My 16mo only eats a good amount of food if he gets to watch telly at the same time

[strawberrycheesecake1989]

Is that really bad??

I just find he’ll be distracted or try and chuck the plate on the floor. Not all the time but most of the time. I’ve tried starting out with nothing on laptop and I’ll put classical music on which helps a bit but I find he’ll only really go for it with the food if he gets to watch a kids cartoon at the same time. So for most meals of the day this is the case.

Am I setting really bad habits??? He wasn’t crazy into food and the whole weaning process was quite stressful.

Other than mealtime he doesn’t watch cartoons. Is this ok??

Ftm if it’s not obviously haha

Does the whole family eat at the same time? Give him the same food as you, variety of colours and textures, describe the food you are eating, sing and chat at the table etc, make the dining table a fun place to be

I've got this book on kindle with lots of tips called getting the little buggers to eat. It's got lots of helpful Dos and Don'ts that are easy to follow, I recommend it

Hi 👋🏼
I would say this is a habit you’ll want to get out of as soon as possible. Is baby feeding themselves or are you spoon feeding?

The best way is to sit together and eat family meals wherever possible. Engage baby in conversation and model yourself eating the food. I would go cold turkey on the TV completely

It's fine if it doesn't bother you. I got into this habit with both DS1 and 2 and I hate it so I wish I'd never started it, but there's nothing inherently awful about it. DH and I often eat in front of the TV as well. Much as I would love to have jolly family mealtimes we adults are generally frazzled and on our last nerve by dinner time!

I mean if you really drill it down what are you worried about, what problems do you think it is causing? Generally none. So don't stress if it's working for you.

If you would prefer to have family dinners then look at how you can make that work, but don't change something that works just because you think you "shouldn't" do it. Life is too bloody short to judge yourself with pointless shoulds.

Don’t worry about it if it is the only thing working at the moment! I definitely went through phases of having to do this. It’s fine, and probably better for your sanity if you aren’t having a battle every meal time.

my DS will hardly eat anything that’s not crackers, bread or fruit TV on or not. If it’s distracts him enough that he will eat a healthy meal I wouldn’t be in a rush to change it:

Thanks for your replies! Well I guess because it means that in total he’s probably watch about an hour and a half of tv a day and I guess I’m just worried that I’m frying his brain.

We do a combination of baby led and spoon feeding. He’s ok with the spoon but also happily let’s me feed him. And yes for most meals we are eating together. We don’t have much of the same thing but that’s mainly because I’ll often be having something spicy or a salad but he’s welcome to try something off my plate whenever he wants so long as it’s safe for him to eat.

I always start the meal without the tv or ill try the radio but sometimes he literally will refuse to eat. I put his show on and 1 second later hes opening hes happily finishing off the plate.

I just think he’s so distracted and busy during the day I think he just doesn’t have the patience or interest to eat a lot?

M’y Hope was just that as he gets older and more and more into food the cartoons won’t be necessary just started getting worried that I could be causing him developmental issues by him staring at a screen for that long each day

Well ,it's not great. He might be eating too much as he is distracted. Better to learn to recognise when you are full. It's also better to eat together. This will teach him table manners, the art of conversation and as he grows up dinner time will give the family a good opportunity to chat and stay connected.

I wouldn't be happy with that as a habit. It's not a great association. I don't know why, maybe its my inner snob! We don't eat dinner in fornt of the TV so I certainly wouldn't have eaten children doing it.

I'd just go cold turkey tbh. Also I'd stop spoon feeding him at 16 months.

I would go cold turkey on it too as pp said. Can you do other things if he needs distraction? When my toddler is being off food and needs a bit of distraction, we read books together while we eat, or do puzzles at the table. Something like that has to be better than that much TV?

The downsides to it are:

• Lack of interaction and chat that can happen at mealtimes. You can mitigate this by actively having conversations at other times
• Less awareness of what they are eating and when they are full, potentially leading to over eating
• Screens aren't amazing for under 2s but I don't think they are harmful as long as there is sufficient time for other play

I would drop screens from some meal times, so maybe start with a screen free lunch. If he doesn't eat much, he can make up for it at dinner. I would also expect some distraction and dropping food on the floor. I just give it back! Does he have finger food to feed himself or his own spoon to hold?

@BendingSpoons yep he feeds himself with the spoon and there’s always some form of vegetable on the side as finger food or depending on the kind of pasta, if it’s penne he’ll feed himself.

Thanks definitely going to try some other distractions.

Hi,

I was wondering how you’re feeding has been going now with your little one? As I am in the same boat with my 10 month old and only eating when watching YouTube. Thanks x