Hi mummies, my 2 yo takes forever to eat her food and she likes to keep food in her mouth like a hamster. I always have to remind her to chew her food. Most of the time i need 2 hrs to feed her and this is really frustrating. I try not to lose my temper but is like testing my limit.

When you are trying to get your child to eat, does she get lots of attention as a result of your many attempts to get her to finish her meal? Constantly talking to your child can be a significant distraction from the task at hand. Your child may also be enjoying all the attention she is getting, and therefore be motivated to keep engaging in her squirrel-like eating behaviour! To see whether this may be the reason for your child’s behaviour, try sitting with but only speaking to your child when she swallows her food, and give her lots of praise when she does this. If your child’s behaviour is motivated by attention, she should soon learn that swallowing in a timely manner gets her lots of it, but storing food doesn’t!

Some suggestions from my friends include: - Avoid giving snacks before meal time - Minimize distractions at meal times - Taking the meal away if child insist on not finishing the food in his/her mouth (resume feeding one or two hours later, troublesome but worked for one of my friends) Key thing to note is to explain that it was the squirrel behavior that result in his/her meal from being taken away. - Give positive reinforcements: praise or give rewards when child successfully chew and swallow his/her food promptly. Every child is different and this is quite a common problem. Hope you find a solution that works!! Good luck!

Perhaps it helps you have fixed eating schedule for your child and during said meal time, aim to keep to the time and avoid distractions like TV, toys or talking to your child. My friend would usually takes her child for a stroll in her pram after mealtime and this motivates the little one to finish her meal so that she gets to go out and spend some time seeing the "birdies".