how to "graduate" my little eater...

kris_kelsey

My daughter is 9 months and not the best eater in the world, and never has been.  She was diagnosed with milk/soy protein intolerance (plus a few other foods possibly) when she was 2 weeks old.  I eventually switched her to neocate, a hypoallergenic formula.  She was a terrible breastfeeder and was functionally terrible at getting milk out of my breasts (and this is coming from me, a lactation counselor plus another IBCLC) and she also struggles a bit with aspiration of reflux and bottles.  Her suck swallow is uncoordinated at times but not bad enough to involve further work up per her pedi GI.  She got purees starting at 6 months and has done well with those.  I have been giving her rice puffs and mum mums for about a month but she still chokes on them once every day or two.  She tries to swallow them before they have dissolved and that is the issue.  She is good at picking foods up and putting them in her mouth and chewing a little but just not chewing/dissolving enough.  I don't want to keep her on purees so long that she can't tolerate other textures. 

Anyone have this issue?  I can't decide if I should wait for her to become more ready, or if there is some other easy to eat food that I should be trying.

As a side note, she is also not quite crawling yet.  she can push herself backwards and roll around, but no forward movement. 

unaveragejane

I have been mashing DS's food so that it is soft but still has lumps so that he is learning how to swallowi some bigger things without choking. I'm not sure it is prompting him to chew more or not but he handles lumpy foods well now. I have done this with bananas, avocadoes, and very ripe, soft pears.

acbfreire

I started giving LO some puffs. She "chewed" on them with her gums. Then I proceeded to give her some little pieces in her purees and she does fine with them.

I never gave her too thin of a puree to begin with.

Natali25

Yes, we have the same issue with feeding. Although our son doesn't suffer from all that your LO does, he does have a horrible gag reflex and will sometimes vomit. We've made to puffs and now cheerios. Sometimes he'll still gag. He's no where ready for "real" solids yet. I'm also afraid he'll get stuck eating purees forever. Sorry I'm not much help. But our son isn't really crawling either. He can push with one leg and roll all over but not crawl on all fours without belly flopping. I think/ I'm hoping he'll grow out of his gag/vomit reflex.

RaeAnt

What's the rush to go beyond puree form? 9m I don't think is that old where there should be a concern. Just as learning to eat purees, eating...using teeth/gums to mash/chew food is a skill. Some LOs take longer than others. Now if she's 12m+ you may want to talk to her pedi. DD turns 8m Tuesday and doesn't like even lumps in her puree (I make my own and have tried giving her some stage3 style premade foods and she spits the lumps out)
I remember when DS started on solids. He would choke and gag at the beginning too. I've read that it's par for the course until they learn. Most kids do that when first introduced to things they have to chew.

As for the crawling, absolutely not an issue. how is she standing? Many kids will skip crawling and go for cruising instead. Both my kids did that. DS learned to crawl after he was cruising for a couple of months/begin walking and would periodically fall so he would need to crawl to where he could pull up again

sam19

Gagging is normal when a baby first starts out eating. It does not mean that they are choking. They are learning how to eat these foods and are sometimes going to struggle with it. I don't think it means she isn't ready. Try some mashed banana or mashed avocado. Leave it a little lumpy. She will gag and it's ok. Just watch for actual choking.