Food

[dobbyssoc]

DS in 11 1/2 months. He currently has finger foods at lunch time and a very lumpy purée for dinner. However with his lunch he will grab a handful of food and just shove it in his mouth, he will then gag or lots of cases choke because he's put so much in. This has meant we have to break up his food into tiny tiny pieces. It doesn't matter if we space his food out he will still wait till he has a whole handful and shove it in! He doesn't chew anything he's had sticks of food since 6 months but still won't chew he just swallows!

Can anyone give any tips as it's not only scary for us to watch but I'm concerned he should be better at chewing now.

Could you use cutlery? Put a piece of whatever he is having on a fork and give it him? He sees you and your DH using cutlery and he will be eating it soon, so it is the normal progression.

As long as you cut up hard non-squishy foods into small pieces, he should be ok.

It's great that he's so interested in feeding himself. He'll be fine

DS is 13 months and actually used to do this, so I figured he just needs more practice (he never willingly accepted the spoon anyway) and we gave up spoon feeding completely pretty early on in our weaning journey and let him crack on with feeding himself. It used to be terrifying watching him gag at first, but it did become quite clear that if he put too much in his mouth he just spat it back out. He still gags pretty often but eats anything and everything and has exclusively fed himself since almost the beginning so I don't even worry anymore. Gagging and choking are very different things, and gagging is incredibly normal (albeit not very nice). My advice would be to give him things that are harder to chew to encourage chewing practice, meatballs are good, does he eat sandwiches? At 11.5 months he can pretty much eat everything you eat - purées (even lumpy ones) aren't necessary and really aren't teaching him anything. If you're trying to encourage chewing, ditch the purées and only give him food that demand chewing.

Thanks all. Will keep persevering

I have an enthusiastic eater too. Such a treat watching him shovel a giant handful of lasagne into his mouth...I tend to think that the only ways he going to learn is by doing it over and over again. There are a few foods I avoid (like raw carrots and apples) which are harder and I stick to things that squish between my fingers or melt but otherwise I just let him crack on. I don't think babies are particularly bothered about gagging or vomiting and DS has never come close to choking - he's remarkably proficient at removing troublesome food from his mouth. And then often trying to stick it in my mouth 🤢

When weaning, you teach many things at once. New flavours, new textures, but also eating habits. And shovelling food putting handful is an aspect you should teach him not to do. Not because of the risk of chocking / gaging but because this is not how you eat.

Just gently and calm repeat, just one piece and you show him with food on your plate

@LeGrandBleu In the future yes, table manners are of course important, but not at 11.5 months! It's more important to have a good relationship with food / eating and getting them to learn how to chew / eat in general rather than concentrating on "this is not how we eat".

I mean, if you want to come and teach DS (13 months) how to use a knife and fork proficiently then be my guest. But don't come crying to me when you find Cheerios stuck down your knickers / in your ear/nose/hair.

I am French and in France we wean with cutlery quite early and if you go in any nursery you will see toddlers sitting and eating on their own with forks and spoon and drinking from open glasses.

Teaching how to eat and table manners are two different things.

This said @mrsmummy111 I have no interest in teaching any 13 months old how to eat cheerios because ultra processed food has no place in a 13 months old diet.

Oh you've got 11.5 month olds who understand the concept of picking up an open cup and sipping from it calmly and casually do you? My arse.

Not at 11.5 but definitely at 15. If you start early. and no need to be rude

@LeGrandBleu unfortunately he understands where a spoon goes (if I gave him a fork he would most likely stab himself in the eye!) but not that you need to keep things on the spoon to go into your mouth. Instead he thinks it's brilliant game to pick things up the catapult them over the room. If we say no and show him he finds it funny!
I really appreciated your posts until you said about Cheerios. My son will have them for breakfast and I find it rude and offensive that you are commenting that it is wrong. You do as you wish and other parents will do as they wish.

Saying that ultra processed food such as Cheerios don't belong to a toddler diet is not offensive nor rude, it is science that says that their consumption (including breakfast cereal) especially in early age is linked to obesity and other health problems (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30660687/) .

If you have been hurt by that comment, that wasn't the intention.