Our 3 year old daughter can and wants to eat more than me. How can I curb her appetite?
We don't feed her sweets, empty calories, or juice, but she just wants to eat all the time. She's on the top of the curve at the doctor for weight and is in the middle of the pack for height. She swims and plays and is pretty active, but she's mostly focused on food.
Different people have different needs for food. If you are a light eater, or a person with a slower metabolism, and you have a child who has a fast metabolism, s/he will always eat more than you. If this person is the mother, the child will spend it's whole life starving to death.
Hunger is a physical response to a nutritional need. Your daughter is too young to be responding to some emotional need for food, so feed her when she is hungry.
Take note of the types of foods she asks for, and her physical responses. Does she crave dairy? It's possible she is allergic to it (dairy allergy is often paradoxical like that).
You might have her tested for food allergies. These can cause malabsorption, which would cause unnatural hunger. Does she appear thin? Is she muscular (muscular people often have higher needs for protein)? Does she appear fat? Does she have more energy than you? More energy than an average toddler? All of these things could account for a higher need for food.
Is she regular? Does her poop have undigested food particles in it? If so, she is not digesting properly, which could be a reason why she is hungry.
Our body has only one way of telling us what nutrients it needs. Hers is telling YOU something. Height/Weight ratios tell you very little. It might tell you that your toddler is muscular, which would be healthy, or it might tell you that your toddler is fat, which is not healthy. A toddler should also not be thin, another indication of poor health.
If all of this tells you nothing, try cutting back on your daughter's carb intake, including breads and fruits, and feeding her lots of protein and fats, particularly at breakfast. Less protein and adding a small amount of carbohydrate and vegetable at lunch, and a lighter supper of mostly vegetable, some protein, few carbs, and some fat. For snacks offer protein/fats, such as hard boiled eggs, cheese, meat and nuts.
Serve vegetables with butter, serve snacks like olives cheese sticks, milk (if not dairy intolerant.)
Your pediatrician may tell you this advice is bad, however you've already tried it the other way. If you try this for two weeks, it won't kill her and see how it affects her - positively or negatively.
Children this age are growing, and burning calories like they're going out of style, which can easily make up for why they eat more than you. You aren't growing, and you watch them play, so feed your daughter what she needs, which is why she is telling you what she wants.
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