u/Unusual_Bother_7659

At this point I've read every Reddit posts and tried every trick in the book. So, unless it's really novel, I'm not looking for advice.

I was wondering if anyone can explain to me how a toddler can eat barely anything and still have so much energy/survive. It's like magic to me.

People go on about toddlers not needing many calories and look at food eaten over a week or month, not a day. That STILL boggles my mind about my kid. 17months old and over the course of a week she might eat 2 cups of food. She has a good appetite for one meal maybe three times every 2nd month. She hasn't got neophobia at all. Readily tries ANYTHING. Just... simple doesn't eat much. A 1/4 cup food in am then maybe a tablespoon at lunch and at dinner.

I really just don't get it. How can kids just NOT eat and be okay for extended periods?

TL;DR Is it normal that I generally take 1.5 hours from waking to make breakfast, eat, dress 16mo old and myself, brush teeth and get ready to go outside? Or am I being undisciplined and lazy by reading to child first thing (cos that's what she wants) and slowly getting up after that?

I feel exhausted and unable to muster energy to rush to get ready for the day. I want to join morning mommy classes, but I would need to get ready in 1 hour, which I can't manage (babe takes 30 mins to eat). Which got me wondering if I'm just being lazy?

I don't know if this is just an excuse... I'm a SAHM, co-sleep, breadtfeed on demand and work and clean at night after LO goes to sleep and on weekends. Pre-child me required 10 hours of sleep to feel rested. I average about 4 hours good sleep (rest of time LO unsettled sleeper).

I sit and think everyone else looks presentable and manages so much more. I feel like I'm just barely surviving every day. I wonder if I'm just just treating my circumstance as an excuse for not being productive ... Am I supposed to just force myself to rush through daily activities to, for example, get to mommy classes in time?

Pretty much every day is the same... take 1 5 hours to start, maybe 2. This includes reading with LO, asking her to help make bed / open curtains/ feed pets/ pick up toys. After, a walk, prep snack/lunch for LO, vacuum floors in living room and bedroom (lot of pet hair). 30 mins of dedicated play (stacking blocks or whatever) before it's time for midday nap. After husband comes home, he takes LO, so I can prep dinner. Fridays are for grocery shopping in first wake window and one other day for a music class. Am I being unproductive? Should I be managing a lot more?

So... what do you do when all the above apply?

I do a mom's and baby class once a week and there's a moms' meet-up I go to as well, so baby can run around with kids. The meet-up leaves me feeling more lonely and distraught at my inability to socialize. Everyone knows each other and I feel like an outsider. I try to chime in where I can but I'm not socially gifted. Ppl generally think I'm polite and nice enough, but no one really enjoys being around me.

For context, all the friends I do have are overseas and when I still worked that was all the socializing I felt I needed (with workers and sales ppl). I also work at night so have no time where I'm not with baby.

Babe is almost 15mo. Has always drank and eaten poorly. Trying to drop dummy, so I will become the pacifier all night long. This would be fine, but I usually work until 10pm, run in when baby starts to cry then go back to work until she cries again. Husband uses dummy up until 10pm. After 10pm the dummy usually fails and baby screams like she is on fire 😅

My conundrum is that I've concurrently been advised to drop night feeds if I want baby to eat more solids. My gut drops at the thought of denying my baby what gives her comfort. I'm unsure what's worse for baby.... denying her comfort or denying her the chance to get better nutrition.

What would you do? Continue with night feeds despite poor solids intake (I'm talking like 1/4 cup to 1/2 cup food a day max). Or sacrifice the suckling/attachment(??) for better potential solids intake?

Two questions related to issues at dinner for 15mo old that just learned to sign "milk" and "water"....

1. Is there something else "water" could be meaning other than, well, water? At first we were pleased as she'd use the sign happily. For the past week, though, she uses it near constantly at dinner and will keep asking after we've given her a bottle. Could it also mean "I want water in a diff format, bish! How am I supposed to spill it if it's in this here bottle?!"? It's becoming disruptive at the table... also, she'll ask for water and then not eat at all. Just plays. Should I deny her request, even though she just learned to ask for it, so she doesn't fill up on water?

