Caring parents try to surround the baby with love and care, they monitor his health, buy only high-quality clothes, regularly visit the pediatrician, get vaccinated and, of course, want the baby to eat well. But in some cases, the child does not eat well, and the mother cannot understand what is wrong.
Poor appetite in a child is a problem for many parents. Everyone solves it in his own way: some force him to eat, saying “for mom, for dad,” and sometimes even threatening, while others turn to various specialists, assuming that the baby is sick.
However, situations often arise that the child is healthy, but does not eat well. First, parents need to determine if there is a problem. If the baby is gaining weight well, but eats little, as it seems to adults, then there is no need to raise a panic. But if there is a lack of body weight, nutritional problems need to be addressed.
Nutritionists and psychologists have found that more often the appetite worsens in babies aged 2 to 4 years. At this time, an age crisis sets in, the child thus shows his independence, sometimes he is simply capricious.
There are other reasons for poor appetite:
- Food is not tasty or portions are too large. Often, the child is offered a bowl of soup or porridge, which an adult can hardly handle. It seems to parents that the baby has eaten too little.
- Frequent snacks between meals. For example, before lunch or dinner, parents allow you to eat chocolate, cookies, candy. It satisfies hunger and impairs appetite.
- Failure to comply with the diet. The body cannot adapt to meals if breakfast, lunch and dinner are held at different times every day.
- The period of the illness. Even a cold significantly reduces appetite, the baby tries to drink more and often refuses any food.
Do not forget about the psychological factors due to which the child does not eat well. Problems with kindergarten teachers, peers, etc. can spoil your appetite.
If there are no health problems, but the child still refuses food, there is no need to let the problem take its course. It is necessary to find out the reason and take decisive action.
- Set the daily routine. To do this, you can make a schedule and feed the baby at a specific time: breakfast - 8.00, lunch - 12.30, etc.
- Offer baby portions so that the baby eats all food without leaving anything on the plate. Otherwise, he will get used to the fact that it is normal to be undernourished.
- Introduce new products gradually. You cannot offer several new dishes at once for lunch or dinner, it is important that the plate contains food that the baby has already tried.
- Do not force feed. This will only worsen the situation, the baby will begin to eat less and withdraw into himself.
- Ask your child to help in the kitchen. If he likes to cook dishes, then he will taste them with great pleasure. You can also work together to come up with edible decorations for porridge, soup, mashed potatoes, etc.
If parents do everything right, then by the age of 5-6 the appetite will improve, and the pickiness in food will become less. The most important thing is that if the child does not eat well, do not force him to eat, this will only increase the aversion to food.
