baby not eating as well

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wandasmart

New member
my 9month old has always loved her solids and was taking anything i fed her. but the past few days she's been so picky and just eating only a few spoonfuls to half of what she used to. wasn't too worried the first 2-3 days but now am getting a little concerned.

am not sure which approach to take, do i say "ok you don't want to eat, then let's stop and not feed her anything until the next scheduled meal" or do i try to coax her into it? i do not want to feed her bread or other snacks which will fill her up and her not eat the next meal because of this.

has anyone else been through this and found a way?
 
my baby started to become picky eater around 9 mths. i tried everything from "ok you don't want to eat, then let's stop and not feed her anything until the next scheduled meal" to "do i try to coax her into it". i even had helpers singing & dancing around to keep her entertained. when we tried the 1st method, she's eat, but it was several hours later & she ended up not having enough food during the day & keep waking up at night for feeds. so what i'm doing now is, give her healthy finger foods (soft steamed carrots sticks, brocolli, banana, avocado, bread, cookies, steamed pork, omelette, etc) every hour. ut it has to be sth she likes. everytime she eats, she's be on her high chair though. (except for cookies & bread). i just make sure that throughout the day, she keeps eating healthy nutritious food, to make up for what she needs.
 
oh, & btw, my baby is 16mths old. so i've tried everything during the past 6 mths. i found this method to be best for both parties. once she doesn't want anymore food (started to shake her head, spit out food) i let her down RIGHT AWAY. now i don't have of make meal time a power struggle. she's happy & gets her nutrition.
 
I think this reducing the amount they eat around nine or ten months is very common in babies. All four of mine did it and so have most of my friends? children. In fact my third child only put on 0.1 kg in the three months from 9 months old to one year. The doctor, however, told me that it was nothing to worry about because he was large to begin with and health in every other aspect.

One of the things which worked for our family was having a tray of goodies at his level that he could slowly eat throughout the day when he wanted it. It was like a toddler?s h'orderve tray, we had small cubes of cheese, grated carrots, grated apples (they go brown quickly but he didn?t seem to mind), a few raisins, avocado cubes (his favourite), etc.

The other thing we did was rather than have his own plate just let him eat off our plates. This seems to take the stress out of the situation because I wasn?t so aware of how much he ate and so didn?t worry about it that much.

Best wishes,
Barb
 
I too think this is very common. At our last LLL meeting almost every mother who had a baby around the one year mark was complaining about their babies not eating as much as before.

One thing to remember is that a toddler?s meal is actually quite small. The usual estimate for a meal is one tablespoon for each year of life. Thus a nine month old?s meal can be as little as two teaspoons.

Best wishes,
SARAH
 
Mine is ten months old and she also doesn't eat as much as she used to. She, too, was a large baby. I found that in the past 3 months, she hasn't gained much weight at all. It is a constant battle with her to eat now. She doesn't eat in her highchair...she has to watch Baby Einstein or play with some toys. At this point, anything is fine as long as she eats. I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one! =) My daughter has also gone on hunger strikes twice. She will go on the strike for about 5 days...absolutely no solids just breastmilk. I noticed it's always when she's teething. Anyone else get this?
 
rest assure, nanzbier. if she's taking bm, then it's not a hunger strike. she gets quite some good nutrients from your milk. =) my baby used to do the same when she was sick.
 
Thanks Joannek...I'm glad to know that...She doesn't take formula...what do I do when I've weaned her and she goes on a hunger strike???
 
is your baby taking a bottle yet?? i started giving my baby bm in a bottle when she was very small (so daddy can also feed her), so she doesnt resist the bottle (i.e. only if i'm not around) if u need to strat introducing a bottle i think it'll be a little tricky.

well, i started mixing feed her at 11 mths with hipp organic formula. i started with 1/2 bm & 1/2 formula in the bottle. & gradually adding the proportion of the formula. she loves hipp organic now so i have no problem giving her milk. but even if she's taking only formula for several days in a row i think it's ok. just try to sneak in a fruit in between. babies usually love fruits - banana, avocado, pear are some of the favorites.
 
