For those who also have fussy feeders

[LPF]

I posted a week ago about how Evan is really fussy at mealtimes - refusing, hitting the spoon, crying, throwing food, refused to feed himself etc

Anyway, I made the radical decision this week to try cutting all food/snacks/milk except the three meals. He has milk when he wakes up and bedtime, then breakfast, lunch and tea at 8, 12 and 5.

He's been like a different child at the table - he's eaten tons, he's interested in food, feeds himself lots and is really happy to be at the table and eat. He eats more in three meals then he did across three meals and 2 snacks before.

Yesterday he had lunch at 12 then we all had a roast dinner at about 5.30 and I thought he'd never last between but he was fine. Ate a big plateful by himself, then after pudding, ate all the remains out of his bib trough!

Might help someone else in a similar situation.

 

[GingerNut]

We've actually found lately that DD eats more if we only give her two meals a day! Now, in fairness, she's going through a phase of having a huge amount of milk at night (whether she eats during the day or not), and she's been getting up late and going to bed on time because of bad sleep so her day is a bit shorter than usual. But we find that a good big breakfast at around 10, a cup of milk and a couple of rice cakes at 1:30ish, and dinner with us at about 4:30, and she's done.

We might not stick with that plan, especially when her nights improve (if they ever do!) but for now it's actually getting her to eat, and she used to refuse everything, so it's great!

Obviously that's not going to work for every kid, but there's no need to be afraid to try it. The '3 meals and 2 snacks' thing isn't a magic formula that's programmed into every kid!

 

[JASMAK]

My kids always eat way better when they are hungry too! LOL! Funny that, isn't it?

 

[jaybee]

We try not to give Tobi snacks any more either. Unless we have a very physical day, then he may have raisins.
He usually only has two and half meals too. He'll have a huge breakfast of porridge, yogurt and dried fruit, then a snack plate at lunch.... If he's awake. Then a good dinner with us.

I think there just comes a time when they start moving into a more 'grown up' style of eating, suppose their stomachs are larger.

Glad you have resolved the issue.
Xx

 

[SwissMiss]

That's great hon! I find particularly Lindsey also eats better when she doesn't have afternoon snack (although lately Kilian too). When she goes to daycare, I pretty much write off her eating any dinner, b/c they give HUGE snacks at 4pm. So on daycare days they'll have like 2.5 meals... Not ideal in my book but its working so

xx