Toddler Not Wanting Breakfast

I think you are getting her up plenty early. My son is the same way, he is now 10. My mom teaches and beats it into my head that kids should not go to school on an empty stomach. I took my son to the store with me and let him pick what he wanted to eat for breakfast and that helped tremendously!

Good Morning J.,
Maybe you should try to give her fruit or crackers with a cartoon personality on it. My 6yr was like that too but I took her to the store with me and started talking to her about what she like to eat for breakfast, know she might eat whatever cereal she like because of the box, poptarts because of the flavor or sometimes eggs with cheese and toast with apple or grape jelly. I hope I was helpful. Good Luck!

An hour and a half sounds like more than enough time to me - I wouldn't lenghten that. Does she have a good morning routine? Here it's potty, breakfast, brush teeth, get dressed, brush hair, out the door. It takes about 30 minutes, though my husband drops her off on his way to work so I just have to get her ready and not myself.

9 hours doesn't seem like much sleep to me for a 3 year old (unless she takes a 3 hour nap?). Maybe she's too tired to eat when she gets up? Just a thought.

Otherwise, I agree with your husband. If she's hungry, she'll eat. Does she drink milk? I'd offer her some whole milk or a smoothie in the morning to fill her tummy up a bit.

First my opinion is she is not getting enough sleep. Most children up to about age 5 or 6 need 12 to 14 hours of sleep a day. My 4 1/2 year old grandson usually gets 12 hours at night.

I would consider waking her about an hour before she has to be to school. Set a plate on the kitchen table with a variety of good snack type items to see if she will go take some. Maybe pecans, raisins, slices of oranges, etc.

Hope this is helpful.

My four year old son is the same way. Although it's hard to get him to eat anything new or different, but breakfast is particulary a challenge. I started giving him my slimfast for breakfast just so he gets something. I buy the powder and double the scoop and mix with 2% milk. Or you can maybe try carnation instant breakfast. I put it in a special cup and he drinks it right down.

I have to agree with hubby. Offer her the meal, and I would wait until she's been up for 1/2 an hour or so, and if she dosen't eat it fine. No fussing no begging, she waits until the next meal weather it's a snack or lunch. Just tell her before hand that this is how it is. I'm sure she'll start eating before long. My girls go through spurts where they don't want to eat much, it never last long. But before we started the nothing to eat until the next meal thing I noticed the not eating would last for longer periods of time. They liked that they were pulling my strings. You daughter may also have a little of that. Good luck!!

my daughter doesn't like eating breakfast either and I just quit pushing it. She is in high school and still doesn't like to eat breakfast often although when she is hungry I will see her grab something in the morning. They will eat when they are hungry and even though breakfast is the best meal of the day it is hard when your child doesn't want to eat that early. It isn't worth the power struggle it causes and if she is getting ready in everything else and not struggling, she may not be hungry that early and they do have snack at school which usually consists of milk and something else so she is getting something with nutrition as some of those snack I don't agree are nutritional. Another thing that may help is to have a set routine and maybe she will eat.
This works for my youngest, I get him up, he gets himself dressed, while he is dressing, I go to the kitchen and put his bowl of cereal on the table with a cup of milk beside it plus his vitamin--then go back to my room and leave him alone to get ready, after he is dressed he comes to the table, pours his milk into his cereal and eats, then he goes to the bathroom after he eats and brushes his teeth, combs his hair, grabs his backpack and if he has a few minutes will watch tv or read then when it's time to go my husband or I take him to school. I have learned that my kids get ready in 10-15 minutes if I am not in the room but for some reason if I am right there they will take longer so they like to get themselves ready and have a little time to chill out with something they like to do before they go to school. He even did this schedule in Kindergarten. If we mess up his routine like sometimes he has eaten first while I went to the basement to find him something to wear in the laundry room--he gets thrown off and will end up forgetting to do things and has to be reminded. Regular routines sometimes helps because they know what to expect next.

i would offer her a nice glass of milk, which is kinda filling. and remind her how hungry she gets when she doesn't eat - but other than that i'd let it be. it's true, she'll eat when she's hungry, and if she comes home starving, remind her that she didn't eat breakfast that morning, and explain that that is why she's so hungry now. eventually she'll "get" it!

ps, i have the opposite problem...my 3 year old is still in daycare (turns 3 tomorrow) and she feeds them breakfast everyday...i constantly have to tell my little tank that milk is ALL he can have because ms. sherry will feed him breakfast! lol...

Hi, J.!
My twins were the same way so I started buying Dannon or Gogurt drinkable smoothies. They love them, and they are healthy, so that at least yiur daughter will get something in her stomach before lunch. I had no trouble getting the girls to drink them, and they are still drinking them every morning.

