HAHAHA SAME. I swear that toddlers are somehow just a LOT more devious in nature and maybe lose that when they grow up? My daughter will insist she wants more. I ask her if she’s sure, she says nice. I prepare more food for her. She takes barely a spoonful and then starts playing with the food. I shut that down and ask her if she’s done. She says “done”. Rinse and repeat for all meals.
I wonder if it’s ’cause it can take the body some time before it realizes it’s full. So by the time you’re done getting her the second serving, her body is like “actually hold on, you’re full. All done”
She’ll eat like 90% of something and then all of a sudden have this disgusted look on her face while chewing it, spit it out and say that she doesn’t like it. You’ve been eating it for the past 25 minutes! Just… why.
I was told this was them still in the process of learning what being full feels like! Not sure if it’s true, but I started saying “oh is your tummy full?” And now its part of her explanation
See, that’s what we thought, and now ours has a really skewed view of what “full” means.
Halfway through his plate, he’ll announce, “I’m full!” Then, before his fork has even hit the plate, “I’m hungry. I want ice cream.”
That makes sense. Being “full”, in a toddler’s mind, may be no different than not wanting/liking any more of the food in question. It’s not that they don’t like it per se. They just don’t want it at that moment simply because they are done. So, they “don’t like it” anymore because that’s how they think they are supposed to phrase being done, but it is really just for that particular time period.
Waits for me to sit down to eat my food before asking for one thing she wants. And then repeats for the next three things. Never all at once. Never before I sit down.
Not using utensils. They are perfectly capable, they just choose not to. I can be relaxed with some meals but I can't deal when it's spaghetti bolognaise or oatmeal or something sticky.
If I can also throw shade at my preschooler but they don't sit on the chair properly. One leg is sitting on the chair and the other is standing, like they are sitting half on half off. Drives me nuts.
he loves dipping things but wont eat dipped things, if he's eating fries and i have ketchup, he *needs* to dip his fries in my ketchup and then will not eat any ketchup'd fries, we're snacking on pita chips and i have hummus, looks like all the chips have hummus now, and he needs a different snack
I'm convinced there's no logical way to solve this one. I mean clearly dippable things must be dipped. It's what you do with them. But then what do you do with them after they've contaminated by whatever they were dipped onto? Gotta throw it away. The only logical conclusion.
It's a tough situation to be in. I feel his conundrum. If only there was a better way.
It’s not worth complaining about, but I like putting toppings on my toast or crackers (like cheese and scrambled eggs on toast) and she wants to be like me and also stack her toast but she only takes a ant sized bite and pushes the topping off and gets frustrated so I have to hold her food, wait for her to open her mouth wide enough, and then shove as much as I can in so she can get the desired “bite” she’s looking for.
Yesterday, she put 4 blackberries on her toast and was genuinely upset when they rolled off (but she won’t eat jam on toast because that’s too messy, so smashed blackberries would have been rejected too)
Edit: actual picture of her taking the worlds [smallest bite](https://www.reddit.com/r/spongebob/comments/16r6b1m/squidward_taking_the_bite_off_the_krabby_patty/) but jk it’s just squidward
Your not alone! I make everything style avocado toast once a week my daughter insists on having one too. She only eats the avocado and toppings but NEVER eats the bread.
I tried giving her just avocado with the seasoning and cheese but she refused 🫠
My son wanted banana toast but then took the banana off and just ate the buttered toast - how dare I give him buttered toast next time however. Where is the banana? So he can pick it off and leave it stuck on his highchair.
My two kids will sit at the table while I’m making dinner and chant “eat eat eat” over and over again.
So, I rush to serve dinner thinking they are really hungry, only for them to take a few bites 😩
My son won’t eat anything in sandwich form. He separates everything from PB&J or sub sandwiches to burgers, then eats the different layers separately. It makes meals that are supposed to be travel-friendly super messy.
