Encouraging a very picky eater

[Peppermint25]

Hello,

I wonder if any of you ladies can give me some advice.

My lg is just turning 11 months and is a really picky eater and eats such small quantities of food. She does go through phases of eating a bit more then goes back to her little.

We have done BLW (mostly) and she didn't start eating food until about 9 months. Until then she would gag and just throw the food on the floor. Shen are lots for a few weeks then slowly ate less and less. She refuses a spoon and will only feed herself. She now picks away like a little bird and will only eat small portions of pasta, egg, chicken, fish, cheese, cucumber, tomato and a few different fruits. She did love breakfast cereals for a while but has now totally gone off them. She's never like purée or mushy things like potatoes. She does eat some potatoes if they are roasted in a stick form.

I don't know how to encourage her to eat more and try more variety. She did love yogurt, brocolli, peas, sweetcorn but now refuses them too and just throws them away! It's getting very frustrating! We give her generally what we are eating and always eat with her.

I wonder if she's having too much milk? She bf's about 9am, 1pm, 7pm and a few times during the night. She's a big girl and when she feeds does take a lot in I think. She's not a snacker! Her meal times are 8.00am, 12pm and 5.30pm ish. My hv always says reduce the feeds and she will start eating more. However, I just don't think she's ready to drop the lunch or morning feed as she always gets sleepy and starts pulling at my jumper for milk. :/ maybe she should now just be getting fed in the morning avd bed time??

Any advice would be great!

So because I am breastfeeding should she be getting vitamin drops? I heard this from another mum this week.

 

[Peppermint25]

Anyone?

 

[mercedybear]

I hope someone more experienced helps you, its frustrating when they refuse foods. The only item I can answer is yes to Vitamin D. My pediatrician advised me even when LO is being formula fed to give Vitamin D.

 

[special_kala]

I dont think anything you have said needs changing tbh.

Your lo will eat what she needs to eat. Trust her

 

[randomrach]

My daughter was just the same between the ages of 8 and 14 months. If she's truly a picky eater and isn't fussed about food dropping her milk will not make the slightest difference, it will just leave her with less calories. There was a time mine would barely eat 1 decent meal and 10oz of milk a day but her weight didn't suffer so we just carried on with whatever she would take. In the last 6 months she has improved hugely to the point where she'll ask for more food and milk. Yesterday, for example, she had milk upon waking, cereal, yoghurt and fruit for breakfast, a sandwich, fruit and crisps for lunch, chicken strips, veg and chips dinner, a few plain biscuits and 12oz of milk before bed.

Having a fussy eater is frustrating and stressful, the best advice I can give you is to relax and go with whatever your daughter wants, it will improve eventually even if it takes 6 months. Best of luck to you

 

[Peppermint25]

Thanks so much got replies. They have reassured me a great deal. I think it is just very frustrating for us mums, as I constantly hear from my hv, other mums and family that she should be eating more and oh isn't she picky.. 'My little so and so was eating full sized meals at her age'..

I guess I just have to ignore them all and not pressurise her to eat. As you say she will eat more when she's ready. Hopefully it won't be too far away. She is certainly happy and healthy and enjoys playing with food. It's the just getting her to try things and eat! I'll just continue as I am and keep offering her foods.

Thanks a lot of your advice x

 

[lily28]

We are in the same situation almost. In fact I came to post my story and get some feedback.

This is my advice & what I try to do with my LO. Try to include her in all the food activities, shopping for food, preparing food & cooking, sharing a meal. don't push her and take the food away when she is getting frustrated and starts throwing things down. Try not to show her your anxiety.

Also a friend told me to leave finger food around in the house, in a small plate on a low table he can reach. I tried it and he is not eating much but he does get curious and will try some. Babies are curious like that.

Problem is he is not eating much, either on his own or when I try to feed him. He drinks a lot of my milk, and he is not exactly picky because he will try anything but will not eat more than a couple of bites. I don't want to refuse boob meals, they are not that many anyway, around 4 or 5 short meals during day time, and 1 or 2 at night.
I'm reading toddler menu samples for the ages of 1-2 year olds, or the UNICEF recommended quantities of food for this age and I want to cry, because he barely has what other kids eat for 1 meal the entire day. The pediatrician told me to offer him a lot of food every 2 h because he is high energy and needs lots of calories.
His growth as I said is fine, weight at around 50% he is tall at the 85%, he has hit all his milestones on time and he is very ahead in speech and fine motor skills, doctor says he is like a 18mo+ in many aspects, he plays football, he is very extroverted and sociable, he doesn't even shows signs of separation anxiety. I know I shouldn't worry and trust my child in this, but I worry because his solid food intake is so little.

 

[MindUtopia]

Just keep doing what you're doing and make sure to offer her a really wide variety of foods, even things you'd never in a million years think she'll like. Also, try to ignore any advice you get to reduce her milk feeds or force her to eat (which sounds like you've been doing a good job of already). At her age, you can start to move in the direction of offering solids before milk if she's happy to do it that way and then letting her have as much milk as she wants after, if you want but you don't need to. The quantity doesn't matter as much, as long as she's putting on weight and otherwise healthy. Some days I'm shocked at how little my daughter wants to eat (and she doesn't have much milk at all, just a cup of cow's milk before bed now) and some days I'm shocked at how much she can put away too. They know how much they need. If she only just started to eat really 2 months ago, she probably just needs some more time. I think the main thing is just to offer lots of different things and see if you hit on something she likes. I discovered that my daughter loves olives and pickled things (pickled onions, beetroot, gherkins, cauliflower). Everyone thinks it's weird for a baby (probably is!), but I would have never discovered this if I hadn't tried her with it. If you've been making most food from scratch up til now, it might also be time to try a few healthy ready-made foods and see if she takes to trying something new. We went through a picky eating phase around then, and I eventually hit on the fact she loved quiche. I get store-bought quiches with lots of vegetables as well as roasted vegetable and cheese tarts and they've been great. It's not an every day thing as they do have added salt, but it's a fun new flavour and she loves them. Ready-made fresh pastas like ravioli with different fillings are easy and fun too and help with trying new flavours and textures. Just keep exploring and eventually she'll learn what she likes and be more adventurous.