Is this the wrong way of introducing solids to 1 year old?

[Jerlin]

I introduced solids to my DS when he was 11 months old. Mashed up banana, butternut squash, sweet potato, avocado, and peas. At first, he would gag with the banana once I got it into his mouth. But he doesn't gag anymore with the foods. The problem is getting the food INTO his mouth. He would shake his head no no no and refuse to open his mouth. I've talked with family and friends about this. I've been told that I started introducing solids to him too late in his life and that's why he is refusing to eat solids. If I had started him on solids at around 4 - 6 months, he wouldn't be like this - that's what I've been told by every single person I've talked with.

The problem with my 1 year old is that he doesn't seem to mind the food when it is in his mouth. The problem is getting the food INTO his mouth. I tried putting the food on my finger and then putting it on his lips and sometimes it ends up in his mouth. And once it ends up in his mouth, he's fine. He seems to eat it fine. I put little pureed foods on his plate and even little chunks of avocado, banana, you know something soft like that. He would pick the food up with his fingers and throw them on the floor or try to feed DH and I. Of course we eat it because we want to show him how to eat and that it's yummy. I even use his spoon (Avent weaning spoon) and pick up his food (well coat the spoon with his peas or other pureed foods) and lick the spoon. Yesterday was a big deal, as he took the spoon and put it in his mouth. Albeit the spoon was coated with pureed food, so it wasn't much. He did it several times and then he was done "eating" and wanted to nurse.

Both my MIL and SIL tried to feed him, saying that I'm going about it all wrong. My MIL wanted to hold his head and hands but I wouldn't let her force feed him. My SIL just kept pushing the spoon on his lips, trying to put it in between his lips. She just kept going and going and not stopping for a break. So I put a stop to that. I don't want to hurt their feelings, but he's my baby and I just don't think it's right what they're doing.

Any advice? So I listen to my MIL and force him to eat or just keep doing what I'm doing and letting him play with his food and hoping he'll eat eventually?

[ann_of_loxley]

that's what I've been told by every single person I've talked with.

There is no scientific evidence at all for this - for any baby - anywhere around the world. In fact, there is a good group of woman (families) around the world who purposly delay solids until a year of age for a variety of healthy good reasons! People have this viewpoint that you have mentioned because of misinformation about breastfeeding - that it is not enough for your baby - that they need food. This is not true.

First - I would suggest that you stop puree-ing. The mush stops here! Just offer him what you are eating! (unless of course all you eat is Burger King? lol)

Then - read this...because this blog post has a lot of good info that I would have posted here otherwise, but this saves me time! lol

http://just-making-noise.blogspot.co...eding-and.html

Last - try not and worry! Your baby is getting enough from your breastmilk alone! He will be digging into three full meals a day when he is ready!

[Chicky2]

Look, all this stuff you're hearing is garbage. I have never used "baby food", and never messed w/mashing my own food, either, or putting some of the veggies/meats aside before I add spices or any of that junk. I always just nurse first, then put Baby in my lap, or even in a high chair (not as much til much older, though), and just let 'em play. They'll figure it out eventually, and in their own way. So what if food gets tossed around? That's just fun at that age - (it's when they start dropping it as a game that it requires discipline, and that's another 6 mos away or so for you). Let your child experiment with foods of different textures, colors, and flavors. The only thing I wouldn't let my babies play w/was something really spicy that they might get in their eyes, but they are more than welcome to try a bite off my finger. I really believe (and have seen w/all of my kids, including my step dd who was raised very differently than my others for the first 6 yrs and it resulted in all sorts of food whining, etc.) that if you try to force it before about age 3 you are setting yourself and your child up for food struggles of all sorts later on.

[Ellien C]

Originally Posted by ann_of_loxley

First - I would suggest that you stop puree-ing. The mush stops here! Just offer him what you are eating! (unless of course all you eat is Burger King? lol)

DD and DH fed the 7 month old White Castle the other day!

I agree with the PP that you don't need to do much to mash up food. Just give small bits of whatever you are eating. No shoving food through closed lips and no holding hands and head - (what a way to create food issues).

Both of my kids started grabbing food off my plate around 5 months, so I went with that.

