Thank you for providing such clear guidelines and a framework for parents. We have two girls who are generally good eaters (eat a variety of foods, no allergies) but the "panhandling" was becoming a huge issue. I feel like this is a step in the right direction.

Thank you again,

From the time he was a baby, my son Owen's well checks were all the same. He's too chubby. His weight is at the 95th percentile. What are you feeding him? his pediatrician would ask. I breastfed Owen for 5 months, but even though I hid the truth about the rest, the doctor still said, too much. Owen ate a lot. I couldn't feed him fast enough. He fussed and fussed as I rushed around the kitchen getting his food ready, and then fussed after each mouthful. He had to have his snacks or he got crabby. His eating, his size, and his being the baby of the family gave me great anxiety because my sister, also the baby of the family, is morbidly obese. Her weight had been a huge family issue when I was growing up, and I was so afraid Owen would have her problems! Looking back, I suspect it was food restriction that made her so fat.

Even though it was hard at the time, I am happy to say that I did not restrict Owen. From age 3 years on, Owen's new pediatrician wasn't concerned about his weight, so I was honest with him about what Owen ate. But I still worried. Truth be told, I worried for years. I kept track of what he ate and got upset when my husband let him have a lot of meats and carbohydrates and didn't push the vegetables like I wanted him to. I watched carefully to make sure Owen didn't sneak and hoard food like my sister did.

Now at age 23, and a lean 6'3" tall, Owen still has a big appetite and gets crabby when he is hungry. When he comes home my food budget goes way up. It seems that all the things I worried about, his big appetite and the way he loved to eat, were just natural for him. Despite all of the pressure I felt to get Owen to eat and weigh less, I resisted. Even though it was hard on me, I did the right thing, and the story has a happy ending!

I had great success as a mother using your division of responsibility methods. My kids were extremely picky eaters as toddles and young children and we just stayed the course with the division of responsibility. It took many years but we got there. I distinctly remember the first time my son asked us to pass the broccoli. We did so without any fanfare, as if he asked for it every night of his life but I was jumping for joy inside with the satisfaction that this method truly does work for the long term. We also enjoyed how he would politely decline foods he didn't like; it was clear with his language that he intended to eat that food someday. My kids are now teenagers and it gives me great satisfaction to see them eat a wide variety of foods with gusto.

~ a registered dietitian and parent

You're awesome! I am reading your book Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family and I must say everything you write in this book rings true. I have an eight-month-old baby boy who's now eating solids. My sister, a dietitian, told me about you and encouraged me to read ANY of your books (she raves that they're all accurate and easy to read... I think she's right!). While reading your book, I've come to realize that my parents raised us to eat much like you encourage your readers to do so. They made meals a family affair, didn't diet or excuse their appreciation of food, and offered a variety of foods at each meal. Even with these excellent role models, I still felt somewhat confused and a little overwhelmed when it came to introducing solid foods to my son. Thank you very much for putting into words what I've always known. I really appreciate it! As a child, I was always the biggest girl in my class and LOVED to eat. Now, I am a healthy 5'5", 150lb woman with a positive body image. I've often wondered why it's been easy for me to embrace my body type and to not fall victim to the 'skinny-girl' image society wants us to covet. Now I think it's because of my parents, the excellent role models I've had all my life. Thanks for bringing this to light and for making me appreciate them that much more!

~ Corrine, a pleased parent

My daughter weighed 9 lb 11 ounces at birth and has always loved to eat.

At about 14 months, my daughter was starting to ask for food all day long. As a doctor, I had given advice to parents (poor advice!) and I didn't know how to deal with feeding my own daughter. I didn't want her to be obsessed with food like some restricted kids I have seen. I was worried about her being ''heavy'' with the constant comments from family and strangers about her size (the delivery room nurses called her ''chunky monkey!'')

In my practice I have treated teenagers with eating disorders, and adults with more problems related to obesity than I can count. I wasn't sure how to handle a kid with a hearty appetite without being too regulating, or too lax. I read Child of Mine, and it was an epiphany.

I realized that I was trying to control my daughter's eating and it was making her afraid she wouldn't get enough to eat. After following the simple message in the book,to do my jobs with feeding and let my daughter do hers,I noticed much less panhandling, and more importantly, less anxiety on my part. I need to trust my daughter, and trust that she will get what she needs. She's over the 100th % for both height and weight. She has such a lovely, funny spirit. She's chatty and active, and not worrying about food or her size, or things I can't control, has made every day more joyful. Things are going great now. We sit and eat meals together, have regular snacks, I let her eat as much as she wants at those times, and she prefers fruit to cookies!

