feeding solids? - i am full of questions today lol

kimberley wrote: since she turned 6 mos (she is almost 8 mos now) i have tried introducing rice cereal and fruit but she doesn't seem to like it. i give her a break and try again, but she never eats more than a few bites. i am more than happy exclusively breastfeeding for her first year but am worried she will have issues later on (i really should ignore FIL) and she does show interest in eating but just not baby food. i have let her taste some of my mushed steamed rice, crackers, arrowroots and bread but she usually just sucks on it then spits it out when the flavor is gone. my questions are:

do i continue trying to feed her rice cereal and baby food fruits or lay off for a while?
can i go straight from breastmilk to finger foods since she likes those better?
if yes, what is safe to start with?

both my boys were text book eaters starting cereal at about 4mos and progressed to veg and fruits, then meats and carbs, then finger foods so i am a little lost now lol. tia.

A&A'smommy replied: I have no idea, but good luck with what you decided!

CantWait replied: HAHA!!! Sounds like little Jade can be like little Anthony sometimes. Anthony would sometimes eat baby foods, but mostly he likes to eat what mommy and daddy are eating. He's been eating small soft chunks of well cooked vegs since he was around 6 months, also little pieces of fruit (you could even shred it up). Also beans, toast, and cherrios is a big favourite, and just about anything else we eat. The only thing he doesn't eat is anything that is a common allergin, or something that is a well known choking hazard ie..nuts, grapes, even though I've given him them cut into a billion pieces. As for the rice cereal you might want to try barley, Anthony liked that one much better. It is important to try and stick with the cereal after bf till at least age 2 because of the added iron and that, I'm not sure about while bf though. His doctor said at his last appointment to basically give him whatever he wants that we eat. Good Luck and hope that helps a little bit

amynicole21 replied: I see no reason to force baby food on her if all she wants is big people food! I think that baby food is just for convenience anyway - except maybe for the iron in the cereal. Have you tried giving her some cooked spinach or greens for iron? There's iron in a bunch of other things, but I can't seem to think of them right now

ediep replied: Jason was a horrible beby food eater.....I had to do a song and dance to get him to have a few bites. By the time he was about 10 months I gave up and just gave him regular food. I don't think there is any reason to keep trying baby food if she doesn't like it. Jason never liked rice cereal, but he did a little better with oatmeal. Good luck!!!

kimberley replied: okay, call me dumb but what does she need the extra iron for? i still intend to bf until she weans herself (which doesn't look like anytime soon) and was told by her ped to give her vitamin D in the winter but i didn't know about iron.

amynicole21 replied: From what I understand, babies can get all of the nutrients they need from mom up until 6 months, and then the only thing they really don't get enough of is iron. I think that some bfeeding advocates dismiss this, but my doc and most books I've read do support that. Will she eat cheerios? I think they have extra iron in them.

Here's a link from kellymom, and she does say that babies don't necessarily need extra iron when they are bfeeding...

kellymom.com

kimberley replied: thanks Amy! i haven't tried her on cheerios yet because i am scared she will choke on them. she does have her bottom 2 teeth but you know me, i am paranoid she will try to swallow one whole. i will give it a try though. i LOVE spinach. you think if i added more to my diet that would be enough?

amynicole21 replied:

Hmmm! I don't know? Not sure how much of that passes through bmilk.

coasterqueen replied: Toss the cereal and give that baby some yummy finger foods!!!! Kylie never liked rice cereal either so we went to jarred foods, which in my opinion were a waste of our time. Next child we have will just get finger foods

Here's a specific link on starting solids/finger foods: http://www.kellymom.com/nutrition/solids/index.html

HTH!

DansMom replied: Daniel would never touch cereal and still won't---he may have less iron than he needs, but he's basically healthy. Like Kylie, he didn't want much to do with any sort of mass-produced mush food---it was table foods all the way (banana, avocado, soft pear, boiled or fried potato were some of the foods I started with). He eats stage Gerber 3 cereals now because it has chunks, but won't eat anything pureed, and he spits out cheerios. Let us know how it goes if you try it!

Edited to say: and if she doesn't want solids at all right now, I still think there's no need to push them---especially if she's not losing weight and seems healthy and happy, not hungry. Daniel never ate very much period, just a few bites at a sitting, until he was almost 11 months old.

Kirstenmumof3 replied: Claudia did not like rice cereal either. I don't blame her it tastes awful! I talked to the LC about this and she said to give her oatmeal and then work up to mixed cereal. I think if she is eating what you are eating that is fine, as long as it is pretty soft.

