she regained some weight. The loaded her up w junk such as sticky toffee pudding. Hospital actually told her to feed her daughter these types of pudding after meals to help her gain! So I would not be so strict on what you feed him if he is too under weight. I get that you mean well. I have a picky eater as well and sometimes it’s more then just picky eating. We are taking him to see someone about it. A lot of kids prefer beige food. But if they eat anything else make sure to give it. Another friend of mine was told to give her dd icecream after meals to help her gain weight!

My ds is ultra picky, but he will eat a few healthy things such as salmon, broccoli, nuts and chicken. He also will eat beef sometimes. But isn’t keen on fruit (other then fresh squeezed orange juice). Drives me mad. But we try to incorporate the healthy things into a lot of his meals. And he eats lasagna and bolognese so I purée veggies into those sauces.

Also, you could try adding healthy oils to his beige food. There are healthy oils that they can’t taste that you can add to help gain weight.

My DS has a 5% BMI MamaBear and he's in the healthy range - I think underweight is 3% or under on the BMI scale.

OP I feel for you, my nieces have the same problem. There’s 3 years between them and eldest niece is quite underweight and under the care of a paediatrician she actually weighs less than her sister now.

My niece was prescribed build up shakes, but younger niece always wants them too. In allowing older niece to have all the treats paediatrician recommends younger niece does too. The only one really gaining weight is younger niece!

They would definitely know if they were getting different foods. If they were at school I would suggest packing different snacks etc but obviously that’s not an option either.

Don’t the centiles cover the whole ‘acceptable’ range? Therefore yes, some kids will be smaller than others but isn’t it only a cause for concern if they are outside the entire range?

According to the NHS website, healthy BMI for a child is between the 2nd and 91st centiles.

They both need to eat to appetite.
Not really understanding why you can't put slightly more on the 6yr old's plate each meal.

From your post it doesn't look like ds6 ate much less than his brother. I'd be worried about such an extreme change of centiles though so would speak to the Dr.

I have 4 and 5 yr old boys, they both eat reasonably well but will also both go through phases of eating more, or less.

@ragged

They both need to eat to appetite. Not really understanding why you can't put slightly more on the 6yr old's plate each meal.

Because DS6 doesn’t tend to clear his plate. I’ll try giving him bigger portions of food he likes to see if he’ll eat a bit more. But they do tend to notice that kind of inequity.

My friends dc was in 9th centile and was kept in hospital until she regained some weight

Either there’s a miscommunication here or there was more to it. If that were true, nearly 1 in 10 children would be in hospital on the sticky toffee pudding diet.

I’ve discussed this with DH and we have a few ideas. Sometimes we let them choose what they’re eating so we can try to use that to our advantage. This morning DS4 wanted cereal for breakfast and DS6 wanted toast. So DS4 got a small bowl of cereal and DS6 got 2 slices of toast thickly buttered.