Food strike!!

Ayja is now about 10 months old - she has always been a Breastfed girl - even though the bottle was introduced at 12 weeks old. You all know that she has never ever taken it well only drinking about 30 mls each time if we are lucky. have tried various teats, bottles formulas, expressed etc - no luck.

Anyway, because she was happy to be breastfed forever - she wasn't interested in solids until about 6 months, which was fine too.

But heres the thing, she is now going on a food strike - if you try to feed her any thing she will spit it out, shake her head "no" and if you still persist in trying, she will hit the spoon out of your hands. It isn't a silly thing - she really genuinely DOES NOT LIKE being spoonfed. even her most favourite things like vanilla custard desert etc do not get more than 2 - 3 spoonfuls into her. She only has a breastfeed before sleep times really now, so it's not that she is full.

Anyway, i have tried moving her up to mashed foods with lumps and those she flat out refuses and hates as well - so I have started giving her finger foods, and she is really good with them, as long as she can feed herself she will eat anything - with her hands.. spoon mastery is a bit beyond her just yet. I am not too happy about the eating with hands thing for things like rice etc. but right now that is the only way to get her to eat, and she likes it.

Does anyone have any suggestions for foods that would be right for her that she could feed herself, which still mean she gets a good amount of nutrition. especially dinner time foods - i mean toast and fruit for brekkie is fine, sammies and fruit and cracker etc for lunch is fine - but dinner time foods i just cannot think of anything that isn't going to make a heck of alot of mess. even the cleanest foods she has always found a way to smear in her ears eyes, up her nose and through her hair and she will scream the house down every time you clean her up no matter how gentle you are. - see exhibit A below - the result of me spoonfeeding her 2 spoonfuls of yogurt, she spat out, smeared on her hands because she was blocking me giving her another spoonful and then smeared all over her face!! I am in no way complaining, i guess she's just really quite a head-strong fiery little girl.

Paris always let me at least feed her some veges or something up until she was about 1 and a half so i always knew she was getting some food, even if she didn't eat the finger food.

any help or suggestions would be great. I sometimes feel it's just too early for me to leave it up to her with the eating thing.

End of novel (whew it's been a while since i wrote a decent one!)



Yogurt anyone?

Edited by mum2paris

lol - we give her those but she only really sucks on them - yes i forgot to mention, she has NO TEETH. just like Paris - who never got them till 2 weeks before her 1st birthday.

Jake loves that battered and crumbed hoki from Pak N Save. He eats fish fingers sans batter.
When i was little i LOVED frozen peas...didn't like them cooked though.
Jake is a mucky eater too. I run the bath as he's eating and he goes straight from his high chair to the bath.   Have you tried both having a spoon? She feeds a little and you shovel it in while she's trying to master the spoon?

I do the double spoon thing with Josiah at the moment... he's busy banging his spoon on the highchair tray, or something like that, and I pop a mouthful in while he's not looking.

not the best solution, but I saw Dr Phil (tragic I know) ages ago. They had a child on there that refused to eat "good" food, only cheese, chips and lollies etc. As dr phil pointed out, he will not let himself starve. This may be harder to do with a younger one though.

would still welcome other finger food suggestions though.

I'm pretty sure I posted about the same age when Hannah decided completely out of the blue that there was no way that I was going to fee her any more. She just refused to eat if I put it in her mouth. (She's still like that now actually!)

I just had to let her go for it herself. She doesn't seem to be as 'creative' with food as Ayja is but mess can be cleaned! (Well... not on carpet I suppose)

If you are worried about Ayja refusing to eat with a spoon, or knife and fork later on. Don't worry about it... there are ways to deal with that later.

And uhmmm... as far as things to eat with her fingers... I used to sautee grated carrot and zucchini with a little bit of butter and chopped garlic (ah yeah, not so healthy. it was from a baby book but one about 20 years old! hehe). I think I eat more of that than Han does. But beware of the orange tinge that follows eating something like that. I swear Hannah is slightly pumpkinish for atleast 2 days after.

lolhahahaha thats what i was thing too