My friend's son refuses to eat table food with the family. He will eat PBJ, Mac-n-cheese, apples, grilled cheese, crackers and dry snacks and anything fried... but THAT'S IT!! He refuses to eat anything else that is not Gerber Jar Baby food. He throws it and spits it out. She has even gone as far as pureeing her spaghetti and putting it in a jar and he still won't eat it. Some days he barely eats at all. She is ready to give up the baby food, but is a bit concerned that he won't eat anything. Has anyone else gone through this and any suggestions would be appreciated.
My friend decided to try the not giving other food until he eats a bite of everything technique but then is getting push back from her husband. He is sneaking her son snack foods. Not helpful. I think that she is going to take her husband to the next doctor's appointment so that he can hear from a medical professional that her son won't starve himself and will eat when hungary. I also suggested that she give her son the foods he will eat for dinner and then for lunch, give him the left over dinner food he didn't eat for lunch.
she waited too long they love to pickup finger food at 1year old or less. Like green beans and macaroni etc. Now she has to just feed him what he likes and add things to it like put pbj on his plate and add the beans on the plate also he will soon eat what they do. His diet dont sound too bad he is getting protien so dont be too concerned.
There is a great book by William G Wilkoff, MD called Coping with a Picky Eater that every parent or provider of kids should read and have a copy of. http://www.amazon.com/Coping-Picky-Eater-Perplexed-Parent...
This book has what I call the Picky Eater Plan. I have used this plan with kids that literally threw up at the sight of food and within 2 weeks they were eating normal amounts of everything and trying every food.
First you need to get everyone who deals with the child on board. If you are a provider it's ok to make this the rule at your house and not have the parents follow through but you wont' see as good results as what I described up above.
The plan is to limit the quantities of food you give the kid. When I first start with a child I give them literally ONE bite worth of each food I am serving. The book suggests that every time you feed the kids (breakfast, morning snack, lunch, afternoon snack, dinner) you give all 4 food groups. So, for lunch today I would have given the child one tiny piece of strawberry, one spoonful of applesauce, 3 macaroni noodles with cheese on them, and 2 oz of milk. Only after they ate ALL of what was on their plate would you give them anything else. They can have the same amounts for seconds. If they only want more mac and cheese, they only get 3 noodles then they would have to have more of all the other foods in order to get more than that. If they don't eat, fine. If they don't finish, fine. Don't make a big deal out of it, just make them stay at the table until everyone else is done eating. They don't get more food until they are sat at the next meal and they only get what you serve. When I first do this with a child I don't serve sweets at all. So no animal crackers for snack but rather a carrot for snack. Or one of each of those. I don't make it easy for them to gorge on bad foods in other words. Now if they had a meal where they ate great then I might make the snack be a yummy one cause I know they filled up on good foods.
Even at snacks you have to limit quantities of the good stuff or else they will hold out for snack and just eat those snacky foods. I never give a picky eater the reward of a yummy snack unless they had that great lunch prior to it.
It really is that easy.
Hi H.,
One of my boys went through the same thing when he was about 2 years old. My pediatrician said it was a phase and that I shouldn't worry. I just gave him what he asked for, which at the time was ONLY PBJ and hot dogs. I worried that it wasn't healthy for him, but a friend of mine eased my worries by reminding me that PBJ is not so bad considering it provides protein.
A few times I would trick him and make him believe we were out of hot dogs and PBJ and guess what he'd try the table food that we were eating because he had no other choice and he was hungry. Sometimes I would enforce the rule that he had to at least have one bite of what we were eating before I even made him his favorite food. Sometimes he liked the food after tasting it and sometimes he didn't. He eventually outgrew that phase and decided to try new foods.
Tell your friend not to worry too much, kids' tastebuds do change, she should just keep encouraging for him to try new foods.
P.
P.S. my son is now a healthy 16 year old that will eat anything and is ALWAYS eating.
my 22 month old doesn eat hardly antything grilld cheese mac n cheese and hotdogs nothing else .so ur kinda lucky lol
My son started to try this with us. He's gone a few nights without eating dinner but he's fine. I always try to make one thing I know he'll eat (usually a veggie) but if he doesn't want what he is given then he is let down from the table. I agree, now is when you train them to be non-picky eaters and the more she gives in to his demands the pickier he'll be down the road.
We went through a similar phase with our oldest (who's almost three). The doctor told us that as long as he growing at an appropriate pace, not to worry about it. If he gets one good meal a day, he's OK. Even eating like this, Luke grew five inches between his first and second birthday.
He will not starve himself. If she continues to be a short order cook, he will continue to demand it. If he refuses the food or spits it out, I would tell that is fine and dinner is over. Put him down to play and finish their dinner. When he is hungry and realizes mommy isn't going to make him a special dinner, he will eat. Kids also don't have the need to eat the variety as adults do, so as long as she gives him healthy foods then I wouldn't worry. If she gives in to this now, he will eat only that stuff for a long time to come and she is giving herself a picky eater. He is plenty old enough to get rid of the baby food. If she doesn;t buy it, he can't have it. I am not trying to be harsh, but she is the mom and he is the child. How can he refuse to eat anything but baby jar food unless she lets him? Sounds like she refuses to follow through and he has her figured out. I haven't met a toddler yet that will go on a week long hunger strike =)
I would recommend feeding him what he likes for now. At least he's eating something. When he's ready to graduate and start eating other table foods, he will, but in his own time. Don't stop trying to introduce him to foods other than fried foods, though (potatoes and other vegetables, chicken, etc.). If he rejects the foods you offer, give him time; he'll come around. Also, Gerber has various stages for kids of different age groups. Try those if you haven't already. Don't give up on him, he's in a discovery zone right now. Take care and God Bless.
Sounds like he's getting his protein from the cheese & PB, fiber & C from apples, so as long as he takes a good multivitamin (my kids love the gummy ones), he should be fine until he gets out of this phase. My 2-year-old is also picky: chicken nuggets, bananas, yogurt, cheese, Cheerios & anything fried.
It is a phase. Lots of children through it. My daughter was a fiend from 14 months to almost 2. she had been eating everything but then went onto what i call the blonde diet - pasta, banana, yoghurt, potatoes, bread but virtually nothing else - it was frustrating but she is now growing out of it. I believe the advice is to just persevere. keep giving the options and then when they don't eat x, give them what you know they will eat. 1-2 can be hard.
