Toddler not eating help!!!

Re: Toddler not eating help!!!

• 00kim00 member

  May 2023

  It's normal, and it can go on for a long time! Your baby is eating, just not a big variety. Is she drinking any milk or juice? If so, she may be getting her calories that way and so not feeling hungry enough to eat. If she's taking any juice, I'd cut that out. Keep an eye on milk intake, too; it's healthy, but if she's getting all her calories that way she won't be hungry for solids.
  
   here are some things you can do:
  -at every meal/snack, offer her one thing you know she'll eat (like yogurt), and 1-2 things you'd like her you eat that you think she'd like. Put all the options on her plate/tray, and she can choose what to eat. This may mean she'll only choose yogurt for a while, but that's ok. You're offering the opportunity to try other foods, and that's all you need to do. Don't force it, just have it in reach and sight if she wants it
  -experiment with giving her foods that are similar to what she's eating. Make a smoothie, and you can even serve it in the yogurt container. Assuming your sorbet is store bought and has added sugars, you can make a healthier version (and mix in different fruits to add variety) by putting fruit in a food processor then freezing it. Don't add sugar! Instead of whipped cream, you can try vanilla Greek yogurt (I wouldn't try both new things at once, though. Put Greek yogurt on the store bought sorbet, whipped cream on the homemade sorbet until she's used to both new things)
  -play with food! You can use a carrot stick to paint with applesauce, a chicken nugget to paint with ketchup. Play with her and model things like eating off of different body parts (can you eat a piece of broccoli off your knee? Smear avocado on your arm and lick it off?) Or dip and lick (you can start with whipped cream since you know she likes it- dip a celery stick or apple slice in it and lick it off. When you're done dipping, you can eat your apple or celery, though she may not and that's fine).
  
  The first two ideas you can put into place now, they're strategies you can continue to use to introduce new foods throughout her lifetime. The third I'd approach with caution. I do food play with kids who have actual, long term eating issues or aversions. Your kiddo doesn't sound like she's even close to that. So the food play may be introducing an awesome new game that continues much longer than you'd like and you may end up with her painting her body with yogurt and sorbet every day.
  
  All this is assuming this is an isolated thing and your child doesn't have medical or developmental concerns impacting this (no allergies or food sensitivities, no problems chewing or swallowing, no motor or developmental delays, no sensory issues [used to be okay with different textures like crunchy and chewy and mushy], no history of breathing or feeding tubes, appropriate weight gain and sticking to her growth curve, etc.). If you do suspect other issues or this continues more than a week or two, talk to your doctor about a referral to a dietician or feeding specialist 

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