My little boy is now two years old. I breast fed him until he was 13 months and he never really used the bottle. He started using the (sippy) cup when he was 9 months old. I figured if he could use the cup and skip the bottle then there is one less thing to worry about when it's time to quit the bottle. I didn't want to feed him formula beacuse I find it too sweet. At around 10 months I started adding whole milk in his cereal and at 11 months I gave him whole milk to drink in small amount. The transition went really well, by 13 months he didn't want to bf anymore and was on whole milk.

About the food strike - my little boy didn't eat any solids for one week when his molars came out back when he was about 18 months old. He only had milk. It didn't seemed to bother him too much although his pot belly was noticeably smaller. :-) He ate normally again after the molars cut through.
 
Mine will not take a bottle...I've tried all different kinds. I 've also tried different sippy cups and it seems the only thing she likes to suck is ME! =) The funniest thing is that she will take water out of one type of bottle I bought....not realy a bottle...but is a bottle that has a spoon connected onto it. I bought it from a brand called Pigeon. It doesn't require sucking...just drink from the spoon. My friend's baby who also doesn't use bottle or sippy only uses this bottle-spoon. Isn't that funny?
DTHY....I really hope that my daughter will wean herself as well....I'm going to try to bf until she's one years old. =)
 
Nanzbier,

Have you tried Tommee Tippee's Easiflow tumblers? They really work for my little boy. He can control the flow of the liquid by sucking on its special spout and it is sort of like sucking from a breast. I got mine from a large local drug store (Not Watson's or Mannings). I've also heard that Toys R Us have them too.

Well, if bfding doesn't bother you and your baby seems to like it then by all means, continue. How many times do you bf you baby now? I found that by about 1 my little boy only nursed about twice a day (morning and evening) but each time for about 5 minutes and he was easily distracted. So I decided to cut the morning feed. Then slowly I found that he wasn't really interested in the evening feed either, so I cut out bfding all together. The weaning process was really natural. I guess one thing you need to be careful of is if your daughter relies on bfding to help her fall asleep...then you might have a different problem.
 
refusing bottle

My baby girl is just over 3 mths old. She started with formula at the hospital and mixed with bf after we took her home. It was difficult period of time when my milk wasn't enough and she was found sensitive to cow's milk. Some times around 1 mth old, she rejected bf and cried very loudly to demand her bottles. With persistance, she finally fully accepted my breast with occational formula or EBM bottle feeding when I needed to be away for a while.

However at around 4 weeks ago she suddenly rejected the bottle totally and took bf only. Friends told me that I should be greatful as it was not not easy to started from bottle at the first place but could end up in exclusive bf. But I really don't understand of her sudden change.

I worry that it will be difficult to give her some water when she starts to take solid. Besides, as the weather get hotter it would be good if I can give her some water in between meals. To make it worse, she also doesn't lke to have water. I tried to feed her with cup whe she rejected bottle but not really successful.

Has anyone been through this?
 
Dear ystwu,

I think it's great that you are bfding exclusively! Have you tried putting bm in a bottle or in a cup? I bfed my boy until he was 13 months, then he weaned himself off bfding naturally. When I had to leave for my part-time job and couldn't bf, I asked my husband to give the baby the stored bm in a bottle or cup. It was difficult at first, but with patience and persistence, my little boy finally took the bottle and later the cup. Experiment with different teats and cups.

I have read from a Baby Center (www.babycenter.com) article and a couple of my baby books that babies don't really need water until they are 1. You can introduce water at 6 months, but only offer it after meals and in hot weather and 1-2 oz at a time, preferrably lukewarm. I gave my son very occasionally diluted prune juice (when he had constipation) after solids were introduced, but never formula which I find is way too sweet. My son really likes drinking water (and whole milk) now. I guess it's because his palate was not polluted by the really sweet drinks, like juice or formula, when he was a baby. Don't worry too much about your baby not drinking water now or even at 6 months because bm is not only nutrious but also has a high water content.
 
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