Toddler food refusal

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I really need help here.

Dd is 2 and 3 months. She’s now faltering growth as her weight fell a centile, her height had fallen at her previous check (born under 9th so one centile is faltering growth). She’s a nightmare with food. I’m obviously the worlds worst mother as we’ve had a rough go of it on introducing solids. I’ll give the greatest hits for some background and then describe our problem. We have an appointment with a dietitian on the 5th but honestly if there’s anything we could try in the interim I’d be eternally grateful.
So backstory: low birth weight and constant grief from HV about weight gain. Born 2nd centile and climbed to 9th by 6 months, ebf. Then in between 9/25 by 7. Got bollocking from HV and Told she needed to eat 3 full meals a day and not bowl fulls to make sure she gained weight. Did this and she lost weight. HV accused husband of under feeding her (didn’t ask what we fed her ) and said we need to do whatever it takes to make her eat, crying need to spoon it in as mouth open. This felt so wrong and she became painfully constipated. We went to blw and she was better.
By 1 she was just under 25th centile, HV did one yr check and was told again she needed to be eating more and now to stop breastfeeding and limit her because I was holding her back, but looking back she ate brilliantly. Pressure to eat more led to outright refusal and she dropped a centile. Told to cut out breastfeeding all together. I did the opposite and introduced more again and her eating picked back up and she climbed half a centile again.
MIL gave her really spicey food, think Thai green chillis. MIL had lied to us and said no chillis in it. This led to a total aversion even at nursery. We paid to see a private dietitian. Dietitian assessed her and she’s got no physical barriers to eating.

She got back on track and then I fell pregnant. I had awful sickness and couldn’t be around food as I’d be vomiting, meal times fell to DH, although I’d still do the prep. The few meals he asked me to sit through I ended up being sick in a bag. My dad then died and I was away for practically 2 weeks. At some point dh introduced distractions, not sure when as he’d obviously been lying to me, i found out when I came down one lunch and saw him giving her screen time to eat. So over the past few months she’s been super ill and fought going into her chair so we’ve been reliant on a distraction to get into the chair but somewhere along the line she’s stopped feeding herself. She will only do it here and there now, mainly for fruit, veg and biscuits. If left to her own devices I don’t think she’d eat. We’ve tried to whatever you eat you eat approach and she ate like a sparrow for 3 days (I mean like one bite of each meal max), we get her involved in cooking (which she loves) and it worked for a bit but now has stopped, making sure she’s got a safe foods on her plate (typically fruit or cheese) but she’ll just eat them and leave the rest, new plates and new cutlery, Spacing out her food so she’s got a good break, wash hands routine but she’ll just push things around and then say I’ve finished. She eats fine at nursery it’s just at home. The things she likes are very low calories like fruit and veg. She’s had a fbc done and is on a mild iron supplement to keep her iron levels up. She’s unwell very often which can’t help.

What can I do to help her to eat independently again? She’s iffy on trying new things, and goes off Things all of a sudden

I don't know that I've got anything useful to offer but I just wanted to say how the HV seems to have done an absolutely awful job and practically created the issue rather than resolve it. The HV seems to have totally misunderstood what centiles are. It's not worse being on the 7th or 25th centile than it is better being on the 75th. They are all normal. The fact she was on the 25th centile was absolutely fine and shouldn't have triggered any aggressive interventions. Suggesting you stop breastfeeding at 12 months is mad.

My instinct for where you are at the moment is to just give her all the things that she will eat, plus a multivitamin, and try to decompress to take any pressure or stress away from eating for a decent length of time. Then at some future point introduce things you know she eats at nursery in very small amounts alongside what she does eat at home. Don't mention the new food, don't cajole or persuade. Don't comment if she does touch it or even eat it.

Hi,

Wow, I can sympathise so much with your post lm in a similar situation actually.

Does your daughter have any allergies?
If she eats well at nursery this could be because she doesn't have the 'pressure' to eat there and they tend to eat better with their peers.

Are you still getting support from the Dietitian?

Some kids are just smaller, there have to be some on the 2nd percentile and some on the 99th percentile. The dropping centiles isn't great but it sounds like you need to take the pressure off, as long as there's nothing medically stopping her from eating.
Offer healthy meals with a safe food and let her decide how much to eat. It may take time but she will learn to trust again that there's no pressure and start eating?