2. Some days, she'll sign for milk at dinner and point frantically at the milkbar. Some days it works to just sit a seat away. Other days I have to eat my dinner around the corner by the trash, so she doesn't get distracted 😑

She re-started throwing food dramatically for the past week. We take her out and say meal is done. If she wants to get back in we'll give her one last chance. In the cases that fails again, dinner is over but she gets so stressed that she cries to nurse. I don't mind but (1) I don't want her to think not eating means she can nurse (she eats very poorly and is skinny) and (2) I don't know if at this age she should be learning boundaries of if she's too young. It doesn't seem like a tantrum. It seems like pure panic. Should I just refuse her milk? Should I be setting boundaries or is 15mo still too young?

My whole existence aches from the trauma of feeding my baby.

15 mo soon, hasn't gained any weight (unsure if she got taller). Never been a great eater. Skinny little thing, so no weight to spare. Will try anything but won't eat anything regularly but iron-fortified cereal, avo and butter. Typically in a day she'll eat 1/2 a cup of food in total a day. Sometimes only 1/4 cup.

Nurse and paed just keep telling me toddlers havent got much on an appetite. If they're energetic there's nothing to worry about.

- Is 1/2 cup of food a day too little? If yes, what do I do???

- Do I just keep offering whatever food she won't eat every day until she eats more than one bite? How many months will that take?

- Do you make something different for your kids regularly, even knowing they wont eat it?

I'm a SAHM and work and clean at night. Don't have any external help other than husband. I'm exhausted, I want to give up but I obviously can't. I feel like I'm such a bad mom that she's not eating... Perhaps I'm not offering the right food, or it's not the right atmosphere, or I dont know what. And she recently started FLINGING food as if into the ether after having calmed down with that 2 months ago. I just don't know any more 🫠

Almost 14mo old; BF; co-sleep; 4.5/6; on one nap for about a month. Awake around 07h30, nap 1.5-2 hrs, sleep around 20h00-20h30.

I was very worried that bubs is way too young to be on one nap, but naps and sleep were getting messy, so I let her dictate (based on mood) the schedule and she seems relatively happy. Only "issue" with sleep atm is 4am tossing and turning.

I've read as many posts as I could and wondering if I'm messing up the schedule? She was doing 5 hour ww at first but with recent teething and illness it's dropped to 4-4.5, which I read is too short.

I find it so hard to understand issues with sleep are due to illness/teething/development or schedule. Is there a way to identify issues based on the type of waking? Eg bubs currently wakes and keeps trying to sit up/climb off bed/be active, but she's in that awake/sleep limbo. Rocking will keep her calm but won't lull her to sleep. The only thing I can do is let her toss and keep guiding back onto centre of bed (if she crawls off she gets distressed). This goes on for a while (haven't timed it... seems longer than 40 min) and at some point she conks out until wake time. This has just started this week.

Almost 14mo old; BF; co-sleep; 4.5/6; on one nap for about a month. Awake around 07h30, nap 1.5-2 hrs, sleep around 20h00-20h30.

I was very worried that bubs is way too young to be on one nap, but naps and sleep were getting messy, so I let her dictate (based on mood) the schedule and she seems relatively happy. Only "issue" with sleep atm is 4am tossing and turning.

I've read as many posts as I could and wondering if I'm messing up the schedule? She was doing 5 hour ww at first but with recent teething and illness it's dropped to 4-4.5, which I read is too short.

I find it so hard to understand issues with sleep are due to illness/teething/development or schedule. Is there a way to identify issues based on the type of waking? Eg bubs currently wakes and keeps trying to sit up/climb off bed/be active, but she's in that awake/sleep limbo. Rocking will keep her calm but won't lull her to sleep. The only thing I can do is let her toss and keep guiding back onto centre of bed (if she crawls off she gets distressed). This goes on for a while (haven't timed it... seems longer than 40 min) and at some point she conks out until wake time. This has just started this week.

At what age did your baby stop squishing food with their index finger?

Mine has been doing it to everything since 8 or 9 months (now 13mo, so for 5 months now). I have to cut everything into tiny bite size pieces, else it just gets squished into oblivion... then squished right off the tray. I just want to be able to give a big(ger) pieces already.

Am I really the only one experiencing these things?

All other mothers in my vicinity never seem to have any of these issues. I feel so alone. 

- Have to cross my legs together every time I sneeze/cough/jump, not because I had a vaginal birth, but because I messed up my bladder holding it in to keep the baby asleep.

- Am I just super slow? My baby is now 13 months, but I'm still unable to do much, unlike all the other SAHMs that I've spoken to. Everyone says after the 12 month mark it gets so much easier, but I don't find that to be so. Having to fit making/eating/cleaning up after breakfast, snacks and lunch in a 4.2 hour windows means I rarely go anywhere or have the energy to go anywhere. It takes 40 minutes just to get up (make bed, dress both of us, brush both our teeth, brush hair).

