Hellobee Boards

I don't have a picture, but I have a mental-visual example. Last night, I served falafal with hummus, pita, tzatziki sauce, and a chopped salad with feta cheese, dried cranberries, sunflower seeds, etc.

She ate 1 falafal after some cajoling for her to "try a bite". She ate 1 bite of chopped salad. She finished her hummus and tzatziki sauce with her spoon, and ate 1 small triangle of pita bread. That was it! I didn't force it, because she has cold and isn't feeling well. She didn't eat anything else before she went to bed.

On other nights, she might eat half a hamburger (no bun), half an avocado, some broccoli, and maybe 4 sweet potato fries. If anything like a bun is included, or something served in a wrap or sandwhich, she will eat way less because the carbs or more filling.

I take a lot of food shots, but this is the most recent from my snapchat. I usually use a divided platter and fill it up with half veggies and the other half protein and carb. Most of the times the kids only eat 1/4 to 1/2.

In my opinion and experience, the portion size picture you have for your son is very reasonable and a good amount!
My kid wouldn’t very often eat more than that.

I don’t have any pictures I could quickly find, but rough estimates of size are below. I generally use the same divided plate that @sweetiepie has in her pic. My LO will only eat what she likes/wants to, everything else is a fight and I’m too tired most nights to fight. So the items listed below are the “good amount of eating” ones. Anything not on the list below she’s likely not to eat at all or only take 1 bite of. Sigh.

Her usual dinner serving would be like pasta plus 1 veggie listed below plus a small handful of fruit

Pasta of any sort/any sauce: ½ cup to 1 cup
Corn: ½ ear to 1 ear
Broccoli: ½ cup
Peas: 1/3 cup
Cooked carrots: equivalent of 6-8 baby sized carrots
Pizza: 2 slices (maybe 3 if they are small and she is extra hungry)
Caesar salad: ½ cup on a good night (won't eat any other salad dressing)
Various veggies: handful (i.e., I’ll give and she’ll eat like 4-6 slices of cucumber or tomato)
PB&J sandwich: ½ to ¾ of standard size sandwich
Hummus: 2 tablespoons
Bread: 1 triangle of pita or naan, 1 slice of white/wheat type bread

@SweetiePie: Random, but your kitchen table looks exactly like my mom's!

@irene: Why do you feel like he needs to finish? Does he ask for snacks after dinner? Does he wake up hungry? Try to trust that your son knows how hungry he is. Imagine if every night somebody else assigned your portion size and then yelled at you if you didn't want to eat it all.

@ShootingStar: Yes my three-year-old is the least it dinner as well, unless it happens to be something that he loves. He eats a sizable breakfast and lunch.

I didn't respond to your last thread but as someone who's been very obsessive about my LO's size and eating, here's what I can impart by way of "wisdom," most of which I'm learning after way too much unnecessary anguish.

My LO is tiny. She's 3, 34 inches tall (she grew less than 2 inches since her 2 year old checkup) and 27 lbs. She was born tiny and has never even made it onto growth charts. She never ate much - maybe 12-15 oz of formula a day, and I obsessed nonstop about her not growing "enough" (even though she was growing).

My mom is a lifelong early childhood educator, and when LO was ~8 months, she told me that it is physically impossible for kids to starve. And the more my husband and I push my LO to eat (and my husband and I are both very overweight, so our relationship with food is far from healthy), the worse we're going to make things for our LO because she will learn to ignore her own hunger signs and begin to have a very unhealthy relationship with food.

It took us a long time, but we're now much calmer about meals. LO loves veggies and meat, she'll try almost anything, and she eats what I consider enough for her. On average, she'll eat a small chicken breast, a fistfull of veggies (green beans, carrots, and broccoli are her favorites) and a small bowl of rice or pasta. Sometimes she'll eat more - the other day she inhaled an entire sweet potato - other days she'll nibble and move on. I have a few backup foods - cheese in any form, avocado, tomatoes, milk - that I give her if I'm worried she'll go hungry, but 99% of the time, I leave her alone.

They will not starve, trust me. They're toddlers, they get distracted. I admit I use her favorite TV show as a way to get her to sit still and eat if she's really distracted, but generally, they will be fine. Let him figure out when he's hungry. I get that it's hard with the growth issues, but if he's a healthy kid overall, let him be, really.

@irene: that looks like a good amount. I think you need to stop letting your mom get to you.

