Can Iron make DD eat again?

I‘ve been doing a spot of reading online recently to see if I can come up with any other approaches to persuading DD to eat something other than Cheerios, yoghurt and ‘juuuuice’.

Baby Centre has some good advice on what to do and not do when dealing with a fussy eater in how to cope with feeding problems and a separate article on feeding toddlers, including useful info on nutrition and vitamin drops. Netmums has similar advice in their Fussy Eaters section but they also have a cooking with kids section with some basic skills you can teach tots under five years old. Across the pond, Ask Dr Sears has 17 tips for tempting little taste buds and another American site; Keep Kids Healthy has a useful reference for the calories that a toddler needs.

I realised through this research that DD was likely to be lacking in iron due both to her lack of meat eating but also possible vitamin deficiency. A lack of iron can cause a loss in appetite and vitamins are vital to iron absorption. So I contacted Dr. Marina and she prescribed a month’s worth of iron and multivitamin supplements for DD to take. Unfortunately both taste disgusting and I have to practically wrestle her to take them with a syringe. She started the course on Wednesday and yesterday she actually started eating some food. YES! Perhaps it’s a fluke I reasoned. But today for lunch as well as her ‘juuuuice’ (yes I’ve added it back in until she puts some weight back on after her recent bronchitis) she had a mini rusk, some apple, raisins, yoghurt, toast, some Philadelphia and half my gingerbread biscuit! At breakfast she polished off a small cup of fruit smoothie I’d made for OH and I to drink as well as her own breakfast. EUREKA! I’m convinced it’s the iron supplement that is increasing her appetite.

I’m a bit peeved that our Dr. didn’t mention iron deficiency as a possibility when I consulted her about DD’s lack of eating previously and it just shows how the webosphere can be an empowering tool for us Mums. Could an iron deficiency be causing your little one to have a lack of appetite? A very simple blood test can rule it out.

Photo credit: A syringe isolated by m_bartosch at freedigitalphotos.net