Customer Reviews

How to Get Your Kid to Eat: But Not Too Much

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Last week we went out for chinese food and my kids (ages 4 and 6) were begging for more broccoli and carrots. "How did you do it" asked the people at the table next door who were begging their two older kids to eat "at least a few more bites." Last night we went out with friends to a "family" restaurant where they put the kids cookies on the plate with their dinner. Our friends took their kids cookies and wouldn't let them have them until they had eaten what the parents considered an appropriate amount. There was alot of fighting. Our 4 year old ate her cookie first, then her chicken and left most of her fries. Our 6 year old ate her chicken and fries first and then ate her cookie. There was no fighting. How did we "do it"? Easy. Ellyn Sater's "How to get your kid to eat, but not too much."

Its simple method for dividing responsability in feeding makes everyone's life easier. Our favorite expression derives from the theories in this book: At the table we say "Eat it, Don't Eat it, Don't talk about it." Our kids know that this means that they don't have to eat anything they don't want but that no special meals will be made for them. We have desert every night and yes they get desert even if they don't eat dinner. Because there is no pressure or special reward, however, they usually choose to eat what is served, or some portion of it. The last things parents need is to battle with kids over food. This book will help you stop!

I found this book when my first child was 2 yrs. old and a very picky eater. I had become very tired and frustrated trying to find things that she would eat at each meal...just to get her to eat SOMETHING! I was so relieved to learn from this book that I am not responsible for how much or even IF my daughter ate. I am only responsible for WHEN and WHAT she can eat.

Since reading this book I have had 3 more children. And though they each have their eating preferences no one would ever call my children "picky eaters". I am constantly amazed at the great lengths my friends go to to get their children to eat or drink certain things. They seem to be equally amazed that I don't have to do the same with my own children.

This book gave me the strength and the "know-how" to get my kids to eat healthy without having to force them to.

This book was recommended to me by our pediatrician when my then one-year-old son wasn't gaining weight rapidly enough. While his problem was not of the seriousness of failing to thrive, it was extremely stressful to my husband and I as first-time parents. And I learned the foundations for parent-child food conflicts can be laid well before the child can participate in a discussion.

I was not interested in having the rest of my life turned into a food battle ground, and this book helped permanently defuse any conflict. My parenting style is relaxed. My husband's style is old school. And my son is willful. Satter's recommendations worked for all of us.

I can't say exactly when my daughter became a picky eater. She started off great eating different veggie and fruit purees, and somewhere around 11 months, feeding went downhill quickly. It may have had something to with her daycare provider or something else she perceived as traumatic, but her preferred diet became yoghurt, Cheerios, and bananas. I tried for almost five months to "get" her to eat other things, then bought every toddler feeding book I could find. This was the one with the best layout, and best philosophy.
Unlike the other books I got, I was able to read the whole book inside of a week, and was also able to read the specific chapters without needing to constantly reference others.
We have incorporated the philosophy and recommendations with our daughter and while she has only added one fruit to her diet on a regular basis, she is now at least willing to try a new food.
The one con I found was that Ms Satter referenced her other book "Child of Mine" quite often in the early chapters, and I felt that including a basic summary of it in its own chapter would have been very helpful.

As a Registered Dietitian, I have used the concepts in this book to help parents transform their feeding relationships with their kids! It is best to read this book before you even have children or when they are very young and problems haven't started yet, but if you pick it up out of desperation, that's OK too - the concepts here are a great relief for many parents: It is not up to you to get the food into the mouth of the child! As long as you are doing your part of providing consistent, reasonably balanced meals, your child will do the rest and eat what he/she needs. In fact, when you end the begging/pleading/bribing of the child to eat, they will end up eating better in the long run! The concepts in this book, when consistently applied, lead to a much more relaxed mealtime, less struggle over food between parent/child, and in my opinion, ultimately help the child achieve and maintain a healthy weight and healthy relationship with food.

This is THE MOST USEFUL parenting book that I have ever read (and I have read a lot). No parent should overlook it, and this is ESPECIALLY true of anyone who has conflicts with their children over eating or who has a child who overeats or undereats.

This is a book all parents should read. As a Registered Dietitian, I have been recommending this book to parents since it was published. Parents become very anxious about how their children eat, throughout the lifecycle, and the book will both comfort and guide parents throughout those years. The book will let parents focus on other more pressing issues of childrearing.

How to Get Your Kid to Eat ... But Not Too Much is the best book I have read on feeding issues. The information it contains applies both to infants and to older children. The advice she gives can start your child off with a healthy relationship to food that can last a life time.
Alan R. Greene, M.D., F.A.A.P.
Dr. Greene's HouseCalls -- Pediatric Wisdom for the Information Age
http://www.drgreene.com

My son's former doctor (not a pediatrician, unfortunately) recommended this book because she was convinced my son was not gaining weight at an appropriate pace. This book was the best thing she did in helping me care for my son!

After my son's former doctor told me my son wasn't gaining weight properly, I went into a little bit of a panic, feeding him whenever the opportunity arose, letting him walk around the house with food, etc. I am grateful that I had ordered this book - after I read it, I realized that prior to my panic we had been doing everything correctly as far as feeding our son. It gave me a point to reference to take to my son's former doctor to say, "Yes, we ARE feeding him correctly." And it gave me the guidance to realize that his doctor was misguided in how my son needed to be growing.

This book does a good job of covering how to feed your child, from infancy to teenagers. The book does a lot of teaching by example, and gives good guidelines rather than hard and fast dietary requirements, so I think it will be a book that will outlast many of the eating fads that seem to come and go.

I have a picky eater. I think he may be pickier than the children in How to Get Your Kids to Eat... But Not Too Much by Ellyn Satter. I don't know if her advice really speaks to my problem. It's helped make it less of an issue and that may be helping him to eat more and get ready to try different foods.

Basically, Satter's premise comes down to this: "It's my job to give him healthy meals and snacks but it's his job to eat it." It sounds simple enough and maybe by reading this book I've decided that my son's eating really isn't so much of a problem. I'm learning to let him do his thing and since I've done that he's started putting different foods in his diet and he's starting to eat a bit more. It's making meal times less stressful so I'll give it that.

The other thing I took out of this book is scheduled snack times. Maybe he's just not hungry when he comes to the table. I'm trying to work snacks into a schedule but I don't want to be too quick to do so. I'd rather he not notice that there seems to be something changing.

I'm hoping that the book has helped me to be a better parent with food. I know it's an issue for me and I don't want it to be an issue for my boys too.