BLW question - Duration of meal...

[angel1976]

Hi,

My 10-month-old son is showing more and more signs of wanting to feed himself. He was weaned with puree but he always gets plenty of finger food and loves feeding himself. Tonight, he got some filled pasta, which he seems to love. A quick question for all your BLW fanatics out there, how long do you let your LO play with the food throw food about feed themselves? It's because my DS seems to get all enthusiastic and eats stuff in the first 10 minutes, then he spends the next 15 minutes throwing things about but if I leave the food on the table, he will start picking bits and pieces to eat again. In the first 10 minutes, I figured he might have eaten about 2-3. But in total, he probably ate about 4-5. But he did have some cheese cracker and one monster munch (courtesy of daddy!) and later some apple crumble for dessert as well.

I would love to do more BLW but I can't face sitting there for 45mins to an hour waiting for him to eat enough. I try to wrap up mealtimes in half an hour... What do you all think? Thanks for any advice!

Ax

I reckon breakfast is 20 mins, lunch and tea 35 mins now DS is nearly a year old. They get faster as they get older. However I think it's a good investment of time and that in our British culture we're too used to having a meal quickly and not savouring it- the rates in obesity might reflect this too (there was some recent research on how fast people eat in relation to their weight).

Soooo I would have thought that your 30 mins was achievable, and if not it would only be 40 mins tops. It's so worth it as it just takes them time especially with new foods to prod, squeeze, squelch, taste, chew and swallow (let alone drop, throw etc!). At some point your DS will want to feed himself, you might as well start now. And really, my DS has never thrown food - he loves it. Do it!

Thanks, that sounds reasonable! I guess my concern really isn't about the time it takes, with BLW, I just don't know how much he has take and am so afraid that if I clear up, he will miss eating more than he should be eating iykwim but I can just see myself sitting there endlessly watching him to see if he will eat or throw the next piece! I just don't have the heart for that. 40 minutes sounds like a good benchmark though, any other suggestions? Thanks MrsJamin! My DS seems to be going through a stage of putting things in his mouth, chewing, spitting it out and repeat ad nauseum (so it's not to do with taste cos he obviously likes it!) to infinity! Please tell me they grow out of this phase eventually as well.