[SeekingSerenity]

Originally Posted by Chicky2

Look, all this stuff you're hearing is garbage. I have never used "baby food", and never messed w/mashing my own food, either, or putting some of the veggies/meats aside before I add spices or any of that junk. I always just nurse first, then put Baby in my lap, or even in a high chair (not as much til much older, though), and just let 'em play. They'll figure it out eventually, and in their own way. So what if food gets tossed around? That's just fun at that age - (it's when they start dropping it as a game that it requires discipline, and that's another 6 mos away or so for you). Let your child experiment with foods of different textures, colors, and flavors. The only thing I wouldn't let my babies play w/was something really spicy that they might get in their eyes, but they are more than welcome to try a bite off my finger. I really believe (and have seen w/all of my kids, including my step dd who was raised very differently than my others for the first 6 yrs and it resulted in all sorts of food whining, etc.) that if you try to force it before about age 3 you are setting yourself and your child up for food struggles of all sorts later on.

THIS. There is no reason to expect your child to conform to a schedule for feeding or anybody else's so-called "guidelines". Baby is getting all he needs from Mama's milk anyway, so to ease your own mind, I'd just back off and let Baby set the pace.

Amen to PP's suggestion to get rid of the purees too. Yuck.

My 2 year old still goes through phases where he just decides not to eat table food for awhile. He's going through one right now - my cousin changed his diaper and was concerned about his "diarrhea." I chuckled when I saw what she was talking about - basically he just has that soft yellow breastmilk poopy. The only solids he wants right now is Pringles. He's okay, though. For him, the "nana-only" phase only lasts a couple days.

Your little guy will likely start scarfing down all kinds of table food when you offer him access to what you're eating. And, like mine, he may go back and forth between eating whatever he can reach to not wanting anything at all to do with it. As for me, I just keep offering food to my Lil' Man, knowing that eventually he'll get hungry enough to want it.

Good luck, Mama. Trust your instincts - so far, you're absolutely correct in preventing force-feeding and whatever your SIL was doing.

[coyotemist]

As others have said...don't make it a power struggle. Let him eat off of your plate, or his the same stuff you are eating, and make it a no big deal kind of thing. Here is your food, eat what you want. Dinner is over, lets clean up. No holding his hands, forcing stuff into his mouth.

My guy loved at that age, and still does, sweet potato fries. They are just the right shape and size to "do it myself", and the rest of the family eats them too.

[annettemarie]

Moving to Life with a Babe since it isn't a breastfeeding question.

[Asiago]

I would just let baby set the pace as everyone else has said- no worries. The force feeding was a thing that came about in the 1970's when it was considered a milestone to conquer the tongue thrust, which we now know is baby's own safety mechanism so that solid food doesn't get in the body before his GI tract or immune system are ready.

As per starting solids too late, for thousands of years human babies ate very little solid food prior to two years of age. In the last 90-100 years it became popular to introduce solids prior to one year, so relatively speaking that is a new practice. Had you been raising your baby any other century, no one would question your timeframe of solids introduction.

I think you are doing a great job, offering healthy foods. That's all you can really do.

For what it's worth, my one year old son started solids at 11 months also. He ingested very little at first but would taste almost anything (on his own, never forced), and he enjoyed playing with food. That's all I ever wanted at that stage. No worries, let your maternal instinct guide you. You know your baby better than anyone.

[Snapdragon]

have you tried giving him yogurt?

[octobermom]

I'll also chime in a bit here... My first DD has apraxia we didn't know that when we first started tryingto feed her at first we jsut though ohh she still has a strong gag refex so we backed off tried again same thing this went on till she was around 15 months then shes began excepting VERY smooth texture foods.. Everythign else puree solids she jsut chocked and gagged...
At first we were patient and jsut chalked it up to being a "baby" Shse was till nursing a ton so it wasn'ta big concern.. then around age 2ish she begin naturally cutting back a lot on nursing but her "solid" intake was still dismal shes didn't really eat junk but shes had little variety.. We still didn't know there was a reason... We were told give her what everyone else is havign shes can choose to eat or go hungry she will eat when she is hungry...
She'd go days on end with out eatting (except nursing) and she jsut wasn't nursing enough for me to not worry..
So being new scared anf frustrated first time parents we tried force feeding... We used threats punishments and did thing I deeply regret...
Did it work?
nope not at all
if anythi g it increased our issues 10 fold
it made her scared of food
a crrect diagnoisis therapy patience and acceptace of a picky eatter is allowing us to heal
Cecilia still sits down to the same meals we do as does the baby I do minor changes for the baby as needed with regards to size of food how much sugar or heavy spicy foods
I do minor adjustments with Cecilia accomodating for some levels of like dislikes jsut like I do with myself and DH..
We eat overall healthy we enjoy FF at times as well..
Margaret age 8 months eats a wider variety and is more willing to try foods than her now 8 year old big sister...
Its not cause we delayed its just what is.


