Many children are difficult when it comes to eating. There are questions galore on this site about eating issues. I have had my own issues where my daughter refused solids until I got her into an occupational therapy group at 18 months. This group was invaluable to me and I learned things I wished I had learned when I had my oldest. Regardless, below are bullets of some of the things I learned through OT (I copied and pasted from a previous response I made). The schedule is the most important. If you stick to the schedule, then your son will eat when he's hungry. Don't worry. His eating is very normal at this age! However, I wouldn't force him to eat because then you may be developing overeating habits that can create issues later in life. Good luck!
- Experts say you can introduce a food to a child as many as 17 times before they will eat it. In OT we practiced this introduction in steps...touch the food, kiss the food, lick the food, bite the food (teeth marks were only required), eat (swallow) the food. We only encouraged one step at a time and celebrated each little accomplishment. For example, if I was introducing green beans for the first time, I would encourage her to just pick it up and if she did that, I would praise her and do nothing more with the green beans.
- Set a schedule. It's recommended that you have breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner, snack. These should be scheduled and consistent each day. You set a timer and give the child that amount of time to eat. I think a 2yo can sit at the table for 10-15 minutes. When the timer goes off, remove the food and there is no other food until the next scheduled time. Even if your child refuses to eat, the expectation is to sit at the table for the designated amount of time. My daughter used to scream and throw food on the floor she didn't want to eat affecting the entire family's meal time. The OT had us move her high chair away from the table, but she was still expected to sit in the chair until she acted appropriately or until the timer went off. My daughter did not like being by herself and learned quickly what the meal time expectations were.
- Be patient. If you get frustrated, bribe, etc., your child has more power than you and will learn to use it. Your child knows and is entering the age to test his boundries and power. Don't stress.
- Check out a book called, "How to Get Your Child to Eat But Not Too Much" by Ellen Satyr. The book was originally recommended by my lactation consultant when I first started identifying the feeding issues with my daughter and was later recommended by my OT.