My daughter does this too, and not just with sandwiches. She deconstructs burgers and hot dogs, and will even peel melted cheese off a slice of pizza rather than eating it as intended.
She tells me she wants sausage and eggs for whatever meal, only eats the sausage, then gets crying upset when next time I only make sausage. This went on for like a week before I just made the sausage. Them eggs too expensive to be wasted!
She deconstructs her sandwiches/burgers/wraps and spreads the ingredients all over her plate and table. She eats mostly everything, but one thing at a time. I wish she would just take bites of the whole thing.
Mine doesn’t like getting her hands dirty, so she often expects someone to feed her. I traveled alone with her last week and I swear she lost a bit of weight because of the amount of times I was unable or unwilling to hand feed my 3 and a half year old
She'll run at me with a wide open mouth yelling "ah! Ah!!!!!" anytime I'm holding food *even if she has the same goddamn food on her own plate*
I love my child but I haven't eaten a whole apple without it being stolen in more than a week 😂
Just sometimes refuses to use her hands and put stuff in her mouth. So I have to act like an idiot to hype her up enough to eat it, or feed it to her myself, and she'll eat it juts fine.
My daughter never finishes any of her snacks! I don’t care about meals but she gets so bored of snacks. I buy so much variety and she’s eager to try but won’t finish anything.
My 3.5yo will shove the last (quite large) bite of food in his mouth and excitedly tell me he’s done. I’ll then tell him that he can get up and put his plate in the sink - at that point he’s pretty much free to do whatever he wants until bath, nap, etc. As soon as he gets up he’ll spit the food out. I don’t know if it’s just too big of a bite or if he really is trying to play me, but it drives me crazy.
Gonna have to go with ‘barely eating at all and gaining less than 2lb per year while barely holding onto the lowest weight percentile’
It also takes 2-3 hours per day of supervision and engagement to get her to eat the tiny amounts she does.
My son (almost 4) has taken 45-75 minutes to eat a single slice of toast for the last 2 years. It drives me up the wall because 99% of the time he doesn’t want anything else.
Takes one bite of something he’s asked for - then asks for something else. I don’t like to restrict food or insist he eats something, but no you can’t take ONE BITE out of an apple, plum, banana and tangerine - you’re not The Very Hungry Caterpillar Ffs 😂
ETA: Fruit salads are a godsend!
Our 4-year-old will sit and eat by herself, say if we have the TV on for her, or if my wife and I are doing some things in the kitchen near the table. But she will rarely sit down with us and anyone else invited to the meal. She will just walk away and play nearby, but will not eat.
Mine is the exact same it's like she doesn't trust I haven't poisoned her portion or something. Last night we had spag bol, 'i don't like 'pasta' half way through MY dinner instead 'yum I love pasta'
Yep mine does the same thing, somehow all food tastes better when it’s on my plate (my husbands is always “yucky” tho lol) even though it’s the exact same food on her own plate. Lately my daughter’s just been learning to spit and that results in 90% of her food and drinks being spit back out for literally no reason. She does it the worst with grapes but it’s all kinds of food and drink, it’s so disgusting and annoying.
He sits at the table eating very slowly, sometimes for over an hour EVERY dinner. We always eat together and we're always done like half an hour before him and he absolutely refuses to leave the table, eating crumb size bites
It’s because your toddler trusts what’s your on your plate. They know you are safe, you are smart, and you protect them from bad things. They don’t know how to evaluate foods for safety and taste yet just from looking, bug apparently you do. The food going in your mouth from your plate must be safe and smart, too, right?
It’s the same reason your kid wants your phone, your keys, your coffee mug instead of the fake phone and toy keys you get them. Kids learn how to talk, walk, dance, use a spoon, and everything else by watching us.
For the toddler brain that is trying to learn and process how to interact with and evaluate every single thing that exists, it’s much easier just to take what the grown-up already trusts. It’s very logical to their small brain. It’s *fucking infuriating*, but it’s toddler-logical.
