Help, my son won't eat or sleep!!!!

Ladies I desperately need some advise. My 13 month old son has slowly over the months completely gone off most types of food, well any food with any kind of nutritional value anyway. I have tried everything I can think of to making meals more interesting, disguising vegetables in something else that he shows any slight interest in, making food into finger food so he has control over his eating and is more independant. Basically I am at my whitts end!!!!!! People try to tell me to leave it, don't stress he will eat eventually. But the problem with that is that he then wakes all through the night hungry and if we let him he would easily go through 3 bottles. I desperately need to start getting some sleep as we are TTC #2 and I would really like to get DS sleeping through the night befvore I get pregnant and have to start all over again with night feeds etc. Last night was the second night of refusing night feeds and it was not pretty. I feel so terrible refusing a feed but know that I have to stick with it to break the habbit. My poor DP stunbles off to work every morning with bags under his eyes. Any advise or tips would be soooo appreciated. I do understand that not all babies sleep through the night, and if he still wakes once or twice once he's back to eating during the day, then that's fine. But I just want to know he's eating enogh during the day that he won't be starving all night. Thanks in advance ladues xxx

It sounds like you have a lot going on :hug:

Has he been taking three bottles in the night until now? How does he usually fall asleep in the evening? Perhaps you could just water down his bottles so he is getting less nutritionally? Some babies just need contact with mum or dad or a big drink in the night to help them settle.

As for food, does he eat his meals with you? I found that was the best way to get dd to eat. I just served up my own meal and she would want whatever was on my plate, so I would give her some of that.

Good luck!

He might be teething and naturally wanting more milk over solids?

He's only 13 months, they still love their milk at that age. I agree not to stress too much about it. It's probably safe to say "this too shall pass". Can you co-sleep at all? That saw us through a lot of the night waking without too much exhaustion.

:hug: I know that when you are desperate for something to pass, all you want is to know how to make it pass quicker :) that being said, I think Liz is right, it does sound like a phase maybe teething related and maybe just an age thing. 13 months is still very little, Pie was having three bottles at that age overnight and her interest in 'real' food was up & down depending on the day.

It might be too that even though you are trying to stay relaxed, he is picking up on some of your anxiety over meal times. Often the best way to get kids to do something is to stop trying.

Good luck!

Unfortunately co-sleeping is not an option for us. DP won't allow it. I'm ok with that as in the past when he has been in our bed we all get less sleep as he thinks it's play time then. Have tried giving him dinner when we eat and sometimes it works. Mist of thd time it doesn't though. I should add that the reason we started allowing 3 bottles in the night was when he had a virus about a month ago he would wake screaming all through the night and so to keep some peace in the house I would just feed him to get him back to sleep. I will also add that at any time of the day or nught if a KFC hot chip was offered to him he will gobble that down no problem!!!!

Belle, it's amazing how common it is for toddlers to go through a stage of seeming to not eat at all. And it's also amazing how they seem to survive just fine on very little (or perhaps it's more than we realise). I went through this with my first DS and I really wish I had handled it differently. From my experience, and I know this is hard to do, I wouldn't make a battle over it or show him that you are at all stressed. I'd sit him at the table with you when you eat and put his food in front of him - finger foods are always more appealing. If he eats, he eats. If he doesn't, just take it away when the meal is over and leave it at that. It's very, very hard to do, but if he's hungry he'll eat, and if he sees his has power, he'll hold out for the "good" stuff. I eventually did this with DS1 and was amazed when after just 1 month he was eating quite a lot of our family foods, even things he had refused what seemed like 100 times before.

Hopefully if this works for you, once he is eating well he will sleep better. I do remember that being about the age that DS1 was not sleeping much at night either (and I was pg) so I am sure it is all related. It was a very, very tough time and I know how hard this must be for you :hug: Hang in there - there is light.