9mo still not taking to weaning

[SurreyArmyWife]

Hi, I am really struggling with weaning. My 9mo DS has never taken to eating, over the last few months we have tried both purée and some BLW. Sometimes he will take a little yogurt or smooth fruit purée, and even start to enjoy it, but after a couple of days he will refuse to take anything. I'm breastfeeding and amazed that he is still gaining weight, but he will go days without anything but milk. I have also tried finger foods, but I've realised that when he refuses the spoon, he will only play with food and not swallow it.

I wondered if there could be anything else going on. He is constipated and has been on movicol for several weeks. He can go 7-10 days before a very painful enormous poo. I'm hoping that the regular movicol use will keep his poo soft, but it doesn't always work. So the pattern seems to be, eat for a few days, get constipated, stop eating for a couple of weeks. I am going to see the HV and Dr this week to try and get some ideas.

I'm getting a little worried, as I'm due back to work in 8 weeks, and some weeks he takes nothing but breast milk. I'd be happy for him to take formula, but haven't had any success introducing it with a sippy cup - any tips what route is best to take at 9mo to introduce a bottle/cup/anything?

Thanks for reading.

Hi Surrey, that all sounds very stressful, you have my sympathies.

Do you offer water at every meal in a free flow sippy cup? If you do, does he drink much water? Drinking water with food could help the constipation.

Now, in your current position, I would go for 100% baby led weaning, and just put his food in front of him. Let him do whatever he wants with it, whether that is playing with it, gumming it or eating it. I would offer lots of fruit to help with the constipation - you could try pear, soft dried prunes, apricots, figs etc.

I will admit I'm not unbiased here though, as I did BLW with my DS and found it worked well.

The issue with going to a BLW approach in your position is that you have this 8 week timeframe. It may take a good few weeks for your DS to get the idea of self feeding, so it might be too nerve wracking to go with. However, if he's eating very little currently anyway then you could view it as having little to lose to give BLW a try. Worth thinking about perhaps?