At my wits end with his eating

[Skadiver13]

Id be inclined to split that morning bottle and do cereal with half and the other half in a cup.

He wont eat cereal doesn't like the texture. Haven't seen a dietician, my Ped won't give a referral yet as he's only a year and still doing the dairy challenge. I will ask again at his 15month check up.

Given that he really really needs the formula from the bottles I'm just not willing to force the sippy cup. he takes it out of his bottle just fine and quickly. We've been trying for months with formula in the sippy he'll take a sip or two even if he's hungry and really wants it he just doesn't like it enough to drink a lot from the sippy.

He gets a lot of spinach puree and sweet potato fries, or chunks that he likes. He does get a daily vitamin.

He hasn't gotten molars yet. :/ should I be concerned? He's got 6 teeth with 2 under the gums that I can see.

[Mama2Athena]

My 14 months old DD is also a light eater (when younger and not yet on solids, 22-24 oz of formula was a great day for her).  I'm constantly worried because she is petite (at 1 year check up was only 28" and 18.5 lbs, but the doctor said she's proportional).  Anyway, the amounts you are describing sounds about the same that my DD would eat.  She also gets around 16 oz of whole milk a day.  She loves her fruits and veggies so I have to set those out last, otherwise she wouldn't eat anything from the other food groups.  I make sure to add butter to all her veggies to up the calories... maybe you can try adding olive oil (does non-diary butter have lots of calories?).  She used to love avocados but now refusing those too :-(.

Breakfast is always her best meal, lunch is so so and dinner could be very hit or miss.  Sometimes she'll skip dinner altogether and just drink 8 oz of milk from her sippy.  It's frustrating but I know I can't make her eat.

I have also looked at the food chart for toddlers and personally I think that is a lot of food for such a little body.  But then again I have a light eater :-).  And like your DS, she is nonstop and constantly on the go.

[Shiv52]

I think I would insist on seeing a dietician.  Ours was pretty insistent that it was solids over milk at this age, main reason being oral motor development for speech. Ours said so long as she was having 12oz of dairy overall then that was more than adequate so I'm surprised your doctor has said your LO needs 16oz of formula plus calcium in solids plus a vitamin to meet dietary needs. That seems excessive to me.   I was saying I'd cut the formula, whether its in a sippy or a bottle doesn't matter at all, as cutting that 8oz bottle mid morning will ultimately increase solid intake.

That being said he eats a good amount so I would maybe continue as you are. Maybe once you do your dairy trial you'll feel more comfortable cutting the formula down. Because what my dietician said was I needed to think longterm and if dairy was going to be off the table for good then we needed to make sure we were covering all bases with her diet and as time goes on that isn't going to include BM or formula. 

[Skadiver13]

Mama2Athena thanks so much for your kind words. It helps to know my lo isn't all that abnormal. I think he's alwasy been a light eater. Like you 22-24oz was normal for him as an infant. Like you he was proportional at his 1yr apt. 19.5lbs and 29.5 inches. So although slight he's walking/running great so obviously getting some nutrition.

Shiv I appreciate your thoughts. I know Solids is more important and he does get a fair amount. He self-feeds most of the time and is eating more and more textures so I'm not really that concerned about oral development just yet. I will want to see a dietician just to make sure he is getting all he needs. His blood work will tell us a lot if he is getting enough vitamins etc.

Ours said so long as she was having 12oz of dairy overall then that was more than adequate so I'm surprised your doctor has said your LO needs 16oz of formula plus calcium in solids plus a vitamin to meet dietary needs. That seems excessive to me.

Not sure where you are located but here 12-14oz this age for dairy (formula, cheese, yogurt etc.) is normal. So for him to not get dairy anywhere else but formula 16oz isn't that much. As for a vitamin this is normal every child gets a vitamin it's nothing to do with Liam. It's automatic they get prescribed vitamins.

So far so good on the dairy challenge although his poop has become a bit puddingy the last 24hrs so we'll see what's what in a weeks time if this continues we'll test for blood in his stool to see if he's still intolerant. If he's not then we can definitely start to reduce his formula and add other things into his diet to make up for it. I would love to be off formula by 16 months.

[Shiv52]

Shiv I appreciate your thoughts. I know Solids is more important and he does get a fair amount. He self-feeds most of the time and is eating more and more textures so I'm not really that concerned about oral development just yet. I will want to see a dietician just to make sure he is getting all he needs. His blood work will tell us a lot if he is getting enough vitamins etc.

Ours said so long as she was having 12oz of dairy overall then that was more than adequate so I'm surprised your doctor has said your LO needs 16oz of formula plus calcium in solids plus a vitamin to meet dietary needs. That seems excessive to me.

Not sure where you are located but here 12-14oz this age for dairy (formula, cheese, yogurt etc.) is normal. So for him to not get dairy anywhere else but formula 16oz isn't that much. As for a vitamin this is normal every child gets a vitamin it's nothing to do with Liam. It's automatic they get prescribed vitamins.

The way the dietician explained to me is a toddler needs 700mg of calcium and a certain amount of vitamin D a day and this translates into 12-14 oz of dairy products. They stress 2-3 servings of dairy products a day  because this is the easiest way to make up calcium and vit D recommendations. There are also fats in milk which are important for growth but there are other sources too. So my dietician always said that it was important to forget about 12-14 oz of dairy products when dealing with a little one with MPI and think more along the lines of WHY they have dairy products. And the main reason is the calcium on top of the others.  So my point was if Your LO is eating calcium rich foods plus having a vitamin which most often contains 100% of RDA and his coconut yogurt plus one 8oz bottle of formula you are well covering what he needs.   They don't need dairy products but they do need what it comes from eating the dairy products, namely calcium, vitamin d, fats.  When we first did a dairy trial it did not go very well so the dietician was really good about stressing if my LO never took another dairy product in her life then she'd still be totally fine as a non dairy well balanced diet would still provide everything she needed.  Thankfully the second trial went much better and she was able to readily eat butter, milk in baked products like pancakes, cheese. She initially still reacted to yogurt but it did settle.  Milk was hit and miss for a good while but she copes really well with it now but can only have so much or ends up a bit constipated.

I hope your trial keeps going ok xx