3_call_me_mama replied: You'd be amazed at what an 8 month old can eat. pretty much anything that you eat can be mushed up for them. ( with the exceptions of obvious allergens) I never used jarred baby food and Cameron was breastfed until 15 months, and we stopped cereal (rice at 5 months he hated it, but liked oatmeal and barley (we used those until about 8 months) he was on pretty much whatever we ate after 8 months. We just shredded up things and mashed others, he had a bunch of teeth, but children without teeth are still amazing with their gums and what they can eat! I'd try regular oatmeal (not baby cereal) and see what she thinks, it'll be a good source of iron and other vitamins and then just mush up some real food.

My2Beauties replied: Hanna didn't like rice neither.. it made her constipated !! So I switched to Oatmeal and she loves it mixed with juice. I can't say much on this because Hanna has been gulping down baby food since she was 4 months old, she eats anything I put in her face. However I do know that forcefeeding can cause eating problems later in the future so don't continue to try and feed her foods she isn't interested in. If she wants your food, mash it up as best as you can and keep a close eye on her while she eats to make sure she can swallow them ok, then I'd say you're free to feed her anything she is willing to eat. Do you bf? If so, and this is totally up to you, continue to breastfeed but also mix a little bit of formula in her diet for added iron if she won't take cereal. Most formula is iron foritfied just like cereal so you could try that. If you're already on formula with baby I would say not to worry about extra iron, too much can constipate baby as well

coasterqueen replied:
Actually baby gets all the iron they need through breastmilk. You could also use pumped breastmilk and mix it with the cereal.

kimberley replied:
i am pretty much exclusively bf and her ped said he is not concerned about her iron intake because she gets enough from me, he just wants me to give her vitamin D because she shouldn't be out in too much sunlight and she needs it. i have read research that says otherwise though. as for formula, i have worked too hard to keep all 3 of my kids bf for at least a year to introduce it now. plus i had severe reactions to the added iron as a baby and worry she will too and it is expensive lol.

i tried pumped milk with cereal. she still hates it. i really don't think she is so interested in eating as she is in feeling like a big girl. she wants to have a plate of food like we do and sit up in her high chair at the table like us. i noticed she licks or sucks on the food then spits it out. so i decided i will continue to let her have small bits of what we eat and keep nursing. her ped has really relaxed about forcing solids. he said she is thriving, so if she refuses solids for her first year... big deal. i'm fine with that

coasterqueen replied: Kimberley, I would just nix the cereal and let her try table foods, they are much more tasty.

As far as Vitamin D, they only need to be out in the sun for minutes or even in the house with sun coming in the window. Here's a great link on it if you haven't seen it: http://www.kellymom.com/nutrition/vitamins/vitamin-d.html

When a study came out recently on this, docs decided to cover the butt by recommending this whether it was really necessary or not.

kimberley replied: yeah i read that before that is why we haven't been giving her the vitamins. i am not deficient, i eat a lot of foods rich in vit D and i go outside so i am not too concerned about it. thanks for the link though.

table food is messy but funny! she has more of it on her than in her LOL!

MommyToRiley replied: riley hated the rice cereal too. I tried the oatmeal mixed with BM, bananas and applesause and he finally grew to like it! He always loved babyfood though, well, until he realized mommy and daddy are eating something different! Now he wants what we're eating, or at least something he can feed himself. He loves potatoes and ritz crackers! I just give him cubed potatoes in his highchair and sneak some bites of baby food in while he's grabbing them! I was also very paranoid about cheerios, till DH gave him some. He did really well with them, now he eats animal crackers (he wants nothing to do with the cheerios anymore) Have you tried Gerber Wagonwheels yet? They get really mushy when they get wet, so you dont have to worry about choking as much. I gave riley those before regular table food and he had so much fun! They're a little messy though. good luck!

My2Beauties replied:

Ok See I didn't know this. I heard after the 6th month, babies need extra iron and Vitamin D that bm doesn't provide. That is what my nutritionist told me at my local neighborhood center. That is the reason for iron-fortified cereal being introduced between 4-6 months. However, I may be wrong on this. I am always open to learning new things. I bf daughter for only the first 6 weeks until I had to go back to work, since then she has been on Carnation GoodStart and the ped said that is iron fortified enough to skip cereal if baby won't eat it. I think us parents hear a milliong different things and we just need to do what we think is best for baby

coasterqueen replied:
Oh no, no problem. I didn't mean to be rude saying that. It's just that a lot of people are misinformed and I hate that. LOL. Actually if a baby is formula fed they more than likely need more iron than a breastfed baby does. So you are correct in that. Unfortunately most of the medical world is not very "up-to-date" on breastfeeding, therefore there is so much misinformation out there that it has set women up to do things they should not have to do.