9 month old not interested in solids

[medin]

Hi! We started giving food from 6 months and now he is 9 month and not interested in food at all. Not even bananas. I give him finger foods also tried purée. He just puts in mouth for a taste and than throw from the table. Im breastfeeding but it seems like he olny wants that. Tried giving food before after milk. Doesn’t make difference. He is very fussy at the table, i feel so stressed at eating times. He has low level of iron and have to take supplements. So doctors always tell me how important for him to eat. But i don’t want to force him. Any advice? Or you have similar experiences?

Do you offer breast milk at every meal time? To be honest I'd be stopping the BF so that he has no choice

I try first offer him food and after milk. But as he is hungry he just scream by the table. If i stop bf im afraid he will scream all the time. As he is very sensitive to everything…

It sounds to me like he thinks solids are for play and milk is for eating. It's like he has a playtime before a feed? It's not about forcing, it's about being persistent so that he recognises that this is also for eating. Perhaps you could give him foods that you eat too, so he has a good role model and you eat together. You have a bit of banana, bread or a spoonful of apple puree and make 'yummy' noises and he is likely to copy you.

You can't just stop breastfeeding a child under one, unless you switch to formula. Which is fine, but wouldn't give him "no choice" either.

Do you eat with him OP? With DD, I'd make myself a plate of finger food for lunch (sliced toast, cheese slices, apple slices etc), sit down on a blanket with her and eat it slowly. She'd crawl over to see what I was doing and would pick bits up to eat herself. It wasn't ideal but she was also a reluctant eater and at first it was the only way she ate anything.

It sounds like baby thinks it's a game. Fed him at the same times you eat and just leave him to it and eat yours. Maybe even eat a couple of bits that are in front of him. Eventually he will realise that food is for eating. I also wouldn't offer food when he's starving , it will just get everyone stressed.

Carry on breastfeeding, it's very nutritious for them particularly when they aren't eating many solids. It's more with formula that it's important that they move off it by a certain age. Keep offering food in various forms, smooth/lumpy/solid, with spoon feeding, with self feeding. Model eating being a happy, enjoyable and calm thing to do, try not to stress or put expectations on baby - I know this is hard to do, especially when people around you are anxious that they should be eating more. You cannot force feed them or trick them into eating, so the main thing is to try and keep emotion out of it and trust that they will eat when they are ready. Maybe prioritise the iron rich stuff so that even if he eats a little bit, it's beneficial.

DS1 was like this and only really ate tiny mouthfuls of stuff until he was 22 months when suddenly he would just eat. I don't know what made him start eating. I had tried everything at that point, but nothing specifically different at that time.

IME restricting breastfeeding doesn't help them eat more and you'd be depriving him of the nutrition he's getting from it. At 9 months, eating should be a sensory/exploratory experience, some babies will be eating to satiate hunger, but it's a supplement to milk at that age rather than replacing it unless they happen to be really keen.

Thanks for advices, we eat all the time together. I also have 3 year old and we did blw exclusively. It was just fine and eating perfectly. But with younger one just nothing works 😣. For first months i wasn’t concerned but at month 9 i think he should start eating

Milk is the main nutrition until one so definitely don’t reduce the milk at all! Terrible advice from PP.

Lots of babies take a while to get a grip witn food, I know a few who weren’t really eating until 12-13 months. Keep offering a range of proper foods to try and explore, it’s as much about getting used to textures and tastes as eating. How’s the poos? If they look like solids are going in he’s probably eating more than you realise. But you’d got a while yet before you need to worry.

You've probably tried this already, but have you given him food earlier? Or given him a bit breastmilk first so he's not very hungry? Or even expressing some of your milk to put into a puree so it's not a completely new flavour.

Are you feeding him a lot at night? I'd try night weaning and see if he's hungrier during the day.

I think you have a bit more time to relax and wait. They say "food is for fun until they're one" which is a bit simplistic, but since you're already offering food regularly and especially since he's already having iron supplements you can probably chill about the actual amounts eaten for another couple of months.

Is he eating literally nothing or do you just think he spits out a lot? I think it's quite common at this age for them to spit out a lot as it's how they work out what lumps are OK for them to eat and which are too big to handle. But that doesn't necessarily mean they aren't swallowing anything.

Nappies is a good point -you can often tell whether something is going in by seeing what comes out!

@Connie2468 it’s not recommended to night wean deliberately before 12 months, if they’re waking for milk it’s because they need it

Lots of people recommend to night wean before 12 months. Most babies don't need milk in the night by 9 months.

I think that might be true for bottle feeding where you can be sure how much they are having in the day, but most breastfeeding experts don't recommend night weaning before a year.

@Connie2468 I don’t know who’s recommending that but it’s not evidence based.

I'm sure there are as many opinions as there are 'experts'

I think you’re putting a bit too much pressure on OP. Breastfeeding doesn’t provide everything a baby needs past 6 months - OP’s son in anaemic, so being able to take iron from some high quality food sources will be better than the supplements. Breastfeeding is also a poor source of vitamin D. It’s much better to get vitamins from fresh and natural food than synthetic supplements.

I wouldn’t stop breastfeeding OP as baby still needs it until at least 1 - but I would probably make sure the meal is a couple of hours minimum after the last feed, so he’s not too full. Can you eat with him so he sees what the ‘point’ of it is? I would also start again with milky, easy to swallow food, like baby rice, porridge etc.

One thing that helped us was DH getting them up and taking them downstairs for breakfast. It meant I had some time to have a shower in peace, they got some time with their Dad and if they were hungry, food was the only thing available.

Could you try that tomorrow @medin?

Hi OP,
have you seen any improvement over the past month?
my DD is BF and not eating much at 9 months, just little bits.

@medin interested to know how this ended our little boy is struggling to take to solids. Becoming distressed in the highchair and seems uninterested. Feeling incredibly stressed out and really out of ideas x tried playing with milk times/sitting on lap, eating same meals role modelling it feels insane x