food fight

Emma and mommy are havieng a stand off on eating her lunch and dinner when it's time to. I have drawn the line in the sand and we are fighting it out untill mommy wins even if it kills us both! I don't know what else to do about this eating thing. I'd finally had enough yesterday with the crying baby fits yelling "i'm hungry" when told no about something she wanted to eat before i left to get dinner. I gave in and gave her the banana. We went to get food. We got back and it took us an hour of talking and threatening with her to get her to eat 1/4 of the burger and 1/2 the banana in time to go out with daddy to the football game. I finally won so I felt proud.

Today she didn't eat a great breakfast but I'd already decided to play this out untill I fully win. so later on when she wanted yet another cup of milk I told her no b/c I was going to go fix lunh in a few min and i didn't want her to fill up on milk. another "i'm hungry!" fit. it eventually ended and a little while later I fixed her applesauce, a cheesestick, and 1/2 a PBJ. she began to eat then tried to get up and play. I saw where it was going so I said if she didn't eat her sandwich and applesauce she didn't get to play with megan (big kid babysitting here in a few minutes) she took another bite. then stopped saying "I'm not hungry. I want to play". I kept telling her "if you don't eat your lunch you don't play" finally after about 45 minutes I'd had enough. I spanked her and put her to bed. I threw away her food and left a note for megan not to give her anything to eat and only to give her one cup of milk. This is so frusterating. We are tired of her not eating at lunch and dinner, wasteing whatever food we've bought (either out or at home), then 30 minutes later crying b/c she's hungry. She would graze all day if I let her. So this week is going to be so much fun for she and I. First, b/c of the daily battles to sit and eat at the right time and even worse since she can't snack I can't induldge and do a sonic run or anything. ;) I guess for the next week she will get no snacks at all. She will only get a few cups of milk throughout the day and she will eat when we eat or she'll go hungry. Hopefully it won't take too long for her to break. This is wearing on mommys heart, emotions, and senillity! . . . . any other helpful suggestions would be greatly appreciated.