4 Year Old Takes Forever to Swallow Food

How did she get a fear of choking? I'm assuming she had a scary episode (for both her and you), and that the eating issue is revolving around control.

Do you think some of the behavior is because she gets attention (and not her little sister?) Unless she is significantly underweight, I would just back off from insisting that she eat anything- when she gets hungry, she'll eat. If she is underweight, then I would go to the pediatrician and ask for a referral to a pediatric feeding specialist ( or perhaps take her to counseling- so she can work out whatever is bugging her). Good luck.

I used to have a an eating problem kid. She was always taking such a long time to eat, no matter what. I don't know that your child has a fear of choking so much as she may be using that as her reason. This struggle is her way of getting your attention. If the situation escalates, she knows you are focusing on her. I spoke with a counselor regarding our situation and she recommended an egg timer. I pulled it out when I could see we were going to have "one of those nights." I didn't stand over her counting or coersing. I just continued to eat with my family and tried to have some pleasant dinner conversation. When we were done, we got up and left her at the table with her timer. When it dinged, her plate was taken away. If she wasn't done, she didn't get dessert, usually a small treat. Eventually, she began to finish her meals without too much drama. I motivated her with dessert but she had to deal with the timer, not an angry mom. And I no longer had to be the angry mom with an upset stomach.

It's frustrating to get things done when you only have a short time to accomplish them. Dinner, homework, showers, getting ready for the next day... it's easy to become impatient with a child that seems to be so unreasonable. She clearly has some emotional issues and is looking for attention, good or not so good. I hope things get better for you guys. I do have a little story about my daughter and I. Hope it gives you some perspective and hope...http://livingintheory.blogspot.com/2008/02/spirited-cries...

I wish I had sage advice for you, but I don't. What I can offer instead is the knowledge that you aren't the only one with a kid that does this. My 5 1/2 year-old will chew food for 30 minutes or more when he decides to be stubborn. If we are trying to get to school, he will spend 30 minutes chewing a single bite of oatmeal. I didn't even know you could chew oatmeal!

Mealtimes are a fight on a regular basis at our house. Some days he will eat fine (he's not afraid of choking), and other days he will spend 30 minutes or more per bite of food for no apparent reason.

A. - It may be frustrating that your child takes so long to eat because of her chewing habbits, but it is actually in your childs best interest to chew her food so well. The leading cause of chronic constipation, colon cancer, and obesity is improper chewing habbits This is one of the main reasons that over the counter herbal colon cleansing has become all the rage. Majority of people gulp their food in whole bites, not even giving the important digestive enzymes in our saliva a chance to kick in. By swallowing whole food particles it makes it more difficult for our bodies to absorb the nutirents that we need from our food and it also makes it much more difficult for our digestive tract to work properly. This phenomena could lead to diverticulitis, irritable bowel syndrome, chronic fatige, leaky gut, obesity and an inablitlty to think clearly because of inadequate nutirition. It is actually the most healthy bet to chew your food until it is almost liquid, approximately 23 times per bite. Maybe allowing more time for meals would help alleviate some of your stress. Good luck .

Don't discourage her. For more reasons than one. For starters, she wasn't born with this fear... what happened? I know I was afraid my first would choke on everything, so I understand if you were afraid but somewhere along the road, she got afraid as well. Chewing food really well is one of the best things we all could do to aid our bodies digestive system. 30 minutes to chew one bite - yea, that's a tad long. At this point, stop saying anything to her about it. Don't draw any attention to it, just feed her. When she is done, she's done. If you are at home and not going anywhere - no big deal. If you need to leave, count down. Tell her we are leaving in 10 minutes, then 5 then 2. At least that way she has a heads up that the food will be taken away soon. Eventually, she may learn that she needs to eat a little faster. I think with any annoying habit or bad habit, the more attention we draw to it, the worse it may be.

Best wishes,
M.

Unfortunately I don't have any advice on how to speed up the chewing, but I can offer some comradary! My son does the same thing it drives me nuts! We just try to be patient. I find it is the foods he doesn't like that he keeps chewing longer. My husband did the same thing when he was young. I think we just need to encourage them and wait it out!

I understand your frustration, but why has this turned into "a constant fight"?. This isn't an obedience problem. You don't fight with a child over a fear, you help the child resolve the fear. This obviously started somewhere, at a specific time. Were you there when she developed this fear? Do you know why it started? I'll bet you do. You need to back off. Allow her to take as long as she wants when you are not in a hurry, and when you are, give her a warning that you will be leaving in 5 minutes, 3 minutes, 1 minute... so she knows. If she doesn't eat, she doesn't eat. Don't force her. Stop turning this into a power struggle. She won't starve, and if you are truly concerned about her health, and you are not able to calmly and compassionately help her through this problem, get her some professional help and do it quickly before this becomes a long-term eating disorder. For goodness sake, stop fighting her on this.

My son did this as well. Sometimes I thought he was done and then we would be at the park or some place else and I would notice the food was still in his mouth! I discussed it with our family physician and I started giving him small amounts of a digestive enzyme and watched for food sensitivities. We found out he was sensitive to milk based products and the digestive enzyme (which we sprinkled just a little bit in his lemonade made with organic lemon juice and stevia) did the trick for him. He only needed the digestive enzyme for about a month. We used enzymedica Kids enzyme.

