What do I do with son who won't eat proper meals all of a sudden? Starve him into submission?!

[bohemianbint]

I jest, of course! He will eat some, but only if he can do it himself. Which is at best hit and miss cos he's only just learnt how to use a spoon.

He's nearly 17 months and always been a brilliant eater, and he'll still have a good breakfast (today he had 2x weetabix, milk, toast and half a banana!) but the last few days I've made him lovely healthy fresh lunch and tea - and he won't touch any of it. And it's not that he doesn't like what I've given him, he just won't eat it. He won't eat any fruit other than bananas - he just laughs at me, but will (usually) eat any veg you put in front of him.

I've been giving him snacks of oat cakes or cereal bars after his nap, but then he's gone on to refuse his tea.

So here's the thing - if he refuses his main lunch, do I still give him a yogurt or something afterwards? Or assume he's not hungry but will be later? I don't want him starving but I don't want him mainly surviving on toast instead of veg and getting malnutrition!

Any advice?

Give him nothing but meals until he is eating them properly again. If he refuses or messes about with his meal tell him a stern NO if he carries on take it away and give nothing til next meal time, he'll soon get the message, you have to do it like that everytime though even if he hasn't eaten previously don't give in with other things jsut so he's had something or he won't see the point of going back to his meals. Being firm in short term will be better long term imo.

Ds has gone like this, I tend to go for finger foods and dip most lunch times which always seems to go down well. At tea time I just make him a normal tea and if he eats it great if not I just take it away. He always has milk before bed

I think the snacks are meaning he isn't hungry enough for his dinner so if you just drop those you will propbably be fine hth

THanks for speedy feedback! I'm just extra worried because he's refused to drink milk from about 12 months and will only have it on cereal or via cheese, yogurt, rice pudding etc, and he's a veggie as well so I'm always extra vigilant to make sure he's getting all the right stuff. Which at the moment, he isn't!

So it's definately not a bit tight expecting him to go from 11.45am - 5pm with nothing in between? I think I'd struggle with that!

DS also became a milk refuser too, what we do now is mix milk with a fromage frais yogurt and call it "milkshake" he loves them!

If he's having such a big breakfast, he may well not be hungry for lunch. Is it possible to make lunch later?

When DD went through a phase like this, if she said she didn't want lunch, I used to start eating mine & she usually changed her mind...

That sounds like a huge breakfast, DS is 21mths and he usually has about 1 weetabix, then a mid morning snack at about 11.00. He eats very little if I give him lunch before 1.00pm so I usually put him down for a nap around 12.00pm and give him lunch when he wakes up and seems to eat more then.

I would assume he isn't hungry, sounds like a huge breakfast. I would let him have a later lunch or a snack though, my ds1 went through a phase where he wouldn't eat much but he was happy and healthy and after a while he went back to normal.

I think you shouldn't make an issue of it. My ds2 is now nearly 12 months and we've done BLW so he always feeds himself, he eats loads some days but not as much the next, all depends how they're feeling. Just like I will eat more some days than others, best to go by their own feelings of hungry rather than trying to make them eat when they may not be hungry as only they know how hungry they are. It's not good to get them ignoring the signs of being full as it could lead to overeating.

I'd do lots of finger foods, always provide child with a spoon and not expect to spoon things into their mouth for them unless they want you to.

I'd feed child when they seem to be hungry, and I'd count up what they eat over a week or even a fortnight rather than worrying about whether they are eating all the right things every day.

Given control over what he puts in his mouth when, he'll eat when he's hungry and not when he isn't, which is what you are trying to aim at, presumably :-)

thanks everyone. Normal service seems to have been resumed; we have cut down on the breakfast size and he's quite happily munched loads of really healthy stuff today. I think the main thing is he just wants to do it himself, which is fine. It's so lovely to watch him feed himself - he literally only grasped it a week ago!

Thanks for all the feedback.