I'm still going through this, and I'm not sure if it's even going to work!
My DD, 2.5yrs, born 25th percentile, then dropped to 9th, then 2nd and is now around 0.4 percentile.... also low iron and vitamin D.
Very happy child. Very small.... if we try to add more calories to her meals she just eats less overall. She had a bottle aversion at 5 months old because we were pressuring her to eat due to pressure from doctors etc.
She had a NG tube for 3 months but that was a nightmare.

Interested in other responses on your post.
It's so stressful and quite lonely.... x

You poor thing. Food has become so loaded for all of you.
Go back to basics and try to stop stressing.
Keep feeding her what she will eat and don't introduce new foods all the time.
Fruit and veg are great. What carbs will she eat and what proteins?
Little and often is fine too.
My DD has always been quite particular with food and likes simple food and is quite happy with repetition. Don't feel that you have to keep offering a wide variety. As long as it's sufficient, that's good enough right now.
My DD likes dry, crunchy foods, no sauces, nothing wet or wobbly. So breakfast would be dry cereal, toast and juice (still is) or maybe porridge or pancakes. Lunch would be pitta bread/crackers/bread sticks, carrot or cucumber slices, plus cubed cheese or maybe a couple of Quorn sausages. She's only recently started eating meat (she's a teenager) evening meal - pasta, rice, potato, with either a simple sauce (no lumps) plain cooked veg and veggie 'chicken' or real chicken. Along these lines! She has never eaten 'mixed up' food such as bolognaise or chilli. She's healthy and a decent weight, just likes simple unfussy food.
Keep mealtimes free of stress and expectations. Offer food, encourage but don't push it. Remove when done without comments. Try again later. Don't reheat leftovers and don't make clearing food or trying food conditions for treats.
Your DD isn't using food here to manipulate you, I think she has become a bit scared. Make it easy for her to gain confidence again.

Thanks for the replies! Honestly the HV started this huge fear that we were doing everything wrong and our instincts were crap. The accusations of underfeeding really impacted my husband. We saw a sleep consultant too who said she needed more.
She was sga and is outside of the mid parental range so is being referred to an endocrinologist but their first guidance is always to increase calories but without supplementation, it’s impossible.

We’re not on an nhs dietitian it’s a private one so about £200 a pop.

Dh is convinced that without help to eat she’d go hungry and fall even further, which we’re worried about. Feels like a no win situation. I’m also mad at dh for introducing the distractions in the first f’ing place, short term gain for long term pain

@Beamur she’s just got even more iffy, she used to and I mean last week eat pasta and then she’d need some help from us to have the mince meat but she’d eat. Same with rice. Potato wise only fries, gone off roasties and mash. Protein, she likes mince made as meatballs or little burgers (well used to), dairy, and eggs, used to like a salmon fishcake too but not anymore xx

I think a certain amount of reluctance around food is quite normal for toddlers and the messages about how we praise good eating isn't helpful to those of us with kids who are not interested in food.
How would she be with finger foods? Quantity might also be key - if she has a tiny appetite, does she get overwhelmed?
Do you eat with her or is she eating alone with you helping/watching?
Sorry for all the questions, just trying to see if I can suggest anything helpful.

No it’s super helpful @Beamur, most of her food can be eating finger food style but we give her a fork too. She physically can eat but she’s so stubborn this week she’s been a real mare. I think it’s dh he gets very triggered, especially with the weight drop and when food goes on the floor he gets agitated. I’m convinced this is part of the problem, the raving and ranting behaviour.

Maybe have been overwhelming her with the portion size.

9/10 we tend to be eating the exact same as her, and sitting down at meal time together. Doesn’t make a difference, sometimes I’m sure she’d eat better alone.

Praise sometimes helps but the dietitian said before that can come off as pressure to a fuss pot xx

Also now she can talk she just goes on about what she wants to watch on the tele, mainly paw patrol or my little pony.

She loves arts and crafts so when it’s rainy and when I was heavily pregnant we used to do that at the kitchen table (cleanable surfaces) so maybe she’s spending too much time in the kitchen in her chair?

