Any ideas?

[krissie328]

My son will only eat purees!! It is driving me crazy, even stage 3 jarred food he gags and won't eat. He is over 10 months old. He won't eat finger foods. He doesn't mind playing with them and might even stick them in his mouth but won't actually eat them. If he does manage to get any in there he just gags until he comes up.

The other night I made him some smashed carrots and potatoes. I offered them to him whole at first to play with and see if he would eat them. When he refused to touch them I smashed them and tried to spoon feed him. But he refused.

Really all he will eat is stage 2 jarred baby food. I can't even thicken it with rice or oatmeal as he refuses to eat it!

His doctor didn't seem concerned at his nine month check up, but I am starting to be!

He did finally start feeding himself a few of the baby puffs but even then its just a couple and he occasionally gags on those.

Any ideas? Suggestions? Positive stories?

 

[MindUtopia]

I would say just keep trying with the finger foods and make sure they are really big, like the pieces are fist sized or larger, so that he's able to have a good hold on them while taking bites, which will give him more control over what goes in his mouth and where and make it less likely he'll gag. And really just persist and don't make a big deal out of whether he eats any or not. Just top up with plenty of milk in between meals if he's not eating much.

Making the switch from purees to chunky food or finger foods basically means having to re-learn everything about eating. It's completely different to purees, so it's going to take time and all you need to do is wait. We started at 6 months with BLW, so only finger foods, and like your LO my daughter was taking a few bites here and there within a couple weeks, but she wasn't eating a significant amount of food until 9-10 months. So it really did take 3-4 months of practice to get the hang of it. If you put it in perspective like that, it probably won't totally take him as long as he already understands that food is for eating, but he doesn't understand how to eat real food that isn't pureed, so it's going to probably take a couple months. I'd just keep trying and try not to stress about it. As long as he's still getting breastmilk or formula on demand, he'll get all he needs in terms of calories and nutrients until he's ready to eat more.

 

[krissie328]

Thanks. I tried BLW at first but he just had no interest, so I have done a combo of finger foods and purees. I thought by now the finger foods would be more interesting. I will try to make the chunks a little bigger. If I had to guess I was giving about steak fry size portions. I was aiming for long and thin. But like you said it will take awhile to get a hold of the concept. I have also been working on eating with him instead of after him in hopes he catches on.

He has always been a terrible eater. He maybe eats 20-24 oz of formula a day. So that worries me some but he does follow his same percentile at every doctor's appointment and seems to be growing fine.