Spitting out food at 6months

[harveygirl]

Ds will be 6months next week. I have started to offer him some solids- puree carrot, banana, sweet potato, baby cereal. But all he does is spit them out! He makes a face as if he hates the taste. He gagged on the carrot and almost got sick! He hasn't actually swallowed anything! What do I do? Do I persist? He seems ready- is sitting totally unaided, will grab food from my hand and bring to his mouth. Is he not ready or does he just hate the tastes?!

 

[Spudtastic]

HI Harvey girl. I had the same issue with dd2. (Dd1 was different and loved food from the start). But dd2 would turn away and close her mouth. I didn't want to put her off food by forcing her to eat it. Instead a chopped up appropriate finger food...soft banana, softly cooked carrot sticks, avocado. Or a put some food on a spoon and gave her the spoon. Most went everywhere else but some went into her mouth. It's only now at 8 months she's taking more interest in food.

 

[jessmke]

Food before one is only for fun. So long as breast milk or formula is still his main source of nutrition it doesn't matter if he is consuming much if any solid food. My 9 month old still spits out tons of food, but mostly just stuff she can't mash up well enough with her gums (we've never given her purees). Would you consider letting him feed himself? That way if he likes something he can explore it on his own and he isn't having something he doesn't like thrust into his mouth.

 

[MindUtopia]

I would just persist and keep offering him different things, but it doesn't matter if he eats any. Like the PP said, up until about 1, it's just about playing and exploring different textures and tastes. How much he eats doesn't matter. I would say we were offering solid food for probably about 2 weeks before my daughter obviously ate anything and she didn't eat in any quantity, like enough for it to really be a meal rather than just playing, until about 9 months. Then from about 10 months, it took off. If you say he's interested in grabbing food off your plate, what about trying baby-led weaning. Let him pick things up, play with them, try them, etc. and you don't have to stress about making purees or trying to get him to eat. Just give him some of what you're eating and let him explore. They tend to be much more interested in food when they can mimic us. You probably don't eat purees or baby rice, so he'll be much more intrigued by what you're doing. Also, if you taste them yourself, you'll find a lot of purees don't even taste nice anyway and they are harder to control in the mouth when they are first learning. I would just sit down with him and eat your meals together and give him things to try. And then also give him some time. It will likely take a few weeks before he eats much of anything and it can be months before he'll be eating loads, but that's fine. It's all just about getting him used to lots of new things.

 

[SandraM]

Not to worry about it. Every baby has different development milestone and it is completely normal. He can start solid food between 6M to 9M.You need to check his readiness for solid food by just observing him like sitting up, walking, and talking. There are signs you can look for to see if your baby is ready, including the baby’s ability to sit up on his own, whether he can pick up food between thumb and forefinger and the loss of a tongue thrust. Till that your breast milk is good enough to keep him healthy. Try new ways of offering him solid foods in a relaxed, fun way.

 

[Megandelv88]

Tongue thrust reflex could very well still be in effect