12mo dd still hardly eating anything

[zambooloo]

I wonder if anyone can advise me? Our dd has always been a poor eater. She refuses to even try most foods. After months of trying she will consistently only eat blueberry pancakes, crumpets with marmite and hot cross buns. She will occasionally eat a mouthful of porridge, cheese on toast, roasted carrot. She will not even try any fruit or veg other than the carrot even though things are offered to her regularly.

It took 5 months to get her to drink water from a beaker! She is so stubborn she just refuses everyhthing. We keep mealtimes fun & stop offering if she starts to get upset.

She is still getting all her nutrients from formula. We offer food first but she won't eat. She still has 4 bottles of formula a day. Do I carry on with this or move onto cows milk? Will she get what she needs from cows milk?

I don't even know if I should be worrying about this or not? I just feel sad & like I'm failing her when I see all her friends eating fruit & veg and really enjoying it!

Any advice would be very welcome, thank you.

Are you vegetarian? If not how does she do with meat/fish? It could be she is hungry for fat and protein, and being offerred fruit & veg is therefore not meeting her needs so waits for the formula which does?

Also when you say refuses - how are you offering it? Are you trying/encouraging to get her to eat, or just making it available to eat so she can choose?

The NHS don't recommend formula or bottles after 12 months zam. I would drop two of her bottles and then change the other two milk drinks to full fat cows milk. Between 12 and 24 months they should be on 300ml of full fat cows milk per day. Formula, especially follow on and toddler milk can be constipating which in itself can be an appetite suppressant. Plus she doesn't really need to eat right now as she knows she won't be hungry, there is always milk coming her way

When you say you keep mealtimes fun, what do you do? If she refuses anything do you offer an alternative or the milk straightaway?

There is a book called My Child Won't Eat by Carlos Gonzalez, I think you would find it really helpful

Are you keeping the milk and food times spaced out enough? Dd only eats well if its at least one hour before or after a milk feed.

I'm pretty sure that the NHS guidelines say that you CAN switch to cow's milk at 12mo, not that you HAVE to switch then.

They probably do new but what would be the point of continuing? The only benefit I can see is that you would be lining the pockets of the formula companies.