Gone off food completely

[JessUKUS]

Hi folks. I'm hoping some mums can give me some advice, guidance, reassurance all rolled Into one as I have no faith in health professionals.

My son is just 8 months old. He has been an ok eater and done well with solids however for the past week he will not eat solids, purée or finger foods. I know the milk is the important food, which he is drinking, but he needs to be eating too for experience, textures etc, which is why it is winding me up people telling me it doesn't matter, but to me it does.

I'm very stressed, I do everything to make it a positive experience, high chair is at the table, praise, try to eat at same time etc.

Could you tell me your feeding schedule? My son currently has 5 6oz bottles in 24 hour period (1 night feed) something like this:

5:30/6am (early waker no matter what I do) 6oz bottle
10am 6oz bottle
2pm 6oz bottle
6pm 6oz bottle

He used to before this feeding strike eat 15 mins after his bottle, and have a reasonable amount however not won't have any after or in between.

Do you offer food a certain time after bottle?

Should I maybe reduce each bottle to 5oz, maybe it's filling him too much?

Or maybe offer smaller feeds during day and larger feeds bedtime?

Please, any advice is very very appreciated!

Apologies OP I cannot recall my now 2 year olds schedule when she was 8months- but it sounds like maybe teething. My LO even now goes completely off food when teething- its frustrating and worrying at the time but they soon start chomping again. Keep offering and dont let it stress you too much.
As for timings, apart from the first bottle after wake up, offer food before the bottles would be my suggestion.

Is he teething? Coming down with a cold? Honestly don’t worry about it, he’s still so little that milk is more than enough nutrition currently.

I just sat dd with me whenever I ate and gave her some food off of my plate. She either ate or didn’t. She didn’t start with 3 proper meals a day till well past 1.

Take the stress out of the situation, just keep offering food and don’t panic if he doesn’t eat. Make sure you keep up the milk feeds.

All three of mine stopped eating for about a week when cutting their first few teeth. Then just ate fine again once it was fine. At 8 months, I'd put my money in it being that. Try cold melon slices, fruit purees or yoghurts but otherwise don't worry about it.

I gave food at least an hour after milk e.g.
Milk - 7, 11, 3, 7
Food - 8, 12, 5

Thanks everyone for the replies, really appreciate them. He has been teething somewhat since 4 months old and still no teeth, but his gums are giving him some serious aggro, and drools so much I have to put a bib on him. So I do hope it is teething which can explain it, the tooth best hurry up and show!

Thankfully he drinks all his bottles, so I should be thankful for that! He also has multi vitamin drops due to previous issues so should be ok - I will keep reminding myself of that when he looks at me gone out!

He today has sucked on the melon pieces and seemed to enjoy them, it may be soothing his gums.

He has antibiotics last week, so I wondered if his tummy was sore and the milk was all he wanted.

Thanks again everybody

I give food 45 mins to an hour after milk. But it could be teething

My son is 3yo now and I don’t remember much in the way of timelines etc, but I do remember this because we were at home in the UK at the time.

At 8mo I cut him down to 3 8oz (I think) bottles of formula per day. I just got a bit sick of it tbh and kind of chucked all the weaning ‘rules’ out of the window. He got a bottle when he woke up and when he went to bed, and one in the middle of the day.

I fed him solids before milk too. I found he was better at feeding himself when he was a bit hungry (we didn’t do ‘baby led weaning’ because I think that’s faddish and daft - I just fed him stuff, sometimes with a spoon, sometimes not). He’s never been very interested in food (except sweets ) so a bottle of milk would tide him over for a few hours and I didn’t want that - I wanted him to eat.

Use your common sense and in two years this will all be a hazy memory

Hi @JessUKUS I know this is an old thread but by any chance can you let me know how things turned out. My 9 month old has been on hunger strike for a month now and I’m desperate for someone to tell me it gets better!!

Hi. Yes. My Son is 14 Months now and eats perfectly fine. He does have periods of not being hungry which goes on and off, but he returns back to normal. He had a few months of not wanting any food, just milk, but he did grow out of that. Still loves milk though! It’s stressful, I know, but don’t worry they seem to grow out of it, unless you think there is something else wrong, weight loss etc xx

@JessUKUS oh thank you!! I only joined mumsnet last night and was hoping I could find a story like this. I’ll try to relax and hope that he grows out of it eventually 😫. He’s basically living on milk, yogurt and fruit. It’s all I can get him to eat x

That’s good, at least he’s having something. My son would also only eat yoghurt and porridge. I just let him, but for other meals, if he wasn’t interested in a spoon, I would leave some boiled veg, potatoes, scrambled egg on his high chair and just let him take what he wants, even if he had 1 or 2 mouthfuls, i wouldn’t force more. My Sons in the 98th centile for height and weight, so his lovely worrying food strikes clearly never effected him. At 9m fortunely, milk is main nutrition so that’s a worry off your shoulders! Good luck x

So glad I found this resurrected thread too, could have written these messages myself. My little lady is 8 months and generally ok with porridge, yoghurt and pureed fruit but not interested in other foods. I give her toast, pancakes, mashed veggies etc and she likes to play with them and squeeze them in her hands but never tries to eat any of it off of her hands, which seems odd to me?!
Glad to know your wee one is doing well OP!

@LittleLadysMama hi. Yeah, very similar here. He doesn't seem to mind the textures in his hands - he will play with food, mash it up etc but never puts it in his mouth. I find it odd too. I expected him to be putting everything in his mouth but it's the complete opposite x