They won't eat!

ugh...I am SOOOOO fed up with the eating (or NOT eating) around here! My girls have always been picky eaters, especially Emily. Now that we finally have Emily's reflux under control again, she STILL won't eat! I try so many different things, and there is not one single thing that I can say for SURE that they will eat any time I put it in front of them. Not ONE... I could ALMOST say it is yogurt, but then again, some days they won't even let it get near their mouths.

I am always looking on here to see what others are feeding their kids...and have gotten some good ideas. Or so I thought...It is so frustrating, and I don't know what to do about it! We try to give them a balanced meal every time, and end up wasting SO MUCH FOOD!

They are both on the small side, but not frigtheningly so. Emily only weighs 19 1/2 pounds at 17 months, but Devyn is over 22 lbs. Both drink whole milk like it is going out of style (three times a day), but when it comes to solid foods...nada. I feel like a failure, really I do. I have so many friends whose kids will eat in one sitting what my kids MIGHT eat all day long. Have I done something wrong? Am I missing something??

HELP!!! I'm beyond frustrated!!!

 

Assuming Pedi is not concerned...
Relax - eating can be such a frustrating experience, but one YOU have little control over.
Keep offerring meals with balanced options, eat with them, no pressure or bargaining. Try to look at intake over a week instead of a day or meal, kids this age are notorious for being very inconsistent.

I had one who didn't get 20 to pounds until 20 months - she is and always has been thriving.

There is a good book about feeding, can't think of the name, but if I do I will be back.

 

Please read the book "Feeding with love and good sense" by Ellyn Satter -- GREAT BOOK someone on here recommended it to me and it changed EVERYTHING. Of course with each book you take out of it what works with you. My 3 % daughter then went below the charts. So I hear Ya. Do a internet search for "high calorie toddler foods" and you will find some great stuff.

Heather

 

phew...ok, I've cooled down a little now that the girls are in bed! So far, pedi hasn't been too concerned. Emily has never actually made it onto the growth chart. She has followed it closely, but never actually made it yet. But she continues to gain weight on her own curve...

Here's what meals looked like today- what was offered and what was eaten:

Breakfast:
- offered oatmeal with mushed bananas and dry rice chex cereal on a plate, followed by sippy cup of whole milk
- eaten: Emily- 1/2 of her oatmeal and sippy cup of milk
Devyn- all of oatmeal and most of her dry cereal, sippy cup of milk (YAY Devyn!!)

Lunch:
- offered pizza (1 piece of bread with sauce and cheese, toasted), avocado slices, yogurt, sippy cup of whole milk
- eaten: Emily- 1/2 of her 1/2 of said pizza (YES, only 1/4 of a slice of bread!), two tiny pieces of avocado, all of her yogurt, and all of her milk
Devyn- NO pizza, NO avocado, all of her yogurt and most of her milk

Dinner:
- offered steamed carrots, avocado, pumpkin muffin, pasta with creamy sauce and sausage (pasta and sausage from our dinner)
- eaten: Emily- NOTHING. Two pieces of carrot and sausage went into the mouth, and all came back out
Devyn- sausage...not even a lot, just a couple of pieces
**then we offered them applesauce and both refused. Then we offered them baby food from a jar (sometimes this is the only thing we can get them to eat) and both refused.

Then we gave them their evening milk before bedtime.

This is a typical day in our house, just switch out the food we are offering them. I think that since we have started table foods, they have cleaned their plate ONCE...and I remember being so amazed at that moment, I just wanted to take a picture and call everyone I knew and tell them that my children actually ATE for once!

I'm hoping this is just a phase and that their weights are still within OK limits at their 18 month appointment next month. I'm not really feeling like they are LOSING weight, and not seeing any other affects. They are mostly happy girls...other than frustrating their momma!

