Help! DD won't eat off a spoon!

[JammyGem]

DD is coming up to 7 months and so we've started weaning in the last few weeks. She loves anything she can pick up herself - fingers of steam veg, baby snacks etc., but she refuses to eat off a spoon. She just clamps her mouth shut. We've tried everything but still she won't eat anything off a spoon, and I feel like everytime she manages to eat it it's because we've essentially force fed her.

Does she have to be able to eat purees etc or can we stick to finger foods? Did anyone else have this experience?

Just let her eat with her fingers, you don't have to purée anything. If she's eating successfully by herself then it's all good.

Dd was like this it only became a problem when she had to take medicine but there’s nothing you can do about that!

Dd has everything to feed herself - mashed potato, pasta, casserole etc. It’s messy but I wasn’t really that bothered about that:

Yes, just letting her eat with her hands is absolutely fine. No need for purée at all, in fact there are a lot of arguments for actively avoiding it. You may find that she's happy to have a spoon on her tray and eat (eh yogurt) with it herself though.

Blimey don’t force feed her! You’ll set up a lifetime of food issues.

Just go down the baby led weaning route (google is your friend here!) some babies just don’t want to be spoon fed, it’s normal. She can have anything you have just watch out for choking hazards (cut up grapes, tomatoes, blueberries etc and no whole nuts) minimal salt and no honey until she’s 1.

You can give things like smooth soup in free flow sippy cups, so she can feed herself, or give her fingers of toast to dip into purees, bagels are good for this as they are quite "sturdy" and don't disintegrate easily.
For things like yoghurt, I've mixed in a few oats and left it to stand for a while to make it a bit more solid - it makes it a bit easier to eat with fingers or for older toddlers who are learning spoonfeeding themselves.

DS is like that. He’s usually more keen if I put food on the spoon and give the spoon to him (does get messy).

He’s also happy eat straight out of baby pouches.

She doesn’t need to eat off a spoon.

No need for a spoon at all. It's great that she'll eat finger foods, let her continue to enjoy lots of different flavours and textures. Give the spoon a rest for a bit and try again in a few weeks (it does make life easier if they'll take certain foods from a spoon, but it's not essential and nothing to worry about at this age). DD is 14 months and still needs to be holding some food in her fist if we spoon feed her something!

Strip her down to her nappy and let her go to town by herself. Maybe leave a spoon on the highchair for her to heave onto the floor at her convenience

Like everyone has said, spoon feeding is completely unessential! Look up baby led weaning, but if you don't like the idea of it just go your own way. You don't need to do purees at all, but if you want to you can make thick soups (or even serve baby purees) and give your LO a spoon to learn to use themselves or something like breadsticks, toast or bread to dip and eat. Hummus is great for dipping too, and yogurt works as a dip with strawberries etc. Scrambled egg is good for hand feeding, cooked veg, omelette, anything really.
The only foods to avoid for now are whole nuts, whole grapes/cherry tomatoes/cherries etc (choking risk), honey and too much salt.

DS1 was like that. Wouldn’t let us put a spoon anywhere near his mouth.

We read up on baby led weaning and went down that route rather than trying to force spoon feeding.
Our local library had a baby led weaning cookbook (by Gil Rapley I think?) that had lots of good ideas for suitable foods.

DS1 was also happy to have a go at feeding himself with a spoon, although we had to pre-load it for him to begin with.

DD2 never once let me put a spoon near her mouth. I just gave finger foods. After a bit she would eat off the spoon as long as she could do it herself. By 9 months she was completely feeding herself with fork and spoon.

Load the spoon up and let her do it herself of she wants to?

Don't force feed her.

ElizaPancakes has it pretty much spot on!

I used ElizaPancakes method in hot weather and SillyBillyz Messy Eater bibs otherwise. IIRC (from a decade ago) they are allegedly size 18 months +, on the advice of MN I bought them anyway despite DC being six months and just rolled the sleeves up slightly

DD1 was like that. Just give lots of finger food. Google baby lead weaning and you will get lots of recipes.

Might not work but could you try different spoons? I started with some cheap hard plastic ones dd hated she likes being able to chew them a bit. Got some munchkin ones I think which are a bit flexible but amazon sell silicone ones which would be loads better.

One if mine wouldn’t either. He just fed himself with his hands - favourite was mash balls with peas!

For my first I invented all sorts of spoons, crackers, breadsticks, falafel thst I could load with purées for him to try different flavours.
For my second we put the purée or whatever in her tray and she ate it with her hands. She blw in terms of she ate what we ate but sometimes I blitzed it a bit.

It is entirely possible to eat custard with your hands as long as you can cope with the mess.

Oh she’s 3 now and uses cutlery.

I have one of these too. I fretted over it, turns out quite unnecessarily. He's nearly one now and eats very well, including with a spoon. He does also sometimes now want to be spoon/fork fed off my plate (will just point and then sit there with his mouth open), the contrary little thing

My health visitor was “but she needs to learn to eat from a spoon” when I told her we would do BLW. 11 years later and DD is perfectly able to eat with a spoon. They all learn at one point.

What helped a bit in getting her to pick up a spoon was that I sat down with her and ate yoghurt or cereals myself and she just copied me one day. It only for breakfast, she was eating with a fork earlier than eating with a spoon without a mess.

Mine is 14 months now. He flat out refused the spoon from 6 months old. He would get so upset, clamp how mouth shut and bat the spoon away.

We just encouraged baby led weaning. It has been slow and he is very behind with his eating. (Still bats away a spoon. I try every day but even today he refused and shook his head.)

It is just very messy OP I'm afraid! Haha

Health visitor won't worry. "Food before one is just for fun"

As long as your baby is healthy and getting most of their nutrition from milk. There is only so much you can do.