BLW and eating too MUCH? Please check my menu!

[Sunnysummer]

We seem to have the opposite situation to most people posting about BLW - our 11 month old DS has taken to finger food from the word go, and never leaves a crumb of chewable food! We are giving him nutritious meals and no sweets other than fruit, so wasn't too worried, but then my sister came over and showed me all this bfing stuffed that said solids should be 25% of his calories at 1 year. DH is now worried because he and his family are bigger, and is concerned that DS won't know what hungry feels like. I'm totally confused.

DS is 25th percentile length / 50th weight, and has been steady since about 1 month.

A sample day might be:
Breakfast - small bowl porridge with full fat Greek yoghurt and sprinkle cinnamon
Mid morning - often nothing, otherwise a couple of rice crackers
Lunch - 3 chickpea and corn fritters, with a 'salad' of chopped tomato and cucumber and grated carrot
Afternoon snack - 1/2 a cut pear
Dinner - large handful of pasta with sauce of chopped up chicken, avocado, courgette, pine nuts, dash of cows milk. If still hungry and grabbing at our food then I might give some extra veggies or pasta, or some fruit as pud.

Plus around 4 bfs, usually before breakfast, then early afternoon, before bed and 1 at night.

Thank you for helping!

[Sunnysummer]

Ahh, bfing stuff, not stuffed! I meant websites like kellymom, which I have otherwise found to be really useful so far...

[drinkyourmilk]

Seems fine to me.

[ExBrightonBell]

Seems similar to my ds at the same age. He would eat loads and I was worried about how much.

He has calmed down and now eats less (he's 20 months now), and will stop when he's full - even when it's something he really likes.

[makeminea6x]

Pretty sure my DD ate as much as that at that age although she was down to 3 BF. At 2 her weight gain is fine. Surely BLW means she can't overeat? If her weight gain is steady I wouldn't worry.

[rootypig]

His diet is exemplary. Helping your child to know and trust their appetite goes both ways. If he's hungry, he should eat! Ignore your sister. If you are offering him food and milk at regular intervals and he is taking what he wants of both, what more can you do?

If you're concerned about him overeating or being overweight in future, I think the main things you can do now are: don't get upset if he doesn't 't want or finish something; don't praise him for eating lots. That latter one is easy to slip into. Replace praise with 'say what you see' verbalising eg instead of 'good boy, you ate all your strawberries!' Something like 'I see you really love those strawberries, aren't they juicy and sweet'. (Say what you see is useful for all aspects of parenting toddlers, it forces you to engage.)

[Sunnysummer]

Thank you for getting back so quickly, I will keep calm and show DH

It's good to hear the amounts are reasonable, and the saying what you see is helpful, I do find myself saying good boy and well done with food quite often, especially when he connects spoon with mouth rather than floor/chair/wall!

[Sunnysummer]

Thank you for getting back so quickly, I will keep calm and show DH

It's good to hear the amounts are reasonable, and the saying what you see is helpful, I do find myself saying good boy and well done with food quite often, especially when he connects spoon with mouth rather than floor/chair/wall!

[rootypig]

It's really hard not to! I do think praising for spoon use is fine - after all the point of praise is to encourage good behaviour, among other things! Just don't slip into praising for eating everything, or a lot

[BertieBotts]

I think the 25% thing is to reassure mothers whose children don't eat a lot at 1 year, which is fairly common.

I don't think you have to worry as long as you're not restricting foods and the stuff he has access to is balanced and healthy (it might be a problem if he was eating 3 happy meals a day!)