We were out to dinner one night when the little man decided to dig his heals in about what he was having for dinner even though he had decided what to eat himself (what was on mummy and daddy's plate looked nicer), so what do you do?
You have a two year old who is about to have a major meltdown in the middle of the restaurant. The next step we make is critical... do we give in? No, because next time he will think he can get away with it... so how do you stop the tantrum and get him to eat with out screaming the place down?
We learned this one the hard way...
On this occasion we gave no alternatives. We took him out of the restaurant to have the tantrum in the car park near our car, this showed him that if he kept it up we would go home no ice cream or treats after the meal. We got down onto his level and said calmly "you chose what is on your plate, you like what you have got. You need to eat it, if you are not going to do the right thing we will go home, but we will be bringing your dinner with us".
We returned to the restaurant, dinner was eaten with the bottom lip firmly out. There was minimal fuss had.
At that point we were left wishing he was still bottle eating... No cold dinner for us... the joys of being a parent. You begin to get used to eating your dinner cold.
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