Not a few parents who have toddlers experience confusion about their child's eating habits, which is eating food without swallowing it. Children can eat food for a long time.
This condition makes eating activities take time for hours, while testing the patience of parents. Not infrequently, this habit of causing the parents to vent their anger by forcing the child to swallow it. This will cause trauma for the child to even make him refuse to eat at all.
Over-storing food in the mouth can increase the risk of choking or other nutritional consequences that may be bad for the body. In addition, this can also affect the child's dental health. For that you need to find ways to overcome these bad habits.
Tips to overcome the habit of children snacking on food
Clinical psychologist Rachael Tan, said, the most important thing you need to do first to overcome this problem is to identify why children prefer to eat their food rather than swallow it. The best way to find the answer is to observe what happened before, during, and after eating.
Here are some things you need to do to deal with children who have a habit of eating food without swallowing it:
1. Pay attention to children's eating habits at the following times
Before eating: if a few hours before eating the child consumes snacks, maybe the cause of the child doing it is because he feels too full to swallow food again when large eating activities begin. Try to limit your child's snack intake before a big meal and see the difference.
When eating: try to realize, do you often invite him to talk when he is eating? If so, maybe this is one reason children continue to eat their food because they don't focus on their eating activities. Not all children can do two things at once.
For example, when a child is watching TV and you invite him to talk, maybe his attention will be more focused on TV than listening to you speak. Even though the child may be staring at you, it does not mean he is listening to what you are talking about. Likewise when you invite him to talk when eating.
To test this suspicion, try to invite him to chat only when the child has swallowed his food. Don't forget to give praise when the child succeeds in swallowing his food. If a child is motivated by the attention and praise you give, he will learn that by swallowing food he will get more praise than keep it for a long time in the mouth. Children also learn not to talk when their mouths are full of food.
After eating: now, try to remember, is there something you usually order after eating that your child might not like? For example, bathing or cleaning the former food itself. If so, maybe this is the reason your child is extending his meal time, which is to avoid the task.
Try to design activities that you don't like and really like after eating. See the difference once you apply these two things. You can use the activities he likes in some time to encourage children to obey other tasks that he does not want to do, including about eating. Talk slowly to children and give positive reinforcement so that children are motivated and follow your instructions. When this routine has become a habit, you can reduce the level of reinforcement to see changes in your child.
2. Invite children to shop for food they want to eat
Ask the child to accompany you to shop for groceries. Let the child choose the new food he might like, even though the child might be interested only because of the color and shape. Making him participate in choosing the food he will eat may be a powerful way to reduce his habit of eating food without swallowing it.
3. Determine the duration of eating
You can discuss with the child slowly to determine the duration of the meal. Install a timer or alarm and tell the child if the alarm sounds the sign that the meal time is up. Not intended to hunt down, this helps teach the child that there is a limit that is determined how long he has to sit to finish his food.
4. Fishing the child to swallow his food by eating together
Another way to stimulate children to swallow is to eat together. Invite children to eat together with you and try to show that you enjoy food by biting, chewing, and swallowing it to encourage children to do the same.
If the above methods do not work it may be time for you to consult a child psychologist to help you solve this problem.