Both of mine (5 and almost 3) are always "starving" while you are cooking and trying to sneak bites or asking for snacks from the fridge. The minute the meal is finished, their hunger disappears and they leave their plates untouched.
Every food has to be in a separate bowl. And he had a strong preference for the dark blue bowl in his 4-color bowl set. I bought like 8 of those dark blue bowls, which helps the crying, but it’s still a lot of dishes when bread is in one bowl, fruit in another, etc.
Will take the toppings and cheese off of a pizza so he can eat just the tomato puree on the base. Not sure what the point of it is and can’t imagine eating a pizza like that. He absolutely loves the tomato puree though so can’t complain when hes at least still eating.
My daughter does the complete opposite. She will BEG for something and when you give it to her she will start crying saying “I don’t want to (enter food name)”
Mine will eat all of a food, ask for more, and then by the time I prepare more and get it on her plate she says “I’m all done”
Atleast she eats the first portion. Mine is done before getting started lol
The wooorrst 🥲
HAHAHA SAME. I swear that toddlers are somehow just a LOT more devious in nature and maybe lose that when they grow up? My daughter will insist she wants more. I ask her if she’s sure, she says nice. I prepare more food for her. She takes barely a spoonful and then starts playing with the food. I shut that down and ask her if she’s done. She says “done”. Rinse and repeat for all meals.
I wonder if it’s ’cause it can take the body some time before it realizes it’s full. So by the time you’re done getting her the second serving, her body is like “actually hold on, you’re full. All done”
Could very well be honestly!
Same!! Such a waste
Mine does this too
She’ll eat like 90% of something and then all of a sudden have this disgusted look on her face while chewing it, spit it out and say that she doesn’t like it. You’ve been eating it for the past 25 minutes! Just… why.
I was told this was them still in the process of learning what being full feels like! Not sure if it’s true, but I started saying “oh is your tummy full?” And now its part of her explanation
Oh interesting! I’ve never heard that. That would make sense then!
See, that’s what we thought, and now ours has a really skewed view of what “full” means. Halfway through his plate, he’ll announce, “I’m full!” Then, before his fork has even hit the plate, “I’m hungry. I want ice cream.”
This is me. As an adult. Once I hit that point I am nauseated by food.
That makes sense. Being “full”, in a toddler’s mind, may be no different than not wanting/liking any more of the food in question. It’s not that they don’t like it per se. They just don’t want it at that moment simply because they are done. So, they “don’t like it” anymore because that’s how they think they are supposed to phrase being done, but it is really just for that particular time period.
Mine doesn’t wanna sit at the table and eat. He will. But he’d rather get down and run around and come back for bites. It’s so hard to fight
Waits for me to sit down to eat my food before asking for one thing she wants. And then repeats for the next three things. Never all at once. Never before I sit down.
Not eating
Throwing food when he's done instead of just saying "done" or doing nothing.
Not using utensils. They are perfectly capable, they just choose not to. I can be relaxed with some meals but I can't deal when it's spaghetti bolognaise or oatmeal or something sticky. If I can also throw shade at my preschooler but they don't sit on the chair properly. One leg is sitting on the chair and the other is standing, like they are sitting half on half off. Drives me nuts.
The utensils thing drives me nuts too. I thought by three she’d use them more consistently, but I’ve even caught her eating cereal with her hands.
he loves dipping things but wont eat dipped things, if he's eating fries and i have ketchup, he *needs* to dip his fries in my ketchup and then will not eat any ketchup'd fries, we're snacking on pita chips and i have hummus, looks like all the chips have hummus now, and he needs a different snack
I'm convinced there's no logical way to solve this one. I mean clearly dippable things must be dipped. It's what you do with them. But then what do you do with them after they've contaminated by whatever they were dipped onto? Gotta throw it away. The only logical conclusion. It's a tough situation to be in. I feel his conundrum. If only there was a better way.