 

I have small girls. Like pp, my girls were 20lbs at 20 months. I used to stress about it too, but I don't bargain anymore. I give them a choice of what to eat so they have some control which makes them eat a whole lot better. It sounds like what you're feeding them and what they're eating is about right. You have to remember the size of their stomachs are still very small...they're going to eat until they're full. Right now, eating needs to be fun for them, so praise for what they do eat and they'll get it. Also, I notice my girls eat more when we're all eating together and eating the same thing. You probably have girls like mine with high metabolism and genetically they're supposed to be small as everyone in my family is. Once I realized that and pounded it into my head mealtimes became a lot less stressful.

 

So I found this site that put things into perspective about how much they should be eating.

http://www.earthsbest.com/node/388

I was worried my kids were not eating enough until I wrote down what they were eating and compared it to the chart. Then I realized we served too many crackers so we adjusted. LOL. A serving of bread for a toddler is 1/4 to 1/2 a slice of bread or 2 saltines. My suggestion would be to keep tracking how much they eat, over the course of week, and add it up to see if they are getting enough servings of everything. Since your children are on the smaller sizes, I'd suggest going with the smaller servings at first. I know it is frustrating but with a toddler your role is to offer the food and model good eating. Only they can choose to eat it.

 

This is so true. I know it's hard but do not beat yourself up over what they choose to eat or not eat. I have two toddlers on the small side and the best thing I can do is put the food in front of them and it's up to them to do the rest. I've come to the conclusion that they will not starve themselves. Hang in there, Momma!

 

I have one terribly picky eater...if she doesn't recognize it as food she knows she won't even try it....and one that will at least try some new foods. I have been all over this eating roller coaster with them. Right now we are refusing to eat lunch, and playing more with dinner than eating it. I had to resign myself to stop worrying about it. As long as they are growing they are apparently all they need. I think as moms we get so wrapped up in doing the absolute best for our children and eating is one place that we have little control over. We can make them great food, but we can't make them eat it.

Two things my pedi told me that helped me not worry so much were....
1. their stomachs are about the size of their fists. so in turn it doesn't take much to fill them up. (i started making smaller portions and felt much better becasse their wasn't as much waste and it looked like they ate more)
2. you can't base their intake on one day. you have to look at the overall week and as long as they have been eating fairly well over the entire week it is ok to have a couple of bad days. (i now no longer worry if they boycott one or two meals a day)

It gets better and then it gets worse again. Gotta love toddlers...every day is a new adventure.

 

Yes this is the book "Feeding with love and good sense" by Ellyn Satter.

We served water with meals and then milk with snacks am and pm and before bed. It is tough since you want them to have milk but they should be getting more calories from food. Her intake for the day looks pretty good - now I didn't read what your DS ate since I didn't want to have comparison in my head.

Hang in there.

 

I just read the toddler serving sizes. That was very helpful. My boys are little pigs. They are 2 and still drink 24 ounces of whole milk a day. And they eat very well. We have our 2 year on Monday. At 18 months the doctor was fine with 24 ounces of milk a day. I will ask about milk consumption again. It doesn't seem to be impacting their food intake. But I may start getting them weaned down a bit.

 

I am another one who only gives milk at snack time and bed time. The public health nurse said to do that so they aren't filling up on milk and not eating food.

 

Oh I feel your pain momma! My ds would only eat baby food and gerber crunchies, I finally went cold turkey and he is still not allowed to have crunchies for fear he may regress and eat only them hahahaha! I had really only 1 or 2 foods that he would consistently eat but somehow we have made it through and he is finally eating things like KD and McDonald's hamburger! He doesn't eat a lot of variety but I am beyond thrilled when he adds a new food to his list. My dd isn't too bad, she will try a bit more than he does.

Foods that work for my picky eater are:
toast and jam and banana cheerios (breakfast every day but hey it works!)
cereal bars
michaelina's chicken nugget tv dinners (they changed the nuggets recently and apparently he thinks they now taste great!)
kraft dinner
pumpkin bread, this is a huge hit!

he still doesn't eat a lot of meat or veggies but we still try and are really happy that he at least finally eats something!

Good luck!

