In my three years of being a mother, I have yet to hear a solid tip on getting a toddler to eat. My son is very well behaved. He doesn’t act up too often in public, he always says “please” and “thank you.” I’m not bragging (too much), but we’ve had strangers tell us how good both of our kids are. It is flattering.
   But there is one department of parenting I have yet to master, and that is getting my son to eat. Don’t get me wrong, I mean he is a healthy boy. He is in the 50th percentile of height and weight, and his pediatrician says he is perfectly normal.
   However, his normal diet consists of about five foods. For meals, my son will eat peanut butter and jelly, grilled cheese, chicken nuggets, pizza or meatballs. And, the chicken and meatballs are new additions of the last few months. Up until then, we thought he was a self-proclaimed vegetarian (even though is father and I are no where near vegetarian ourselves).
   We’ve asked doctors, other parents, friends, family, read tips online, listened to radio shows … nothing we’ve been told to try has worked. And, we’ve really tried it all.
   What is strange, in my opinion, is that up until about 18 months, he would eat nearly anything. At a younger age, my son at full-sized pork chops, a cut up hamburger, vegetables, well basically anything we put on his high chair tray.
   Now, my daughter is nearly a year old, and we are desperately trying to break our son’s habits before she catches on and develops the same. My daughter, much like my son at the same age, eats any and everything we let her. I don’t want, in a year from now, for us to be having the same battles with her as we do with him. (Though she is her own person, and with her brother’s influence or not, it is quite possible she’ll stop eating a variety of foods all on her own, in the same inexplicable manner as her brother.)
   My son somehow stays healthy. We drop in a vitamin supplement to his daily juice. He drinks two-percent milk when he wakes and right before bed. We sneak him “vegetables” in a Juicy Juice product called “Harvest Surprise” (a mix of vegetable and fruit juices that taste like fruit alone). He eats a good mix of fruits. And, while he’ll only eat about five “main courses,” they are at least semi-healthy choices, mixing some of the missing food groups in his diet.
   We have tried rewards, stickers, discipline, begging, letting him cry, not making alternatives … my son just won’t budge. We’ve cut foods into fun shapes, matched their colors, purchased fun plates, forks and spoons … nada.
   Part of our problem is his stubbornness, and no, I have no clue where he got that trait. Part of our problem is the lack of energy we, as parents, have. Getting him to eat would be a long and difficult road, and most nights after working all day, I don’t have the “enthusiasm” to argue it out with him and listen to the screaming.
   I always said I’d never be the mom that made dinner, then made the kids alternative meals. Yet, here we are.
   I have no other solutions, but I’d love to hear suggestions on this. Register online and comment! I need your help!
   In my three years of being a mother, I have yet to hear a solid tip on getting a toddler to eat. My son is very well behaved. He doesn’t act up too often in public, he always says “please” and “thank you.” I’m not bragging (too much), but we’ve had strangers tell us how good both of our kids are. It is flattering.
   But there is one department of parenting I have yet to master, and that is getting my son to eat. Don’t get me wrong, I mean he is a healthy boy. He is in the 50th percentile of height and weight, and his pediatrician says he is perfectly normal.
   However, his normal diet consists of about five foods. For meals, my son will eat peanut butter and jelly, grilled cheese, chicken nuggets, pizza or meatballs. And, the chicken and meatballs are new additions of the last few months. Up until then, we thought he was a self-proclaimed vegetarian (even though is father and I are no where near vegetarian ourselves).
   We’ve asked doctors, other parents, friends, family, read tips online, listened to radio shows … nothing we’ve been told to try has worked. And, we’ve really tried it all.
   What is strange, in my opinion, is that up until about 18 months, he would eat nearly anything. At a younger age, my son at full-sized pork chops, a cut up hamburger, vegetables, well basically anything we put on his high chair tray.
   Now, my daughter is nearly a year old, and we are desperately trying to break our son’s habits before she catches on and develops the same. My daughter, much like my son at the same age, eats any and everything we let her. I don’t want, in a year from now, for us to be having the same battles with her as we do with him. (Though she is her own person, and with her brother’s influence or not, it is quite possible she’ll stop eating a variety of foods all on her own, in the same inexplicable manner as her brother.)
   My son somehow stays healthy. We drop in a vitamin supplement to his daily juice. He drinks two-percent milk when he wakes and right before bed. We sneak him “vegetables” in a Juicy Juice product called “Harvest Surprise” (a mix of vegetable and fruit juices that taste like fruit alone). He eats a good mix of fruits. And, while he’ll only eat about five “main courses,” they are at least semi-healthy choices, mixing some of the missing food groups in his diet.
   We have tried rewards, stickers, discipline, begging, letting him cry, not making alternatives … my son just won’t budge. We’ve cut foods into fun shapes, matched their colors, purchased fun plates, forks and spoons … nada.
   Part of our problem is his stubbornness, and no, I have no clue where he got that trait. Part of our problem is the lack of energy we, as parents, have. Getting him to eat would be a long and difficult road, and most nights after working all day, I don’t have the “enthusiasm” to argue it out with him and listen to the screaming.
   I always said I’d never be the mom that made dinner, then made the kids alternative meals. Yet, here we are.
   I have no other solutions, but I’d love to hear suggestions on this. Register online and comment! I need your help!