All the stress and pressure needs to stop. Not cajoling to eat, no ranting and raving when she drops something or doesn't want it, no heaps of praise for eating. Serve safe foods and whatever else you're having and do not mention the food. Talk about normal things at the dinner table while you and DH eat and leave her to do whatever she wants without commenting on what she is or isn't doing. Serve her some dessert (fruit or yogurt) along with her main meal.

Also have you tried grazing platters instead? Some toddlers don't do well with sit-down larger meals, DD went through a phase where she was happier if we made up a platter of things like carrot sticks, cheese, fruit, breadsticks, and left it in reach for her and she could just help herself to whatever she wanted from it when she was hungry.

But essentially it sounds like meals have become so high pressure and loaded for her and that needs to just stop. That's how long-term food issues are born.

If dad is ranting and raving at meals than for now he needs to not be there when she eats.
Keep food she likes in her reach throughout the day (see if she starts nibbling after a few days), don't say anything about it (either way).
The best thing long term is to deescalate and take the pressure off.
Will she drink smoothies/milkshakes - things with calories in them?

Have a look at the Gentle Eating Book. There's a whole section with solutions.

Essentially:

Hold the praise and rewards
Remove the pressure
Don't stop trying different foods
Give them some control
Model healthy and relaxed eating
No screens or distractions
Try a grazing platter if three square meals isn't working
Try to relax!

I’ve found getting my toddler involved in the prep of food really helpful. Nothing major, I just sit her on the counter and she picks out some cereal from the bag and puts it in her bowl. Then she helps me pour the milk, that sort of thing. And also if we are eating together to have the meal in the middle of the table and she can choose what she has. I always put a small amount in her bowl. Might not work for you but definitely helped enormously for us. Good luck, it is very stressful when they won’t eat.

You poor thing, this sounds like a really difficult situation for you.
I was just thinking is there any safe food she has that can be mixed up. For example my fairly fussy 2.5 year old likes muffins, so can do a huge variety of muffins (cheese and bacon, carrot and raisin, courgette and chickpea etc) but she tends to be fine if I just tell her it's a muffin.
So maybe there's something she can feel safe with that you can mix up?
I don't know really but know it's bloomin hard and such a worry. Well done for all you do

*the raving and ranting behaviour wouldn't it put you off if every time you tried to eat, someone big and loud started ranting and raving at you??

Great idea @Starcaller, we actually had family style tacos for dinner tonight and it went down a treat. She ate a whole taco and then made a few more, took a few bites out of each of them and then gave them to me and her dad lol.

Think we’ll definitely keep tacos/ fajitas on the menu moving forward. She liked making things into wraps herself.

@negomi90 should we take the baby proofing off the cupboard, she’ll always happily go in the cupboard and chow down on some raisins and biscuits or chocolate.

@Buggysleeper
she loves cooking, we tend to do easy things that she can’t hurt herslef with like scrambling eggs or pizza. Pizza worked really well at getting her to t try different things, she now likes olives, raw mushrooms, spinach and onions. She used to eat the pizza well, i mean she’d eat half a pizza (sans crusts) but I’m not sure if we had it too often because she’s gone off it now. She made ‘mermaid’ dessert today, strawberry mousse, angel delight and some cream with a little natural food colouring lol. We’ll see if she eats that.

I feel so bad because, I’ve just been away (death, funeral etc and in hospital myself) and or ill with mo(u)rning sickness that dad just had to take over, she was fine before.

I wouldn’t even say she’s fussy as who likes raw onions lol. I think she’s a grazer but I know them id find food all over the house and mushed into the sofa

@SleepingStandingUp

*the raving and ranting behaviour wouldn't it put you off if every time you tried to eat, someone big and loud started ranting and raving at you??