It’s not worth complaining about, but I like putting toppings on my toast or crackers (like cheese and scrambled eggs on toast) and she wants to be like me and also stack her toast but she only takes a ant sized bite and pushes the topping off and gets frustrated so I have to hold her food, wait for her to open her mouth wide enough, and then shove as much as I can in so she can get the desired “bite” she’s looking for. Yesterday, she put 4 blackberries on her toast and was genuinely upset when they rolled off (but she won’t eat jam on toast because that’s too messy, so smashed blackberries would have been rejected too) Edit: actual picture of her taking the worlds [smallest bite](https://www.reddit.com/r/spongebob/comments/16r6b1m/squidward_taking_the_bite_off_the_krabby_patty/) but jk it’s just squidward
Your not alone! I make everything style avocado toast once a week my daughter insists on having one too. She only eats the avocado and toppings but NEVER eats the bread. I tried giving her just avocado with the seasoning and cheese but she refused 🫠
My son wanted banana toast but then took the banana off and just ate the buttered toast - how dare I give him buttered toast next time however. Where is the banana? So he can pick it off and leave it stuck on his highchair.
My two kids will sit at the table while I’m making dinner and chant “eat eat eat” over and over again. So, I rush to serve dinner thinking they are really hungry, only for them to take a few bites 😩
My son won’t eat anything in sandwich form. He separates everything from PB&J or sub sandwiches to burgers, then eats the different layers separately. It makes meals that are supposed to be travel-friendly super messy.
Mine does this! It drives me insane watching him pull apart a perfectly good sandwich.
Seriously! He also asks for parts of mine, like asking me to take the ham out of my sandwich and give it to him, so I’m left with a sad sandwich, too.
Sad sandwiches for everyone apparently!
Mine is a deconstructer too
Yep!! Any kind of sandwich or burger- even does it to pizza? Drives me mad.
My daughter does this too, and not just with sandwiches. She deconstructs burgers and hot dogs, and will even peel melted cheese off a slice of pizza rather than eating it as intended.
Yes! My son takes cheese off of everything!
She tells me she wants sausage and eggs for whatever meal, only eats the sausage, then gets crying upset when next time I only make sausage. This went on for like a week before I just made the sausage. Them eggs too expensive to be wasted!
She deconstructs her sandwiches/burgers/wraps and spreads the ingredients all over her plate and table. She eats mostly everything, but one thing at a time. I wish she would just take bites of the whole thing.
Mine doesn’t like getting her hands dirty, so she often expects someone to feed her. I traveled alone with her last week and I swear she lost a bit of weight because of the amount of times I was unable or unwilling to hand feed my 3 and a half year old
She'll run at me with a wide open mouth yelling "ah! Ah!!!!!" anytime I'm holding food *even if she has the same goddamn food on her own plate* I love my child but I haven't eaten a whole apple without it being stolen in more than a week 😂
its the refusing to eat that drives me bonkers
Just sometimes refuses to use her hands and put stuff in her mouth. So I have to act like an idiot to hype her up enough to eat it, or feed it to her myself, and she'll eat it juts fine.
My daughter never finishes any of her snacks! I don’t care about meals but she gets so bored of snacks. I buy so much variety and she’s eager to try but won’t finish anything.
Mt daughter (3yo) refuses to feed herself.......
My 3.5yo will shove the last (quite large) bite of food in his mouth and excitedly tell me he’s done. I’ll then tell him that he can get up and put his plate in the sink - at that point he’s pretty much free to do whatever he wants until bath, nap, etc. As soon as he gets up he’ll spit the food out. I don’t know if it’s just too big of a bite or if he really is trying to play me, but it drives me crazy.
Telling me he doesn’t like a food any more as he is eating that very food 🙃
Gonna have to go with ‘barely eating at all and gaining less than 2lb per year while barely holding onto the lowest weight percentile’ It also takes 2-3 hours per day of supervision and engagement to get her to eat the tiny amounts she does.
Commanding me on what I should eat on my plate first, and then crying when I don’t comply. And no, I don’t do this to her at all.
