Dealing with gagging on anything textured :(

[sometimesyouwin]

I'm looking for tips or anyone else's experience of the same thing. My DS2 is soon to be 8mths but weaning isn't going too well. He'll accept very watery puree from a spoon but that's about it. I've tried gradually making things more textured but he literally gags on every spoonful and sicks it back up and then gets upset . Finger foods are no better. My DS1 has an over sensitive gag reflex (still bad at age 4) but he wasn't this hard to wean. He's EBF at the moment and won't take a bottle and I'm due back to work in Feb so need to get a move on with things but don't know how. My DS1 was on 3 meals a day by 10mths and made up on milk feeds early morning and evening so transitioning to nursery was easy. Any suggestions greatly appreciated! (I find weaning really stressful!)

Watching with interest as going through exactly the same here. dS is 8months next week and will eat only if its the consistency of a stage 2 pouch, nothing lumpier. He is ok with and interested in finger foods but gets easily bored and frustrated then gives up. My main problem is not returning to work but the fact tha he feeds every 2 hrs at night!

I'm with you on the sleep thing too! He randomly sleeps between 1hr and 2hrs at a time all night. He's a co-sleeping boob monster! Let's hope someone has some suggestions!

Watching with interest here, too. My nearly-1 year old DD gags in nearly every meal. Today, on a few grains of slippery, soft rice. Stressful for the person feeding her, and I'm worried she doesn't eat much anyway! We are nowhere near the finger foods etc that the books say we should be on!! Yikes! Wondered about asking our HV but I'm not sure what they can do ...

Hi all.
My DD was the same. She's now 18mo and only gags occasionally. I found that giving a tiny amount of the thicker stuff on the spoon seemed to lessen the gagging. I did that until she got used to the texture. She seemed to tolerate that better.
DD's dietitian ( she's alergic to cows milk) said that babies with a very sensitive gag reflex should be given more fingers foods. Wish I had been told about that back when I first started weaning as I'm having a nightmare getting her to chew proper meals like chicken goujons etc!

Stop purees and get him to learn about textures by using his hands and finger foods, basically share your meals (chop his up a bit if you like). Let him learn how to bite, chew, hold in his mouth, swallow. Gagging is a natural useful response, all part of learning.

i.e. look up Baby Led Weaning, the theory behind it is sound.

Agree with Galvanized. Forget about the purees and give finger foods. At 8 months he will quickly become more dexterous and be able to deal with chewing, moving them about in his mouth. To be blunt, he's never going to learn to deal with lumps if he just has purees, however textured they may be.

Also, try not to be anxious about the gagging, it is a natural response. The important thing is to know the difference between gagging and choking, and what to do if the latter happens.

Tongue tied babies can have difficulty with chewing and swallowing certain textures.

Has he ever been checked for it by somebody who knows what they are doing?

Thanks for all your comments everyone. That's interesting what the dietician said Lindsay about finger foods. The rest of you seem to think the same. Maybe I should persevere with finger foods and new textures. I'm pretty sure I know the difference between gagging and choking but the gagging episodes go on for so long before he gets the stuff up and out and sometimes have to get him out of his chair and give him a pat on the back to help him get stuff up. I really try not to get stressed about it as I don't want him picking up on it but I'm a nervous wreck inside. In people's experience how long does it take for the gag reflex to calm down?
I'm so jealous of friends that just lob chunks of broccoli, potato and omlette on their babies tray and watch them happily hoover them up without any gagging!

This is so reassuring to read. My DS is one and just throws finger food on the floor! If he does eat anything too big he just gags which freaks me out completely. He's fine with chunky stuff in purees but as for him munching on carrot batons or whatever he is a way off!

Tried to post earlier so apologies if this comes up twice! Our discovery here is grated cheese! DD (1) can put individual fronds of cheese - yes, we are excited about that - in her mouth and chew and swallow them. This is a huge development as even she can't gag on a piece of grated cheese :)

I see the points about baby-led weaning. I guess we need to be braver about just trusting the gag reflex. It's just so scary when it happens, and I have dealt with two real chokes. Pouf.

Anyway! Onwards and upwards! Hope everyone had a lovely Christmas.

That's interesting what you say about grated cheese bluestocking! My DS1 was terrible with gagging too but we discovered the grated cheese thing with him too. He would spend ages picking up and eating individual bits with no gagging. But I tried the same with DS2 the other evening and he just gagged, spat it out and then yaked up the bit of puree that I'd managed to get down him .
Does anyone think a baby's size makes a difference to how ready they are for food? DS2 is only a wee chap, just over the 2nd centile. Whenever I've tried to progress to 2 meals a day he gets badly constipated. I've noticed that those doing well with weaning are much bigger e.g. a friends 6mth old who is already bigger than my DS!

Oh dear - that's a shame that the grated cheese trick didn't work for your younger one, sometimesyouwin. We have tried it with rice, too, but I guess that might be the same. Yes, I think their size might make a difference - DD is also in smallest centile and is a titchy one! Was also a tiny bit early so maybe that makes a difference? I'm trying to reassure myself with something a friend's Hv said: babies don't starve themselves. Mind you, we are relying on too much milk ATM. DD is 1 so I should be cutting it down, but daren't too much as she can't survive on grated cheese :(
We tried quinoa, too, last night (middle class menus!), in tiny, tiny, clumps - that was ok too. Mind you, the amounts she eats are tiny, tiny ....

What else have people tried that doesn't cause too much gagging?!

PS Toffeeboffin - I'm really reassured by your post above. My DD is 1, too, and she's way off a carrot baton also. Can't even think about it!! She can do sort of chunky things in purées but we are still mashing up baked beans etc and diluting... Yikes!

Mashing up baked beans... Never thought of that, will try!

The way I did it was by getting those little pasta stars by Heinz or even orzo pasta. Cook that up with a sauce. Start with it quite runny, then gradually build up the amount of pasta to sauce ratio. As they get used to that you can start to add other textures like tuna, chicken etc.
At 18 mo, my dd still likes it on the runny side, but will now happily accept big lumps in it like veg/quorn sausage etc. However she was a serious gagger and happily puked up the contents of her stomach regularly until she got used to the textures. I just laughed it off when she did it to try to keep it a positive experience!

LindsayS79 - off to buy orzo this very day!! Thanks for the tip. Will keep sauce runny etc and see how we go.

Yes, Toffeeboffin - I mash the beans (reduced sugar and salt ones) then add a drop of boiled water to it's not too much of a paste, and she will eat that relatively easily....

Might try to talk to HV but she always seems in rather a rush and just asks about whether DD has "a range of tastes", which she sort of does!

Happy Friday! Phew.