Deanna

[moongloe]

i agree with not forcing food. eventually your baby will eat.

i don't agree with ditching pureed or mashed though. you don't know that your baby will be able to handle regular food. some babies gag more easily than others. mine is one that does.

as long as your baby is still nursing well, just offer the spoon dipped in food like you mentioned. if it gets eaten, redip. if not, try again later. go with your baby's pace, and all will be well.

[Tattooed Hand]

My DD had trouble with table food so we began just giving her chunks or sticks of fruits and veggies softer, like steamed carrots. We also eat some things that cannot be picked up with a hand like stews, soups and cereals (like amaranth and millet breakfast cereal). We offered her food from 8 months onwards and she was not interested until a couple of weeks ago (10.5 months) now she actually eats (we can tell from her poop). We put the steamed bits in front of her to handle herself. The other stuff I try to fish out chunks for her to feed herself and spoonfeed her the broth or stewy parts. This works fine and as long as she knows what we're giving her, she is happy to get some of it on a spoon. With something that has no chunks like breakfast cereal, I give her a little dollop to try to feed herself with (or just play!) and then give her a few spoonfuls. It's fine.

Also, I come from a country where breastfeeding is still part of living memory. My mother and her generation didn't do it because the wonderful modern things like formula had arrived by then, but my grandmother's generation either nursed or had wet nurses. My grandmother told me that 6 months is the EARLIEST you should ever give your baby food and that many babies aren't eating hardly anything until a year and nursed until around 2 years (like my dad and aunt, while my other aunt ate much earlier and weaned herself by 1.5 years). Of course, even with this living memory, my mother was trying to sneak feed my DD at 5 months because she thought it was "cruel" to deny her food. :eyeroll

I swear it was like a switch. One day DD was not really interested and throwing everything on the floor and then all of a sudden she is a little hoover vaccum cleaner and nothing ends up on the floor if she can help it.

[jsh7809]

Just to prove that you could still have this problem if you'd introduced solids at 4-6 months , I've been trying to introduce them (slowly and mostly for play) with my 6.5 month old for about a month, and she is just.not.into it!  I've stopped trying to "make" her eat (I don't even know why I was trying so diligently - I guess I always assumed she'd want to eat, and then was trying to "teach" her despite knowing it was unnecessary).  Right now she's playing with a chunk of pear, but I don't think any is making it down her throat, and that's fine.  I'd rather she enjoy learning about food smells, textures, tastes, etc., and figure out the eating later.

But I know the pressure you must be under.  Her pediatrician told me that if I don't "practice" with the baby daily to get her to eat purees, she won't learn to eat.  What??  What human has never learned to eat?  Give me a break!  She's doing very well on breastmilk only, and even though other people (grandmothers especially) seem to think she "should" be eating a bunch of solids by now, DH and I are back to letting her go at her own pace, and we're focusing on enjoying the lack of mess and nicer smelling poops that come with a baby who's not eating solids yet

[dakotablue]

You did nothing wrong. He knows where his mouth is and I'm sure he's been putting everything (like most babies) in there already. Your babe isn't broken, or behind. I second getting rid of the purees try some real foods. DS we started solids at 8 months he would have nothing to do with puree, we started with finger foods like carrots (cooked) and rice he eats everything now...even purees.

Force feeding...I've only ever seen it done with severely disabled children who have major diagnosable food issues that are endangering their well being and then its only done by trained professionals in a clinical setting. Does it work? yes. It is so unbelievably horrible that its only a last resort....I think so.

[Jerlin]

Thanks everyone for the replies! I will definitely check out the links. I have given up trying to make him eat. I'm just taking it easy. He's nursing well and I'm just not going to worry about the solids yet. He will be on solids soon enough. I want to enjoy nursing for a bit longer instead of stressing out that he's not eating solids.