Toddler Not Eating - Tacoma,WA

Our 2.5 year old grandson goes through "stages"...he doesn't want to eat much for days and then suddenly he eats everything in sight!!! My daughter has found that she has a much better day if she just allows him to "graze" on snacks and things through out the day instead of expecting him to sit down and eat 3 meals a day with his Mama and Papa. It keeps a toddlers blood glucose levels more even if they eat multiple small meals during the day...which helps eliminate melt downs and temper issues.
She makes fresh,healthy foods readily available to him, bunches of grapes, a small bowl of fresh blueberries, hummus and pita chips, baby carrots, deli sliced meat, cheese and crackers.
Don't make meal time a battle...she has plenty of time to learn to sit at the table and eat her dinner while she socializes with you. Let him eat what she wants and when she is done, set her down and let her go play. Your goal should be pleasant meal time experiences..not clean plates!!
Maybe you could let her be involved with the meal preparation. Our Grandson loves to help mix things or dump ingredients together in the bowl. Let her have some choices..."do we want corn or green beans with our meat loaf tonight?". Get her involved...let her feel like it is "HER" dinner too!! She might surprise you!!

My son is 4. He did the same thing around 3. He went from eating anything and everything to practically nothing. I thought it was a phase, but he is still the same way. He'll eat about 3 bites for dinner, and 4 bites for lunch. Even that is only because the rule in our house is at least one bite of everything before you can be excused. He makes up for it with 3 breakfasts and snack. Our bodies are actually made to need more food in the morning when we wake up to give us energy through the day, and every little food for dinner when we are preparing to sleep and not use calories. This in one of the reasons America is obese. We eat huge meals for dinner. Anyway, my point is that my son has somehow maintained being in the 98th percentile for both height and weight even though it seems to me like he eats nothing but breakfast. The trick is just to make sure that the food that does go into their bodies is a healthy balance.

Hi T.-

Toddlers have a wonderful ability NOT to eat when they are not hungry. I wish I did. As long as your little one is gaining weight as she should, you're fine.

Just a hit, when she does eat, give her her foods in stages, first the protein, then the fruit/veggie THEN the carbs & milk. This will ensure she fills up on good foods and not filler foods.

R. Magby

We go through this about once a month. It usually lasts a few days, then he's back to eating normally. When he first started doing this, we tried giving him the foods, but after a couple of tries of that, we just offer him whatever food is for dinner, and if he refuses to eat, so be it. He's skipped dinner several times, sometimes a few days in a row, but he eats well for the other meals that day. I look at what he's eating for the entire week to decide if he's getting enough nutrition. He always is! If you're worried about nutrition, offer extra-nutritious snacks and sides for breakfast and lunch. I also like Carnation Instant Breakfast- it tastes like chocolate milk but has a lot of good things in it!

She is at the picky eating stage. Find a peice of cheese or fruit. Sometimes my son eats very well, and sometimes he does not. They will not starve. I would not make a new meal, but offering crackers or fruit or cheese will help fill their belly's. I would not make a big deal out of it, keep her sitting with you at the table, but if she eats great if not let it go. Just make sure what you are offering is good viatimin choices. and she will eat what her body is needing.

For example, My son loves beans. He will eat them one night like they are going out of style and the next day he will not touch them. I think that his body is not needed the protein so I let it go.

Good luck

The most important thing here is to NOT make her special meals if she doesn't want to eat what you've made. You don't get upset with her for not wanting to eat, you just say, "I'm sorry you don't want to eat dinner!" And then let her know when the next meal/snack time will be (in this case probably breakfast) and tell her she can eat then. It is NOT a good idea to let children graze all day, because this establishes bad eating habits (it's hard on your body to always be digesting food) and it lets them know that it's okay not to eat at meal times because they can just get a snack whenever they want. Have specific times for meals and snacks (and yes, it is important to eat snacks in between meals, but they don't need to be eating ALL day long), and let them know that if they don't want the meal or snack, then they can eat the next time you have a snack/meal. They won't starve if they skip a meal or two. And like another person said here, it is a great idea to find ways to let them help prepare the meals, because then they have a sense of ownership over the meal and will want to eat "THEIR" salad, or whatever they helped make.

Wait a few weeks. Haha.

But seriously, toddlers can turn picky (when they weren't picky as babies). They get tired of the same food (just like adults often do) and sometimes they really just aren't that hungry.

I have a daughter who has pretty much always eaten very little. She's now almost 8 and she's bright and healthy (though very thin just like her dad and I were when we were her age). I learned a long time ago to just not let it bother me. When she is very hungry she eats! We keep putting healthy food in front of her in small portions, dishing up more if she eats it and is still hungry. Most of the time she eats just a little at dinner and makes up the rest of the calories in snacks and other meals. Sometimes she claims to be hungry later, but we don't do after dinner snacks. As time has gone by she's occasionally entered phases where she becomes more adventurous with eating and as a result she eats some things now that she would barely look at before, much less put in her mouth!

So, in short, don't worry. Your job is to put food in front of her. She gets to decide how much she eats of it.