BLW - baby doesn’t like touching food!

[TedTonks]

I have just started weaning my baby and intended to do mainly BLW.

Anyway, baby doesn’t like touching/holding food! I think it’s because it’s slimy/wet/cold. He will have a go if I hold the food for him, and he will eat off a spoon (he also likes holding the spoon himself and trying) but if you give him food to hold he just immediately drops it (on purpose).

do I just keep giving him food to hold until he gets used to the sensation?

Yeah keep trying different textures, and keep going with the spoon, you’d be surprised how quick the learn to spoon feed themselves, I blw twins and by necessity would have to divide my time so used to give them spoons to play with whilst feeding and they just started using them!
try Different textures, temperatures etc

How old is your son? Did he show all signs of readiness?

If you are weaning true BLW put the food in front of him and you eat as normal. He'll naturally want to explore more. The first few weeks hardly any food is eaten but trust the process.
If you want to traditionally wean (spoon feed or purée before moving onto finger food) that's fine but recognise he'll eat more if you put it in his mouth than if he feeds himself so don't compare the two

What worked best for us was putting DS' food - rice, puree, bits of fruit - in little piles on the table of his high chair. Almighty mess (put a mat underneath!) but he started to play with it and then before long was putting it in his mouth and working out what to do that way. Maybe bring things up to room temperature if cold stuff isn't working (I wouldn't want to touch it either!) and as @TrudyProud says, trust in the process - I did a mix of blw and spoon-feeding and between us, and a very messy kitchen, we got there in the end!

Thanks all :) I’ll just keep going - he has all the signs of readiness and is very interested in putting the food in his mouth, just seems a bit picky about touching it haha

i Imagine he would happily hold dry food (like toast) but we’re nowhere near that stage yet

I started teaching him to use a cup from 4 months (because he wouldn’t take a bottle) so maybe that’s why he likes the spoon!

Some babies love BLW. Some (mine!) had no interest at all or don't like it. If it works, give it a go, if it doesn't, just spoon feed, and feeding himself will come in time. When you look at a group of reception kids eating lunch together, you can't tell who was BLW and who was spoon fed!

Baby led means just that, being led by the baby.

As above, just keep giving him access to food. It takes a while for them to get the hang of the whole eating thing.

You can get little net/dummy things that you put something like a chunk of banana into and let them chew. The food mushes through the net so they get the taste of it. Might help as a go between so he knows that it tastes good.

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