Eating but won’t touch food

[jackiesgirl]

My 10 month old has started nursery this week and they are trying to give him finger foods - we are also trying at home. He eats well from a spoon or if you hold pieces of food to his mouth but he just will not pick anything up. We are at the stage where we want to start introducing more foods but this is making it hard. Any ideas what we can do to get him to pick food up? His grip etc is fine with other objects, he picks toys etc easily

Have you tried putting one or two pieces of food in front of him when he is in his highchair and then pretending you are busy with something else? Obviously keep an eye on him, but maybe do some tidying/washing up so he doesn't feel the pressure of being watched?

No we haven’t tried that - always eagerly watching and encouraging, but will give it a go!

Use a baby fork and stab a piece of food with it and hand the fork to him

I think eagerly watching him and encouraging might be the problem. He doesn’t need encouragement

Like the PP said, pop a couple of things on his tray and go and make a sandwich. Obviously you stay in the same room but you’re looking at blithely ignoring rather than full on entertainment system when he’s eating

10 months and not picking food up is pretty normal tbh. Some kids just skip that phase for a bit, try bigger soft pieces he can grab easier, like banana chunks, not tiny bits, makes a difference.