 

Honestly, this sounds like plenty of food for their age. For example, for lunch - that's 4 servings of food from 3 different food groups (for Emily). Breakfast sounded ok too. As for supper, we often found that ours were not particularly hungry in the evenings, especially if we gave snacks in the afternoon. It does help to keep track of every single thing they eat, kind of like counting points at Weight Watchers. I think you'll be surprised that they are eating more than you think.

 

Do you give snacks? My boys' tummies are so small, they can't really eat enough to last for more than about 3 hours. Since they hit 12 months, I've done breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner, and sometimes we throw another snack in there before dinner because they're starving! They get food every 2-3 hours, and while they sometimes don't eat a lot, they never refuse.

 

My boys eat much less than what your kids eat!! I wouldn't be worried about it.. Honestly, mine have always been small eaters and they're okay. They're 3 now. Yes, I did/do stress about it but as they say.. "You can lead a horse to water.."

Again, I'm impressed w/ their intake! Also, milk makes them less hungry.

 

In addition to what everyone else said, look at food intake over a whole week instead of one day. Toddlers often eat well one day and hardly anything the next. Also, if you are seeing a decrease in intake from their baseline, it could be teeth. My DS always eats less when he is getting new teeth.

 

You say that you have reflux under control now...how long have they had reflux issues? If you have been battling reflux for a while, they may have developed an aversion to eating in general. You may be able to get a few small bites in them here and there, but their little brains may remember how painful if felt to eat food and now they fight the eating process out of fear. I may be going in a wrong direction, but this is part of what I have experienced with my two boys. They battled reflux for over a year before things were finally under control and I can't begin to tell you the amount of feeding issues we have had over the past two years. My boys will turn two in a few weeks and I finally have one who will tolerate thicker textures like pudding and oatmeal but absolutely no finger foods and nothing lumpy or inconsistent. And my other DS is finally moving into small portion of finger foods as of a few weeks ago.

Now I do have to add that they have sensory issues as they were born very premature, but knowing all that we've been through, I am confident that some of what we have fought over the past several months has been getting them to mentally get past the whole reflux thing. It has been a long, extremely slow process, but I had to start over from scratch with food. I gave them a month's break of nothing but toddler (gentlease) formula (their tummies still can't handle whole milk or regular toddler formula) and juice, water and a little bit of pediasure for their day's calories. Then I slowly started incorporating smooth runny foods to them for a few weeks, then every couple of weeks I gradually started increasing the thickness and texture of their food until we got to a pretty thick consistency. Then I started introducing small crispy crunchy finger foods: crackers, goldfish, cereal puffs, biter biscuits, etc. for a few weeks. Now 5 months later I finally have one that is eating green beans, cooked fruit pieces, pickles, etc. in addition to 3 or 4 small bowls of some kind of thicker pureed fruit, cereal, yogurt, etc. My other DS is still at the the thick puree, but I am hopeful that he'll be venturing into the finger foods soon too.

This may not be of any help to you, but if you don't see any progress or see regression of any kind with their eating, try to scale back a bit for a few weeks (while making sure they keep up with their calorie needs via pediasure, toddler formula, etc.) and then gradually add foods on a very gentle pace (i.e. thin foods down a bit at first, then thicken, thicken, thicken until they are taking a thick oatmeal type texture) then try the finger foods again on a small scale and see how it goes.

One more trick that may help. My kids have sensory issues and have monthly visits from a great occupational therapist that has shared tons of tips and advice on getting past the feeding issues. Your girls may not have sensory issues, but it wouldn't hurt to try this anyway. A few minutes before feeding them, take your hands and gently press against their cheeks, then using two finger gently press against the top of their lips, then their chin, hold those presses for about 5 or 6 seconds. For kids with sensory processing issues, this helps calm the sensory signals going to the mouth area before feeding time, but I don't think it would hurt trying it on kids with eating issues that don't have sensory issues. It could still help the brain not focus on being sensitive to what is going in their mouths at dinnertime.

Sorry for the long post, but I just wanted to share our story for you or anyone out there with feeding issues that could gleam some kind of help from what we've gone through so far. Good luck!