My 18 Month Old Will Not Eat Fruit or Veggies

My son has the same problem. I agree with the suggestion about the v-8 juice. The fruit fusions give a serving of fruit and veggies in them.
I also give my son the gerber fruit and cereal bars. He doesn't like things that are soft or slippery, but he'll eat anything crunchy or things like bread and waffles. So I give him the cereal bar.
As for vitamins, I give my son the Shaklee infant and toddler mix. You can mix it right in their juice. It's a powder. I really love it, and my husband's family has been using Shaklee products for over 30 years, so I really trust the company.
You can find the vitamins at www.shaklee.net/rkklemm

Kids go through phases, but you have received some really great advice so far. If you are looking for a vitamin, ChildLife liquid Multi is great. You can purchase it online at www.vitacost.com just follow the directions. Or buy it at Whole Foods, which costs more. It is a good, clean quality liquid vitamin. They also make a liquid vitamin C, which is great to have during cold and flu season. Be careful of the "chewable" vitamins, it is all made with added sugars kids do not need.

Avocado is a great fat for the brain. Try hummus, my daughter scoops it out of the container.

It takes 10-14 days for a kid to try a food from the first time it has been introduced...so you have to keep at it everyday, then once they get used to seeing it, they'll eventually give in and try it. We forget that as parents and we tend to give up too soon, giving into what they want...and that is a bad habit to get into.

J. W. MPH
Wellness Educator/Lifestyle and Wellness Consultant
Specializing in Women's and Children's Health and Wellness

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. BUT make sure they get no other food till 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,
My daughter, (19 mo.) is the same way. What I have been doing now for the past 6 months is make her smoothies everyday. she usually eats them with blueberries, strawberries, peach or bananas or a combo of these fruits and she LOVES them. They are a pain to make but I am very stressed about her eatting habits and introducing the fruit flavor and having her like that was important. I just started cutting strwberries small and putting them on top of frozen yogurt, she loves that too. Everynow and then she'll eat applesauce too. As far as veggies, I cut up brocolli pretty small and pour cheese sause on it and I can usually get her to each chicken noodle soup with the carrots and celery.
Good luck,
K.

my 1 year old daughter loves canned green beans-whole foods has some w/o added salt and fruit in light syrup (i rinse them)-costco has good price on little cups. worth a try.

I agree with M R. Don't even offer anything but a veggie. He'll soon figure out that that's lunch/dinner and just eat it. Now, if there is a particular veggie that he doesn't like, I wouldn't force it. My daughter will eat anything but detests carrots. A vitamin can't replace the essential vitamins in fresh fruits and vegetables. Maybe a smoothie with yogurt and fruit? Avocado is really healthy, that's great that he'll eat that. My daughter is likely to eat anything if she has something to dip it in too.

My son is 15 months old and doing the same thing. The ped. actually suggested that I try V-8 juice. My son loves it. The plain old tomato and the fruit fusion drinks. I still give him fruits and veggies everyday and eventually this phase will end. I also give him poly-visol everyday.

Good Luck!
J.

Hear hear!! Don't offer favorites. Kids won't starve themselves. You may think they are, but nope. They eventually come around once they see that mom's not budging and this is all there is on the menu. They consider it a power struggle, and believe if they hold out or throw an escalating tantrum, mom will budge. Don't. Offer a veggie only, and if he pitches a fit, ignore them, and say fine you may be excused, and keep it there till he realize he's hungry. After he has eaten his veggies, "reward" with his favorite, like a banana, or protein, or avacado.
Good luck mama! You can do it!

Keep offering or offer them first.

I found that I have the best success with my 21 month old if he gets the veggies first, then the protein, then the fruit (his favorite). It's sort of like, out of sight out of mind. I don't even get the fruit ready until he's done with his veggies and eating the protein.