Hi J.,

My little kid is the same, he is 3 years old and 7 months. I have tried to give him many different things for breakfast, and he just said he was not hungry. I let him be, and I just gave him some time to wake up but I gave him orange juice because he told me he was thirsty; around 10 am he will ask for breakfast kind of meal. Because the idea is to make your little one eat something in the morning, you may want to try cereal (CHEX or any other non sugary rice cereal) and Yoplait vanilla yoghurt, ( I am not making advertising H.,lol, it is just my kid only likes Yoplait vanilla yoghurt because of his texture and flavor,and add a few drops of chocolate syrup all in a little bowl, you may also want to let him dip the cereal in the mix of chocolate and yoghurt. This is the only thing my kid is having at breakfast before 10 or 10:30 am!! After that he eats everything, it is just breakfast!
Another idea: little pieces of toast and margarine or butter cut in shapes and orange juice....bar cereal w/chocolate served in chunks and yoghurt , little pieces of cheese and cinnamon toast or muffin tops...
I hope this helps..at least it would be healthier than pop tarts which my kid loves them, but I avoid them at all costs! Breakfast is essential for everybody, at least try to make him eat a little, little bit of something.
Good luck!
Alejandra

J.
I am not sure I'm going to be any help. My 4 year old started preschool this fall and has usually been a good breakfast eater and has recently told me she is not hungry. I have been trying to offer her different things...things she never turns down even though it may not be exactly what I want her to eat...at least she's eating something which for me feels better than nothing until they have snack time. I am also having trouble getting my daughter to eat lunch when we get home from preschool. It almost seems like her snack is too late, but I am hoping we'll get it figured out! I was hoping you'd have tons of responses and I could learn from your question! Thanks for asking it! Sorry I'm just getting to this day's requests. Good luck!! A.

My soon to be 3 year old daughter doesn't eat breakfast hardly either I just offer her milk to some what fill her up and then she doesn't get anything till snack time.

It may be that you haven't hit on something that appeals to her (maybe a smoothie or something to eat in the car. My daughter loves pancakes. I make a double batch and freeze them and she likes to eat the frozen ones) or maybe she isn't hungry for some reason. Also, 9 hours of sleep sounds pretty low for 3 years. At that age, the "official" amount of sleep is 12-12.5 hours (but that's total for the day, so maybe she gets a nap later?) Good luck. It's always something :)

If it was my 3 1/2 year old that did this I'd just let him go. He's old enough to know that if he's hungry he can eat to get rid of that feeling, and if he went to school and came home starving enough times he'd realize he needed to eat breakfast. Right now my son has about 40 minutes from the time we wake up to the time we have to walk out the door and he barely manages to eat a poptart or cereal bar in that length of time, he's just too busy doing 3 yearold stuff! :o) Have you tried offering her a bar or something she can eat in the car on the way to school?Maybe she'll find soem novelty in doing this.

My little guy sometimes doesn't want breakfast either. I figured out that he just needed some time to wake up before eating. A lot of times (it may sound bad, but whatever works right?) he just eats his breakfast in the car on the way to preschool. Those Quaker oatmeal squares, blueberry mini muffins, bananas, dry cereal--all of those are pretty easily eaten in the car. Not sure if that is your little one's problem or not, but hopefully this helped a little. :) GOOD LUCK!

I have 2 almost 3 yr olds and we don't eat breakfast either. Ever since they were little, they have 1-2 cups of milk (they drink whole) and then maybe a granola bar, or dry cereal in the car on the way to school (daycare). We get to school right at morning snack time, and then they eat very well at lunch. I too worry that they should be eating something, but they're healthy and I know they eat well at lunch and dinner in the evening, so ....Hope this helps.

My son is almost 2 1/2 and I have the same question. I'm interested to see what others have to say. I usually don't push it too much because he will eat eventually. He likes to do everything on his own time. He will eat in spurts. One day he won't eat hardly anything and the next day he'll eat a huge amount of food.

At that age I rarely ever ate breakfast because I had bad allergies that created drainage and made me nasueous in the morning. I'd say let her sleep and skip breakfast. My kids are about 70/30 on not eating breakfast in the morning... I hated being pressured when I was a kid so I just let it go...if they are hungry, they ask for something, if not, then they make it until lunch.

My 3 yr old son hardly eats breakfast in the morning either. He goes to preschool 2x week and always comes home hungry in the afternoon. I think all we can do is try and hope that they will eat, obviously we can't force feed them, but continue to offer food each morning. I let my son know there is food and drink on the table and if he's hungry he'll eat, otherwise he'll have to wait for lunch. I don't think my son eats his snack at school either!

I couldn't eat breakfast when I was a kid. I wasn't hungry. Decades later, I still don't eat breakfast. Other people can't relate, don't get it, but it's just the way my appetite runs.I'm smart. I'm healthy. I'm fine. She will be, too, as long as she gets enough calories and nutrients the rest of the day.

Do you have a morning routine? We had our oldest son: go potty, get dressed, then he could watch tv for 15-30 minutes, eat breakfast, then we brushed his teeth, got his shoes on & left.

I am in the same thinking as husband: If she doesn't want ot eat breakfast she will be okay & she will eat when she is ready. Ask her teacher how she is doing in class, if she is eating snack & if she is struggling on the days that she is not eating.

God bless!