Help!

DD is three and ever since she could eat solid food, she shoves food into her mouth and crams it in until there's no more room. Then she tries to swallow the whole mouthfull at once and often ends up choking. She's choked more times than I care to remember in her 3 years of being here. Meal times are so stressful and I'm on edge the whole time and I can't wait until she's finished so I know she's not going to choke.

SO even told me last night that she's going to die if she keeps eating like she does. And that scares the smurf out of me, because I do agree with him. We've tried everything we can think of to get her to eat right, but she doesn't. I spend over ten minutes every meal just cutting up her food into teeny tiny bites, but she still shoves tons of it in her mouth.

We've even seriously discussed putting her back on baby food. She never choked when she was on baby food.   I really don't want to do that, though. She loves real food. But if it keeps her from choking and dying, then I guess we'll have to do that.

Help!

My son does that. I sit there while he eats and only give him safe portions for his mouth and tells him he will not get more until he completely chews and swallows what he has now.

Since doing that when he's in a good mood I can give him his own food and hell ear the propper way!

I just offer him a little at a time then add more food as we go. My son isn't three but he's 1 and he does this with things he really likes.

Our youngest (2yrs) is like that. I swear he thinks he's a chipmunk. He will take things like a hamburger patty and shove them in whole if we let him. What we ended up doing was to take his plate away and give him one bite at a time. It was frustrating for him and us because he wanted his plate and to do it himself but eventually he caught the hint...now he's a lot better about it but sometimes he'll go back to his old ways and we just immediately switch too...I'll take his plate away put a little bit of food on his fork/spoon and hand it to him. And we'll continue during that until he gets it.

Quoting *MommyLove*:" My son does that. I sit there while he eats and only give him safe portions for his mouth and tells him ... [snip!] ... what he has now. Since doing that when he's in a good mood I can give him his own food and hell ear the propper way!"

I will have to try that!

<blockquote><b>Quoting *MommyLove*:</b>" My son does that. I sit there while he eats and only give him safe portions for his mouth and tells him ... [snip!] ... what he has now. Since doing that when he's in a good mood I can give him his own food and hell ear the propper way!"</blockquote>



I was going to suggest the same thing. Place one or two peices on her plate at a time.

My DD still does this occasionally as well. I usually just give her a few bites at a time on her plate in minimize the cramming it *all* in! And refill her plate when her mouth is empty and she takes a drink. Although she is getting MUCH better than when she was younger--she's 3.5 now.

ETA: we have 2 plates for her...her cutesy plate she eats off of and a paper plate/bowl with the rest of her food

I have taught ds to spit the food out because what I notices he does is put a ton of food in his mouth, store most of it in his cheaks for a while, when I see this I take a napkin or bring the trashcan to him and say spit, and he spits it out...