Won't Eat

Just be patient. One thing to remember as a parent is that it's your job to offer the food, it's the child's job to eat the food. It can take up to a week for children to transition to eating only table food. I know it seems cruel, but when they get hungry, they'll eat. You might want to slowly wean the bottle-take away 1 bottle every 3-4 days. Keep offering food at meals and snack, whether they eat it or not. Set up a regular feeding schedule-just like with the bottles and stick to it. They'll catch on soon. Good luck!

Hi K.,
My first suggestion is that you keep trying to stay consistent with giving them healthy snacks. As a mom of 2 picky eaters it is so hard sometimes, I know. Apple Slices with peanut butter to "dip" them in. My daughter loves to dip things...messy, but could be effective! Seedless watermelon chunks are good too. Frozen grapes, saltines with peanut butter or cream cheese... start small, and don't give in to the junk food. Kids are not like adults in the sense that they will eat when they are hungry and they will stop when they are full. Their stomachs are only about as big as their clenched fist(not very big at all at 14 months)...Hope this helps some! For some reason, we don't get instruction manuals for these things! lol. Good Luck!
A.

Try hiding the bottles period. They will continue to refuse to eat if they don't want to try new things and know the bottle will always be available. My son went through a phase where he only crackers and juice. I would give him real food and he would refuse to eat. Later my mother would give him crackers because she was thinking, it's better that he eat something, anything, rather than nothing. My son was smart because he knew that by refusing real food, the crackers would always be available.

try to ease them with that baby food crackas stuff, then the regular food
they won't eat it, they won't eat it, what can i say?

~~M. K~~

Do remember that when children are born premature, you have to give them a little time compared to other children their age. So you should treat them as 12 month age children. Now, I do remember my doctor telling me, that slowly i have to decrease the amount of milk feedings I give my child, and increase the amount of solids-by 12 months of age, children should have no more than 8 oz of milk per day...but every child is different. I gave my child about 12-14 per day until he was truly on solids-eating with the family. I am sure you do know that you have to try to offer food when they are happy but a little hungry...but not overly hungery. set a schedule...it makes a big difference. I mean you will know around what time they are most often hungry. Say you give their milk at around 7, feed them a little breakfast first. Then offer a snack around 9 or 10. I think you are right on starting with snacks...those snacks will turn to meals sooner or later. Start offering them more mushy finger foods, rather than the baby food in jars. Like small pieces of overcooked pasta with a cheese sauce, overcooked peas and carrots, try canned peaches and pears, over cooked rice...all these you can put on their high chair around the time that they are showing signs of hunger. There was a time when my son would not touch any food if it looks "different" for him, so i started putting a little sauce of the food on his lips or toungue, so he will taste it, once he tasted it, he would realized that he liked it. Also i realized that when the rest of the family was eating, my son was most likely to try something on his high chair...he loved to mimic his father ;-). So I would put him on his highchair and leave a few bits of the family dinner in his plate and a spoon. Sometimes he would use his fingers and sometimes try the spoon...it makes a big mess, but they learn to eat. And above all, remember that no kid will eat on the first try-just offer it over and over again. Hope this advice helps....

I agree with everyone else...they will eat when they get hungry. One of my neices went through this same thing. Her mom would give her all the milk she wanted (in a sippy cup) and Pringles. She figured that at least she was eating something so it was ok. Now she is underweight and they are struggling to get her into normal eating habbits. They finally have figured out that she will eat when hungry. At her house they cut the crusts off bread and peel apples. At my house she eats the crust and knows better to ask me to peel an apple. My kids eat it and she can too. You have to be the parent. My kids to this day will ask for soemthing different than what I make for dinner but I only make one dinner, if you don't like it you don't eat. (I know that sounds mean but my 2 year old would eat nothing but pb&j and hot dogs if I let her). Only if I make something fancy that I know they probably won't eat will I make them an alternative...but they always have to eat 2 bites of everything to try it...even if they have tried it before. This is the way we do it and it seems to work pretty good. Good luck and stay strong. They will eat when they are ready.

A lot of the time a child will refuse to eat anything but, say spaghettios, for example, simply because you can't MAKE them do it. It is something they can control, so they do it to assert their independence. Even though it's hard, teh best thing you can do is not let them know how much you want them to eat. Offer them the food, give them a set amount of time to eat it (maybe 20 minutes), and then after the time is up, calmly take it away again and let them go play. Don't give them a bottle right after they have refused to eat, because then they learn that all they have to do is hold out and they will get their way.It may seem like they aren't getting enough, but their have been studies that show even when children eat sporadically it ends up evening out so they are getting the right amount of calories over time. They just need to eat small amounts more often, and a serving size for a child is smaller than you'd think. Like a couple tablespoons each of a couple different foods. Like the other person said, it may sound mean, but they will eat when they get hungry, they aren't going to let themselves starve. Good luck!