I talk about your book all the time. I can't believe how poorly health care professionals are trained in this matter. I wish this book was required reading for all medical students who will deal with children, and parents to-be.

~ Grateful Doctor in the Midwest

Your book Child of Mine really changed the way my daughter Kyla ate. She refused table foods, other than Cheerios, only wanting to eat pureed baby food. After reading your book, I realized I was going about feeding her all wrong. I started following your advice and she has become an incredible eater, not afraid to try new things. I also have improved how I view food, which has improved our family meals.

Thanks!

As a dietitian I have read Ellyn's manuals and watched the videos as well so that I can counsel parents. But only since having a child of my own have I realized the importance of the division of responsibility. My busy 2 year old boy can be quite a handful and has made our life quite busy for sure. However, we all look forward to mealtime. My son runs eagerly to the table when he is called and both my husband and I enjoy sitting with him to eat and engage with him and watch him really enjoy mealtime. He has become a child that eats a variety of foods and will eat most everything we prepare for him. We allow him to eat whatever he wants in the meal and do not coax him to eat anything else. Our friends look at us a little strange when we all get together to eat, especially when we allow him to have seconds of something before finishing other items on his plate or allowing him to have dessert when he has eaten very little. Mostly though I think they are amazed at how well he eats in general and how pleasant he is at the table. I am so thankful for the joy and relaxation we are able to experience at our family meals and I know it is due to the fact that we are following Ellyn's philosophy.... we do our job and we allow him to do his.

~ Carla

The Kid's Menu: Solid Foods, Fluid Rules

For someone who loves food, could there be a more exciting moment than giving her baby that first spoonful of the real thing? I had dreamed of it before my son was born, and I had countless fantasies of the event in anticipation: Franklin in his high chair looking excited; me with a lovely little bowl of mashed sweet potato, or pink applesauce, or something else gem-colored; and him clapping his hands and smacking his lips, looking eagerly for the next bite.

I so wanted to get the moment right, I even researched which book to use for research. And after reading Ellyn Satter's classic, Child of Mine, I thought that I knew everything there was to know,certainly, in my warm, encouraging-but-not-pushy presence, my baby would be just beside himself with joy to eat from that tiny spoon.

Satter's philosophy is to only put a spoonful of food in the baby's mouth when he appears to be a willing participant,making eye contact with the feeder, or at least the spoon, and opening his mouth,rather than trying to cajole or fool him into eating the way most of us probably did as infants, with airplane spoons and momentarily open mouths jammed with pured peas. Satter's method theoretically encourages a healthy relationship with eating: The child is allowed to eat until satisfied, and then allowed to stop, and doesn't have to take any mouthfuls he doesn't want, so no battles between parent and child can sabotage everyone's enjoyment at the table. It sounded wonderful.

I didn't like the sound of moving on before we had mastered Step 1. Wouldn't that be already capitulating to the whims of a baby who didn't know better? Or worse, make each subsequent step even more difficult? I referred back to Satter's book regularly for encouragement. But whenever I was in the moment, faced with a bowl of cereal and a baby who couldn't care less, the advice from the book fell away and the voices in my head started shouting at each other. Oh, just shove it in! yelled one. No, give him time! yelled another one right back.

I guess I'm wondering if I'm being too careful, wondering if he'll ever learn, I said sheepishly.

"It all goes back to trust, doesn't it? came the voice on the other end of the line. Trusting that your baby will learn, and that he really does want to grow up. But you start getting scared and losing your trust that he will learn. She was so warm I was ready to weep.

We talked for more than an hour, but throughout the whole conversation I found myself wanting more advice than she was giving. It started dawning on me that it was because there wasn't more; by telling me to trust my baby, she had already said everything I needed to know. When it was time to hang up, I didn't want to say goodbye. He'll just do what he wants to when he's ready, she said. I'd recommend to you that you set aside your agenda and cultivate your curiosity.

Perhaps most helpful was your encouragement to do my job,and not waste my time trying to do my sons' jobs, too! I have recommended your books to all of the mothers I know (including my own mother, who lives alone and faces the challenges of how to feed a rather small family). Everyone who has read them has thanked me!