I'll respond to the other thread, but I keep a chart like this on my fridge so I can stop freaking out that DS doesn't eat enough. It further relaxes me when I keep this guideline in the context of a WEEK'S worth of eating, and not daily. He may eat no veggies today, but he might have eaten a lot of carrots on Sunday, etc.

https://www.healthychildren.org/SiteCollectionImages/energybalance_portionsize_chart.jpg

Its also helped me waste less food because I just these keep reasonable portions in mind and then assume DS will eat a bit less than the guidelines as a general rule. So I start with about 75% of what the recommended guideline is and if DS wants more, obviously he can have more.

@irene: that looks like a good amount! I don't have any photos handy but for dinner last night my 3.5 year old ate a bowl of phad see iw. She didn't finish all the chicken but she ate a good amount of noodles, broccoli and a bit of chicken. The bowl we use is the Skiphop one. We filled it almost to the top but it was very loose in there. This is her typical portion size.

https://www.amazon.com/Skip-Hop-Melamine-Plate-Bowl/dp/B00WANFL6I

That looks like what my girls eat.

@Mrs. Carrot: that's not true and could be dangerous information to dole out on the Internet. My mom has hundreds of patients that for various reasons refuse to eat. Many of whom require medical intervention to survive.

I agree with you @oliviaoblivia: in reference to what @Mrs. Carrot: said.

DS1 (the one I mentioned in my earlier post) required almost a year of eating therapy before he would eat. At 2 he ate only 5 foods. Now at 3.5, he will at least try things, even if he doesn't like it, he makes the attempt. Countless people told me it was a phase, that he wouldn't starve, etc. but that wasn't the case. He needed a BIG push to get to where he is now.

@SweetiePie: WHAT??? I am literally laughing out loud about that!

I read an article one time that basically gave me two guidelines I have been trying to live by with my almost 3 year old. 1) make sure you give them something each night that they WILL eat without a fight and 2) rule of thumb is one T of each food group for every year they are old. DD is almost 3 - so I would expect 3T of meat, 3T of starch and 3T of veggie/fruit (depending on the time of day). It has worked well for us.

I also have noticed that my daughter just doesnt eat a heavy dinner. I give her proper portions but some (most) nights she doesnt finish them. She doesnt ask for a snack later and doesnt wake up hungry. Daycare tells me she houses breakfast and lunch - so I have decided she must just be a light eater at night.

If she eats particularly light (like only a few bites) I remind her before excusing her from the table that there will be no dessert and no snacks. Of course if she were starving I would give her something - but I dont want her passing on nutritious dinner bc she plans to ask for animal crackers later.

@Mrs. Carrot: I agree that there is considerable anxiety here and it's unlikely the OP's LO would starve himself. I'm just very sensitive to assurances and advice lingering in the internet that if relied upon could potentially harm a child.

@winniebee: Haha! Same here for my 2.5 year old. I stopped stressing about it though.

I don't have pictures. But today, my 3 year old ate:

Toast with butter
Watermelon
A little less than half a pb& honey sandwich
Several crackers with humus
A few raisins
A handful of corn cereal
Maybe 1/4 cups brown rice
Plain yogurt- maybe 1/4 cup
One bite of a spinach curry
Probably 12 oz whole milk

I don't make her finish meals. She usually gets to choose her lunch, and helps decide on breakfast. At dinner I try to make sure she likes at least one thing on her plate. She has to try a bite of everything.
I try to look at food intake over a week, it helps me stress less. She barely ate veggies today, but we had broccoli last night and carrots for snack and she ate a bunch of those.

I'd be more concerned about impacting her emotional well being by making rules and yelling and manipulating around meals.
We have "dessert nights" maybe 2-3 times a week, where we allow her to have dessert. The only expectation, which is the same every night, is that she try a bite of everything. Often she will try her bites, then eat her (small) dessert, and then return to eating more dinner. My husband felt strongly that we shouldn't have expectations around how much she eats- he's read significant research that suggests this can set people up for unhealthy food relationships.

Maybe he eats better at school because at home he is in a power struggle with you about it?
We just focus on making dinner a nice time. We set the table, serve food family style light a candle, say a blessing, and talk about our day.

Granted, my kid is growing fine. But if your pediatrician isn't worried, I'd try really hard to back off and ignore your mom.
My mom gives my kid sugar all day long when we visit, and thinks we are ass holes because we don't give her dessert every night. I just ignore her, and trust my decisions about my own kid.