We also did a bit of behavior training with him, which I'm not saying is the right thing, but we did do it. We allowed him to watch TV while eating and we would pause the Tevo and he would have to swallow and then we would resume. I understand that thoroughly chewing food is good, but he would chew just a few seconds and then let it sit there. If you would like to read more about picky eaters, checkout this article:
http://www.bluedominoes.com/nutrition_recipes.php

She does this to feel in control of her universe, and to feel safe, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but it's taken over everyone's life. I would resort to pureeing all her food, and telling her very matter of factly that now she will not have to chew at all. Give her lots of yogurt, applesauce and baby food, a time limit on eating, and realize that she will not be malnourished (she'll undoubtedly be getting more than she does now.)

Maybe you could feed her smoothies with fruit and tofu for rush meals? If you blended her food (gross!), she might get tired of eating like a baby and go back to regular food. Good luck.

Perhaps put her in control of the situation by giving her a plastic knife to cut up her foods with. Teach her how to cut tiny bite size pieces that aren't really "chokeable." If she feels like she is in conrol it should help her anxiety.

Have you looked at her tonsils? Just a thought. Two of my children, when they turned about that same age, their tonsils just seemed to grow (and not due to any illness). My children kind of did the same thing, but actually they just got really picky and wouldn't eat things unless if is was already mush. With my older child, she would even wake up very frequently through the night--come to find out she had sleep apnia due to her tonsils blocking her airway. She was struggling to breath at night. Needless to say, she had hers removed, and boy, what a difference! She put on about 5 pounds, because eating wasn't such an issue, and she started sleeping great at night too. As for my 4 year old son now, we are kind of trying to figure out what to do. He is right there borderline. Anyway, you may want to bring this up to your doctor and see what he/she has to say.

My son started this when he was little and still will take an inordinate amount of time eating. (He's almost 9 now)
He's extremely strong willed - so sometimes just my impatience of EAT! makes him go slower.
Here's two things I've done:

1. If you finish your meal at the same time as everyone else or with in 5 minutes you will get dessert. If not you may sit there and eat, but no dessert.

2. When Dinner's over its over. I clear the dishes and explain he can eat tomorrow at breakfast.

Take heart - Kids aren't cats .. in that they won't starve themselves to death.

Without emotion or fighting , simply tell her that she has x amount of time to finish her meal & then must go on with her day. Let her eat as much as she can, then take her plate away (without negative comments!) until the next meal or snack time. She will eat when she's hungry enough. If you want to make sure she gets a well balanced meal at breakfast, make her a smootie with fruits & yogurt. This will provide her with protein, calcium, & other vitamins.

Also keep in mind that her fear of choking is real to her. Help to ease her mind. Also, does she actually choke when she's eating? If so, she might have someting that should be looked into by a doctor.

Dear A.:

This could just be a developmental thing. (She could have difficulty swallowing or be responding to unpleasant textures.) My son was like this but I didn't let it take over my life. I'd have a smoothie ready and he could sip it in the car if I had time constraints on me. Just think of ways to make food portable and SAFE. (Obviously, you wouldn't want to hand her a sub sandwich to eat as you drive!)

If it persists and she begins to lose weight, I'd start waking her up EARLIER so she could get a few more bites in. Do what the prior posters mentioned and make the food more highly nutritious...pack in the vitamins! You should act perfectly casual about it so that if it IS a powerplay, she won't have the success at "ruffling" you she seeks. But I don't think it's a powerplay based on my experience with my son. To this day, my son (now 11) is a very slow eater and, while he did learn to speak early, he does have a slight speech impediment.

Best wishes,

M.

I am not saying your child has a swallow disorder, because I have no idea. But occupational therapists deal w/ food/ swallowing/textures alot. That could be the problem. I would ask the pediatrician.

Sounds like she had an "incident" and is fearful now. This is something she will need to do on her own to get her confidence back. There are lots of foods that are "squishy" that provide enough nutrition that she needs to survive. Make these the staples of her diet: Yogurt, applesauce or smashed up fruit of any kind, get an immersion blender and blend up soups, stews, etc, so she can eat them with a spoon, make smoothies, etc. Then, at every meal, give her a little bit of a challenge that she needs to chew and swallow. start with small pieces of pasta (that stuff slides down pretty easy even if you don't chew it) and work your way up to vegetables, meats, etc. This sounds pretty high maintenance, but at least she will be able to eat and do other things, too! Good luck.

Hi, A.. How about small textured food, like rice, spaghetti (you can chop the noodles almost rice-sized), peas, fruit cocktail, etc. Smooth food like puddings and yogurt (smoothies or go-gurts are good becuase there is no fruit pieces in them). This worked well for my daughter.
Good luck.

A., unless you feel it is a control factor as others have mentioned, I would also consider that she may be having difficulty with certain food textures, or have swallowing difficulties which could benefit from the help of an occupational therapist or speech/language therapist (or speech pathologist). Both disciplines work with swallowing and sensory issues (ie, food textures), depending on what part of the country you live in. Maybe you should speak with your pediatrician for a referral.