At his 3-year check up, my son's pediatrician was concerned about my son's low weight - he was in the 3%. Grady has always been long and lean, but his weight percentile was dropping. The pediatrician recommended putting Grady on medication to increase his appetite. Medicating someone so they'd eat just didn't sound right to me and I asked him to give me 3 months, and a referral to a nutritionist, to see what we could accomplish without the meds. Our nutritionist was a wonderful woman who made me realize I had been restricting foods and generally not making eating much fun for Grady. Most of my hangups were left over from my own childhood when we belonged to the "clean-plate club." The nutritionist recommended I read your book "Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family." It was like a huge weight being lifted off my shoulders - all I had to be responsible for was providing a healthy, balanced set of meals and snacks, and then Grady was responsible for the rest. Phew!! It took a little while to get my husband on board with having dessert served up even if very little else had been eaten, but over time he too began to understand that the new philosophy was working. Grady gained weight, I shed my stress over food, and now we are all eating better. I only wishe I could get my friends, who continue to battle over food with their preschoolers, to understand. Thank you.

~ Sara

UPDATE

Our daughter is almost 2 now, and is starting to slim down as most cherubic babies do. From being off the charts, her height and weight have dropped down to the 95th percentile. I have to protect us from interference, however, because standard recommendations would diagnose her as overweight and newer guidelines would even suggest lab work! Instead, I have been feeding her well and letting her get the body that is right for her, and we're doing great. It takes a lot of planning with meals and snacks, but it's worth it. As a toddler, she's gotten a little more sensitive about textures and trying new foods, but we have faith that she will learn to enjoy the foods we do. She loves fruit, and eats an adequate variety of veggies, but honestly she'd eat ice-cream and mac-n-cheese every meal if we offered it to her! To me, that is a toddler, not a weight issue. I still get anxious occasionally when she eats a very large meal, or asks for a third oatmeal cookie, but I am recognizing it's my problem, not hers, and it always seems to even out.

~ Grateful Doctor in the Midwest

Gemma is nearly 5 and she's still a good eater, though that's not to say she eats everything I give her. Some days she eats lots, and some days not. Some days she doesn't like things she previously enjoyed (like last night with crab), and some days she comes back to something I thought was lost forever (like last week with guacamole). But because I'm always providing good food (well, *almost* always!), I don't worry about how much she eats. Ellyn's philosophy is a true blessing when it comes to Gemma because she's headstrong and loves to be in charge. I can't imagine the kind of battles we'd be having at the table if I didn't understand about the division of responsibility.

~ Nancy

Dear Ellyn,

I am writing to thank you so very much for your books. I live in the San Francisco Bay area and your books were recommended by the lactation consultant at Kaiser Permanente.
My daughter Penny is 11 months old, and has been, exclusively breastfed without bottles or formula. We ventured down the solids road at six months, and thankfully had Child of Mine so we could follow her lead. I was VERY apprehensive about making the transition to solid foods because of my own issues with food. I was forced to eat as a child, hit with a belt for not eating, lots of power and control issues around food growing up, which I am STILL working on healing and overcoming as an adult at 44. I have made a lot of progress in the years I have been in recovery/therapy, but I still feel incredibly fearful that my own eating habits are not up to par and nothing to emulate and how-the-heck-am-I-going-to-teach-this-little-precious-baby-how-to-eat-when-I-barely-know-what-I'm-doing-myself?!!! I loved breastfeeding because my baby was in charge, and I had nothing to do with the what and the when and the how much of eating. I realized I was terrified of making the transition to solids, only having my totally abusive experience to draw on and not knowing what to do. When I started reading your books, I felt so much relief and also realized they were helping me tremendously to heal my own relationship with food.

I am so determined that my baby have a pleasant, healthy, relaxed, and SANE relationship with food and I am deeply grateful for your work and your books which are invaluable not only for her but for me (and my husband too)! Child of Mine is on the top of the stack of books on my bedside table and I read it daily.

