Weaning

[Rose1999]

I feel like I’m failing on our weaning journey. My baby is 6 1/2 months old and has refused everything I’ve given to her so far. I’ve done the usual, offering broccoli, cauliflower, carrots etc. Tried apple and bananas too and, I must confess, tried a couple of Ella’s Kitchen veggie pouches. My daughter doesn’t want to know anything and I feel like I’m failing before I’ve barely even started 😕

You are not failing, this is a huge learning curve for baby. All they know is milk, it takes week or even months for them to begin actually eating. Food is fun til 1, up til then they are learning to eat and exploring, their nutrition comes from their milk. Keep offering, make it relaxed and baby will get it when they are ready

Assuming you started at 6 months, surely it’s been 2 weeks!! You have unrealistic expectations-of course they won’t like/eat everything straight away. Just keep offering small bits of things over and over again. I’d stick with whole foods rather than pouches. Their nutrition / calories are from milk - food is just to explore

As above make it fun, baby is still getting everything they need from milk so don’t stress that they actually NEED the food, try some more playful things like toast triangles they can pick up n chomp on, cucumber sticks, carrot sticks, cooked broccoli, anything they can pick up and hold because i dunno about you but everything my 5/6 month old picks up goes straight in the mouth lol she doesn’t particularly like being spoon fed at the moment so i give her lots of different fingerfoods and sneak in a quick spoon when shes not chomping on her finger foods, toast is her favourite at the moment lol i also bought her the feeder so if she really doesn’t want spoon feed i can get her to try different purées and she can do it herself, she loves her frozen purée feeder and its great for teething baby too xx

You're definitely not failing OP! It's your to you to offer food but as you're fixing out, they can and do choose whether or not to eat it!

There's a great Weaning Section on MN under "Feed the World" which you might be useful.

Have a read of this guide from the Caroline Walker Trust. It gives some great suggestions of first foods to try and finger foods.

Is there a particular reason that you're only offering fruit and vegetables at the moment?

Just give her bits of what you're having at normal mealtimes. Don't make it an unusual or unnatural thing. While you're all round the table at breakfast, give her a slice of toast and butter to gnaw on, or a bowl of porridge she can shove her hands in and squish.

Don't salt any food when cooking, salt and spice your own food separately, and use solid starts app to help serve her food in a way to minimise choking risk.

Don't overcomplicate it.

How are you both getting on know @Rose1999?

Weaning is a mind fuck for pretty much every parent from my own and my friends/family’s experience! Give yourself a break, keep offering, and one day they’ll have something. They’re only just old enough to even taste stuff. Then they might have lots, then decide they don’t want anything for a bit, then back on it again, and so on! My LO has loved banana since about 7 months old, now hates it aged 12 months! Babies are chaos 😂