This is what I tell him too! But he doesn’t think she’s shouting because he’s not effing and blinding. I even recorded him the other day and played it back to him and said what would you do and how would you feel if your boss spoke to you like that. She probably thinks she’s upsetting you

The ranting absolutely has to stop.
I'd try the platter approach too. Keep portions small but have regular snacks through the day, but equally keep these small too. Never comment on how much or little she's eaten. You could comments yourself though - like 'mm that cheese was nice' so that some positive messages around food are out there.
Don't worry too much about 'healthy' breakfast either. I felt very guilty once turning up for a nurse appointment and DD had been so slow with breakfast that we'd taken it with us and she was munching on Coco pops...he just smiled and said sometimes it didn't matter as long as they ate! I suspect both DD and her big sister are supertasters and some flavours are different to them, they've both been really sensitive to texture too. DSD is in her 20's and has made huge efforts to widen her palate but still can't abide lumpy food!
I used to offer DD lunch that was the usual triptych of carb/veg/protein (pitta, cheese and carrot for example) and something sweet at the same time. So fruit/biscuit too. So that the eating if the 'main' part had no bearing on the sweet part. She would just eat as much as she wanted of both and it makes the leverage of sweet less of an issue. She's 14 now and one result I think of our approach is she's excellent at self regulation and never over eats or comfort eats. She knows how much she wants and eats just that amount.

That is the worst advice I have ever heard from a health visitor. If you were crying and someone kept shoving food in your mouth then you would hardly associate food with positive things. Also massive choking risk!

Check out kids eat in colour on social media. Good tips there. She eats at nursery, so the food issue is at home. I would do a full reset. Only serve things she likes for a couple of weeks, before starting to introduce one less desired thing at a time. Play with food with no expectations of eating eg make vegetable funny faces, help with cooking for mummy and daddy, play with different textures, uncooked rice and some bowls and spoons. Above all absolutely no pressure to eat or try. It's there if you want it, leave it if you don't. This will take time.

Honestly, centiles can cause more problems than are helpful!
Dd was born on the 50th centile then dropped slowly down to the 9th, she was always small and remains so as an adult.
Somebody has to be on the top and bottom of the charts, all adults aren't the same size after all.
Was always a battle with mil as her other grandson ate and drank probably more than twice as much as dd, not surprisingly he ended up more than 6ft.
Food needs to be a relaxed affair from now on, no pressure and definitely no shouting!

@Namechangetimes100 if that cupboard only has things you're happy for her eat in it, then yes take off the lock and let her know its open.
Put some fruit/carrots a range of foods in it.
Or keep the lock on and leave a plate out with a variety of things. Whichever works best for you.
You need to take off the pressure. Right now, getting her to consume calories happily is your priority, then you can start moving her to more distinct meal times.

Solid Starts on Instagram has excellent advice for picky eaters or food refusers.

I’d just make it very relaxed, floor picnic with you, sharing plate etc for lunch. No TV/phone/iPad. Her choosing from a platter family-style. You could do a little snack box that she has access to in between meals so she can go and pick.

Anything really that gives her that control over what she eats.

It’s our dried goods cupboard @Beamur so it’s like rice, pasta lentils etc and biscuits. She’s a biscuit fiend. I’m intrigued by the grazing plate, tell me more. Do you keep it in the kitchen and she just goes around and gets something if she wants it or do you have it in the lounge and just stick to dry foods? I think she’d like that but we sometimes have the tele on, especially when I’m feeding the baby. Would that be a problem? Do you still give lunch to stick to some sort of meal time but then no stress If they don’t eat it?

Sorry million questions

Sorry tagged the wrong poster meant to tag @negomi90 in the above… baby brain xx

I can sympathize, I have lots of experience with fussy eaters. My older DC is 6 now but has severe sensory issues with food and it all became so much easier when we just accepted it and we just give him what he likes (around 5-6 basic things).

My younger DC is just turned 2 and he's much better with food but it has to be on his terms. If we put him in the chair he will refuse most things but if we set him on the table and put some food there he'll wander back and forth and eat some of it. Also, if we sit down to eat he'll come over and want it and he ends up eating lots that way. I would recommend just going with the flow, don't worry about set meal times right now, introduce new things slowly.

Would she eat more if you made picnic meals? Let her help prepare the picnic, maybe get her a little picnic basket & then put a blanket down & let her enjoy her food in a relaxed setting. Will she drink milkshakes & smoothies? If she will then make them with whole milk or even cream, add calories in any way you can, ice cream, custard, fruit syrups, freeze fruit to add. Make a game of adding different fruits & guessing what colour the drink will be.