Help!!! I cant get my son to eat regular food!!!!?

Question

My son is 17 months and only eats certain thing like snacks but when it comes down to eating a real substantial meal, he wont, he just wants a bottle. He may even like the food but just wont eat it and is extremely stubborn. I hate seeing him cry for a half hour when I sit him down and tell him he has to eat and I eventually give in. Please help me??

Answer 1

Throw away all the bottles, serious, go into wherever you keep them right now and put them in the trash. A child should be off a bottle by at least a year. DO NOT give in, he plays on that and will refuse to eat for days if he knows you will eventually give him a bottle. He WILL eat when he gets hungry enough. Let him be, but let him be bottle free for crying out loud.

Answer 2

http://familyfun.go.com/recipes/kids/

Ants on a log is a cute one put a bunch of peanut butter on celery stick,and then put raisins on it.

Answer 3

make it creative make a picture with the food like a happy face and allow him to do something small to help

Answer 4

At a year an a half he should get a little bottle ,after he eats some real food. let him cry they get bored after awhile and stop. the bott. shuold b like dessert. at 2 no bott.

Answer 5

First of all-TAKE THE BOTTLE AWAY!  He's 17 months old-he's only wanting the bottle cuz he knows you will let him have it.  My son loves the frozen pancakes.  Scrammbled eggs and mashed potatoes mixed with cottage cheese are good too.  Seriously though-throw out the bottles.

Answer 6

just a thing baby's do keep feeding him bottles and snacks or make his regular food look like a snack some how my baby never really ate baby food it was either small portions of big er people food or a bottle

Answer 7

tell him he needs to eat his big boy food, then after he does, reward him with a cookie or small toy or something. if he wants his bottle, let him have it, but dont give the treat. tell him that thats the way it will be.eventually he will learn that that is more fun than going to the bottle. lol my mom did that with both food and potty training with my lil bro and it worked REALLY well for her.

Answer 8

disgiuse the foods he doesn't like, like maybe put cheese on his veggies so he'll think he's eating cheese. Refuse to give him a bottle, and when he's hungry, he'll eat.

Answer 9

YOU started the problem and you enable it.  First of all he shouldn't be getting a bottle.  He should at best be using a sippy cup and only after he has eaten his meals.  Too much milk fills his tummy so you have to cut back.  If he doesn't eat remove him from the table and don't feed him until the next meal.  If you "hate seeing him cry" that's too bad YOU created the problem to begin with.

Answer 10

I'm sure he is absolutely fine and healthy and will grow out of his fussy stage.

I'm having awful issues with my 3 yr old son who was very premature, born weighing 695g!. He only weighs 20 pounds now but will currently only eat burnt homemade roast potatoes, crisps and sweets. However, his blood is checked regularly and his iron, enzymes, potassium etc are all absolutely perfect.

He has multivitamins so I suggest you get these for your son if you don't already.

I've tried every method possible to get him to eat... including starving him (health visitors advice) but nothing has worked as yet. I understand how stressed you feel but from experience, he will pick up on this stress and it will make everything worse! I've hoping that when he gets a little older and I can reason with him, things will get a lot better

Don't listen to the criticisms in some of the other answers. I can understand completely why you give in with the milk. If he's only eating junk food, the milk will be giving him more of the nutrients and goodness that he needs to grow. I would be over the moon if my son would drink milk. Maybe think of substitutes occasionally for the milk i.e. soya milk. Then he'll be getting some different nutrients into his diet and it might help him subtley with new tastes.