With gratitude and best wishes,

Leslie

A few years ago, a doctor told me that I needed to "cut out the snacking" for my two year old daughter, as her height was at the 25% while her weight was at the 95%. I mentioned that our snacks usually consisted of fruit, cheese, seaweed (she's always loved that) and other pretty healthy stuff, and I only gave her two a day (and of course, her three meals a day). He suggested I cut out one of the snacks. He said she was too heavy and I needed to help her grow while maintaining her current weight so she could grow down the percentiles. I pointed out that she had always been this way, since she was four months old, and he said I should switch her to 1% or skim milk. He said all this right in front of her.

I immediately found a new doctor.

I told the new doctor that she should not speak to me about my daughters weight or body in front of her. One of my closest friends growing up was anorexic. A distorted self-image and unhealthy relationship to food frightened me more than a chubby kid or adult. The new doctor assured me that my daughter was fine and not to worry. Which I did anyway, until I read your book. Thank you so very much for writing it. It's helping me to be much less controlling about food choices and lighten up a little with desserts. It's helped me to enjoy meals and my kids even more than before. And with three girls, it's made me feel secure that I can support their positive body images.

I feel like I came within incheas of creating a real eating disorder in my son when I happened upon Ellyn Satter's book "Your Child's Weight, Helping Without Harming." Reading her book helped me break a multi-generational cycle of weight and food issues.

My son was two years old when I found myself sobbing to my mother over the phone about having to worry abut my child's weight, after worrying about my own eating all my life. My son had gone from premature and tiny to a heavy boy who was off the weight chart within a year. By the time he was two, he was obsessed with food, shoveling it into his mouth and badgering me relentlessly when I tried to prepare meals. The pediatrician had said we should try cutting out something, but we already fed him such healthy food I didn't know what to cut out.

My mother's response that night turned on a light bulb that changed my life forever and sent me in search of something ... and luckily I found Ellyn's work. That night, my mom provided suggestions that she had used with me and my sister when we were young, such as "pouring milk into the cereal bowl before pouring in the cereal so the cereal would float on top and look like more." She also said that she had "noticed" that I had given whole-milk cottage cheese to my son one day. When I mentioned that it was hard to get my son to run around at the playground because loved the swings so much, she suggested I take him to parks without swings. She called me back a couple of days later to discuss how concerned she was about Trey's weight. I love and admire my mother, but luckily I was able to see the absurdity of her suggestions, particularly as she has had her own struggles with food and weight since she was a teenager. Furthermore, my sister had a serious eating disorder as a teenager. There are issues on my husband's side as well, and I believe our history led us both to be conciously and unconciously restricting our son's food. He was obsessed with food because we were restricting, particularly fats.

I found Ellyn's book through a message board, and told my husband I wanted to do an experiment that would sound crazy. I asked him to let us try for one month. Within two weeks of using Ellyn's suggestions our son's relationship with food was completely transformed. I changed my own habits as well, and have never felt better.

Yes, my son, who just turned four, still LOVES to eat and stays at the table longer than any other child I know. Yes, he is still off the chart for weight (and 90% for height). But no longer is he obssessed, nor do we parents struggle. He is right where he should be for who is as a person, and he is in control of his eating. We all eat breakfast and dinner together most days, and we are a better family for it. We enjoy eating all kinds of food I used to consider "off limits" due to fat content. I love serving my son dessert with dinner and watching him alternate between ice cream and carrots. I could go on and on, but I should wrap this up. Thank you Ellyn!

~ Jill

God bless you for the smarts you are bringing to the family table. I am an RD too, and thought I was so smart until I had a baby. I can pinpoint the day at 11 months old she stopped trusting new foods after throwing up the first time. I would get so irrationally angry that she wasn't eating what I gave her any more. Many a dinner for her consisted of fruit, crackers, and milk (and really, that ain't that bad). I persevered and kept offering her foods to only toss them away or save for the next meal. One day at age 3 (more than 2 years later) I watched her eat a raw green bean for the first time. Then she ate peas. (Previously her only vegetable was pizza sauce). In the last MONTH she has eaten raw carrots, edamame, white and brown rice, a hamburger, blueberries (first time since 11 months - it was one of the foods she threw up), a grape tomato (spit out, but she tried it), red and green peppers, and potatoes. I think the key was, I recognized the division of responsibility and tried my hardest to follow your advice. I watch my friends with tots miserably fail at this though I tell them about your books. Watching them was just as much of an education! In short, thank you and keep up the great work. We parents of young'uns take on the world for them, but in the area of eating we don't need to, and I for one appreciate that reminder.