- Everyone says I have to invest in "self care." MIL asks if I get time for my hobbies. I'm sorry, but where is the time? All weekday days are spent on eating and cleaning up after cleaning (while baby is whining and hanging around legs), the afternoons are spent prepping dinner and family time, I have to work in the evenings. Weekdays (Sat afternoon and Sunday) are for work, grocery shopping and meal prepping for the week. We go for a walk as a family at least once every day. Maybe I'm very inefficient? Do people who work and look after baby all day really have time for themselves?

- I'm covered in food all the time. I live in the same clothes every week. I don't use traditional antiperspirant, because I BF and don't want my baby exposed to the stuff in it (which means I don't smell great, as the natural stuff rarely works). My nails look like shit and my hands are so dry they feel all scrappy on everything. All the moms in the play class either have neat nails or manicures and dress prettily (at least look clean). Additionally, my postpartum hair means I have a hill-billy fringe that no hairspray can tame.  It just sticks up like a peacock tail. I hate looking in the mirror. I guess I let myself go and have myself to blame? I dunno. 

- Almost every mom, even SAHMs, have nannies in my area. Today I saw a mom walking her dog, while the nanny was pushing the baby in a pram. I even met a store clerk, who said a nanny looks after his child (in our country, such clerks get paid very little). How :'(

- I spend my "free time" looking up what the hell to do with baby who keeps updating their software. Just as soon as I feel I might breathe, some new fresh hell is unleashed. Food, development, speech delays, growth.... Everyone says, "just enjoy your baby," but those same people also say, "my baby sleeps through the night / baby has no problem with solids / baby says xyz words," so I feel like I must be doing something wrong. EVERYONE elses' babies are developing in a certain range and I feel like I must be messing up somehow. 

And many other fun stories.

Is it normal for my just turned 13mo old not to be interested in any artistic related activities? I've tried crayons, playdough, water 'painting', yoghurt 'painting', paint in Ziplock baggies and drawing in sand. Just wants to get away. Pushed finger in playdough once and only tries eating crayons. Has been walking for 2 months and very interested exploring outdoors, playing with sand and balls... Is it okay for me to accept she'll be interested when she's ready and just try every other week until she shows interest?

Baby is 12.5mo old and I don't know how/when to change WW/nap schedule.

Baby has zero sleep cues. For first nap I can put down after 3.3 or closer to 4 hours and doesn't seem to phase her. Even at night, she's completely awake when we put her down. We've trying letting her get her energy out in various ways and keeping her up a little later at night, but that all caused falling asleep to take longer.

Do I need to change schedule, since she's getting older? I noticed that for the first nap she started bridging herself in past month and will also continue to sleep past 1.5 hours if I let her. Is this a sign that I should elongate first window, let first nap run and start reducing nap 2?

Current status quo: 3.3/3.5/3.5; nap 1 1hr 20, nap 2 capped at 30min; putting down for naps takes a few mins; putting down for night takes 15-25min (hence playing around with capping nap 2).

Dunno if it's relevant, but baby not sleep trained, I co-sleep, breastfeed and baby has done the 40min false start after falling asleep at night for forever.

I feel like I'm failing my baby by providing her with boring meals. I love food, and I worry she won't have a positive association with it, as she doesn't enjoy what I make for her. My boss laments about his late British mother's inability to cook. I wonder if I will be viewed in that way one day.

She's never enjoyed food with gusto (except butter and mango) and recently we went through another step-back where bebe is only interested in self-feeding berries and butter; although, she has now started pointing at our plates and requesting random items from us. Problem is that all I eat all day is oats and peanut butter sandwiches. Dinner consists of the same meal I prepped on Sunday all week. I feel like she might eat more if she got things she enjoyed, but she has been point blank refusing everything I have curated for her... so, for my sanity, I've just been feeding her blueberries and offering her food from our plate to throw on the floor.

Does anyone else feel this way? Am I doing irreparable damage by not feeding her a variety of wholesome but delicious foods daily? How do I make foods for a 12 month old delicious, anyway?

I hope I used the correct flair.... Are there any papers or books you can recommend regarding structured teaching of +12mo olds?

I know I'm not raising Einstein and I focus on the basics (reading, singing, etc), but want to have a structured approach on teaching ideas (seasons, numbers, colours, alphabet, etc).