We had a phase like this! Luckily, it was relatively short
My son (almost 4) has taken 45-75 minutes to eat a single slice of toast for the last 2 years. It drives me up the wall because 99% of the time he doesn’t want anything else.
Begging for a banana and then, immediately after I open it, telling me “no I don’t want it.” 🥴
Takes one bite of something he’s asked for - then asks for something else. I don’t like to restrict food or insist he eats something, but no you can’t take ONE BITE out of an apple, plum, banana and tangerine - you’re not The Very Hungry Caterpillar Ffs 😂 ETA: Fruit salads are a godsend!
He hates water and it sucks!
Our 4-year-old will sit and eat by herself, say if we have the TV on for her, or if my wife and I are doing some things in the kitchen near the table. But she will rarely sit down with us and anyone else invited to the meal. She will just walk away and play nearby, but will not eat.
Mine is the exact same it's like she doesn't trust I haven't poisoned her portion or something. Last night we had spag bol, 'i don't like 'pasta' half way through MY dinner instead 'yum I love pasta'
Yep mine does the same thing, somehow all food tastes better when it’s on my plate (my husbands is always “yucky” tho lol) even though it’s the exact same food on her own plate. Lately my daughter’s just been learning to spit and that results in 90% of her food and drinks being spit back out for literally no reason. She does it the worst with grapes but it’s all kinds of food and drink, it’s so disgusting and annoying.
He sits at the table eating very slowly, sometimes for over an hour EVERY dinner. We always eat together and we're always done like half an hour before him and he absolutely refuses to leave the table, eating crumb size bites
She literally will spit out any food that is not “bite-sized” for her.
Sneaking her food to the dog as much as possible
Yeah. Always have my food stolen
It’s because your toddler trusts what’s your on your plate. They know you are safe, you are smart, and you protect them from bad things. They don’t know how to evaluate foods for safety and taste yet just from looking, bug apparently you do. The food going in your mouth from your plate must be safe and smart, too, right? It’s the same reason your kid wants your phone, your keys, your coffee mug instead of the fake phone and toy keys you get them. Kids learn how to talk, walk, dance, use a spoon, and everything else by watching us. For the toddler brain that is trying to learn and process how to interact with and evaluate every single thing that exists, it’s much easier just to take what the grown-up already trusts. It’s very logical to their small brain. It’s *fucking infuriating*, but it’s toddler-logical.
Mine just ate a crayon.
He says "all done" and I have . 2 seconds to get to him before he starts throwing the food on the floor
Both of mine (5 and almost 3) are always "starving" while you are cooking and trying to sneak bites or asking for snacks from the fridge. The minute the meal is finished, their hunger disappears and they leave their plates untouched.
Mine also eats my food more than hers lol. Dinner last night was eaten from a single container that all 3 of us shared 😂
This is also amazing! I wish my kiddo would eat what I did!
Throws empty cups or silverware on the floor UGH
I always add extra to my plate because I know two other toddlers will be eating some
Every food has to be in a separate bowl. And he had a strong preference for the dark blue bowl in his 4-color bowl set. I bought like 8 of those dark blue bowls, which helps the crying, but it’s still a lot of dishes when bread is in one bowl, fruit in another, etc.
Mine throws a fit about trying things, tries them with a big smile and says “oh I like it!” then refuses anymore or it ever again
stuffing way too much food in his mouth then proceeding to spit it all out in one go because he can't swallow it or chew further...
throwing the god damn utensils and food on the ground. 😵💫
Will take the toppings and cheese off of a pizza so he can eat just the tomato puree on the base. Not sure what the point of it is and can’t imagine eating a pizza like that. He absolutely loves the tomato puree though so can’t complain when hes at least still eating.
I ask my daughter if she wants something and she’ll confidently say no. Then after it’s all gone she’ll start crying for it.
My daughter does the complete opposite. She will BEG for something and when you give it to her she will start crying saying “I don’t want to (enter food name)”