~ Suzanne

Dear Ellyn, My daughter Martha was born at 26-3/7 weeks. Because of several GI blockages and infections as a preemie in the hospital, she was fed parenteral nutrition via IV for a long time. Every time she was started on breast milk (I pumped for months and months), she would have a major setback, such as an infection, and would have to be put back on parenteral nutrition. By the time she was ready to come home, she only weighed 5 pounds and was unable to swallow because of several rounds of intubation. She came home on a G-tube, and we fed her around the clock every 3 hours for many months.

I am ecstatic to say that several months after she came home, we were able to discontinue the G-tube and she was able to breastfeed for a few months. Starting on solid foods was another matter. Martha has never been a very good eater. My last year has been filled with *daily* anxiety about what exactly to feed her and how much she would (mostly would not) eat. I had your book at home, but had not cracked the section on toddlers. About a week ago, I did just that, and it has changed everything!

I have let go of most of my anxiety, since I have embraced the division of responsibility. I have completely stopped making separate meals for Martha, and we now sit together for all meals and snacks. I think we were both happier the very first day! My husband and I have made the big decision to have family dinner together every night while Martha is still awake. We are all happier having an earlier dinner, and Martha is actually eating fairly well. It's very hard to adjust to not coaxing or cajoling or begging, but I can already see that it's helping a lot.

A Parent Who Stayed the Course

I remember being frightened when my second daughter grew into a chubby, double-chinned baby. She loved to eat, and was purely joyful at mealtimes. A stranger first confronted me about her size when she was 6 months old, all dressed up and standing in line to have her picture taken. The line was long, she became hungry and fussy and I said, ''don't worry darling, you'll get to eat soon.'' The woman behind said ''looks like she could go a long time without eating.'' As I walked away I felt guilty and angry. How could someone say something like that, and more than that, how could I have let my beautiful baby get so fat?

I found How to Get your Child to Eat...but Not Too Much when my daughter was about 5 years old and had somehow become a picky eater. I suspect it had something to do with my old eating issues, thinking that I was fat, dieting as a teenager, taking diet pills and the like. I bent over backwards so far to avoid eating struggles with her that I was making special foods and catering to her. I consciously put the division of responsibility plan into action. We did have family dinners already, but I stopped making her special food and insisting she had to eat. I let her choose what she did or didn't eat. Over a period of 6 months she went from eating bread and milk to eating almost everything that was on the table. In fact, one night after dinner she looked down at her plate and said ''I've eaten a whole plate of food.''

As she got older, her weight was always at the 90th to 95th percentile. When she was active and played sports (soccer mostly), she slimmed down. When she stopped, she gained weight. I threw away the bathroom scale, and never talked about her weight. When she was in high school, she said she didn't have any idea of what she weighed. She was 5"4 and I would guess she weighed between 140 and 150 pounds most of the time. She was always larger than her friends but never felt that she was overweight. We did have some tearful moments in dressing rooms when she was trying to fit into the ''typical teenager'' clothes.

Today, she is 21, beautiful, with healthy attitudes about foods, her body and her life. She recently dropped 15 pounds as a consequence of a change in her habits. She was busy, working, dancing, going to college and decided to stop drinking soda and eating fast food,not because she was fat but because they didn't make her feel good.

We always stressed meals, having snacks, and eating as much as she was hungry for. My youngest sister used to love to come and visit us because we had so much fun at family dinners. I know for sure that if I had tried to restrict her, limit her foods, or even talk to her about being fat or overweight, I could have spoiled all that and caused her lasting damage.

By all means, please share our story with other parents. Tell them that it does take courage to stay the course. There were many times that I worried my daughter would grow up to have food issues and to be fat and unhappy. But it turned out well. Even my husband said a few years ago, the best thing you did was throw away the scale.

Hi Ellyn...

I just wanted to send a note of thanks for your wonderful book "Child of Mine". It is THE book that always refer friends to when we talk about feeding our children.
My kids are 4 1/2 and 2 1/2, and both wonderful eaters...and I largely credit this to YOUR book. It was pivotal as I figured out how to feed my daughter in her babyhood, and I refer back to it frequently when I need a little coaching (and someone to tell me to "chill out"!). Living in Los Angeles, we are bombarded with bizarre standards of beauty, and it feels good to know that we are doing fine.

I eagerly look forward to your next book, and to continued news about your work!

~ Carrie