I have a 17 month old son and we are (and have been) introducing him to solid foods for some time now. He will readily pick up a napkin, shred it, and then attempt to eat it; however, when we give him solid food - he smashes it up in his fingers and flings it to the floor. He will eat some solids if we actually put it in his mouth with our fingers, but he doesn't want to put the food into his own mouth. We tried putting pieces of his favorite food (chicken) on a plate on the floor to see if he'd put it in his mouth, where every item not edible from the floor goes, and he recognized it as "food" and flung it down. There are no tantrums or fussing - he just won't put the food into his mouth himself. This is very frusterating - any advice?
Thank you everybody for your responses - they definitely helped. Today, he picked up his first morsel by himself and put it in his mouth - he ate half of his lunch this way. He has his 18 mos. pediatrician appt. next week and I will bring up the issues that everyone mentioned. This is my first child and I was feeling really "in the dark" - thanks to everyone for helping!
Try a grilled cheese cut into quarters. My son hated it when we cut things into tiny pieces. Just watch him. It is basically mush anyway. Good luck!
Tell your pediatrician, have his iron level checked. My nephew wouldn't eat things, but then he started eating things like cardboard, paper, etc. It turned out he was iron deficient. It's just a thought
I think they all do this at about this age. My two boys certainly did. The only advice I can offer is to only feed him when he's obviously hungry, and even then, only give him one or two morsels at a time. Once he starts throwing it, he's no longer hungry. You may just be giving him too much food. Babies have stomachs that are (for an adult, used to adult portions) inconcievably small. The trick seems to be very small and very frequent meals. Also, my littlest one wouldn't eat something we put in front of him, he'd toss it immediately, but if I offered him some of the exact same thing off of my plate, he'd snarf it down in a heartbeat. Just another thing to consider..
And don't worry, he'll outgrow it sooner or later, they all do. Just try to be patient and certainly don't react to it because he'll figure out it's a way to get your attention as well.
Best of luck!
What Dyreka K said. :-) Hang in there.
Just my opinion,, but he may be telling you something. He may be getting a belly ache and associates food with this. Another idea is that he is not hungry. I have a 3 yr. old and he actually took himself off the bottle and wouldn't eat either. Later found out he has a milk allergy and anything that has milk in it would give him IBS for 24 to 48 hours and he wouldn't eat hardly on those days. He may be telling you he has an allergy. P.s. if you find out that this could be the problem; then probiotics is also a big life saver. It helped my son to eat.
Good luck! Jojo
