Is your baby refusing to eat solids,
or you're just overwhelmed by the amount of information out there.
Well stay tuned, as I share with you,
my fail proof tips that will ensure your baby will eat.
These tips are really practical and quite easy to use.
And they'll ensure that the mealtimes are enjoyable for you and your baby.
Hi, if you're new to my channel, my name's Emma.
I'm a paediatric occupational therapist and mum to two gorgeous children.
So you've decided to start giving your baby solids,
which is a really exciting time,
but you're just not that sure where to start or you've been giving your baby
solids for a few months now and they're just not progressing .Well these tips
are going to help you ensure that your baby will eat some food and make
mealtimes really enjoyable.
The first thing I want to cover is making sure that you have realistic
expectations of what you should be expecting from your Bub in the first few
months of trying solids. So in the first few months, of trying solids,
the aim of each mealtime is that your baby will actually be exploring the food
by touching it, placing it in their mouth.
There isn't a huge focus on swallowing a large quantity of food.
So we're not expecting them to eat a bowl of food. Say,
what we are expecting is in the first few times that you give them solids,
they may only have half a teaspoon of food. And that is totally fine.
And it's actually really successful.
So just take the stress off yourself and your Bub during these mealtimes in the
first few months and know that all you're wanting to do is get your baby to be
happy, exploring, and touching, smelling, and looking at food.
You don't need to be stressed if your baby's not eating a large quantity of
food, because in the first 12 months of their life,
they get most of their nutrition from breast milk or formula.
After 12 months of age is when you'd be expecting them to primarily get all
their nutrition through meal times that they have with their family.
So eating solid meals with the family.
So now that we've got a realistic expectation of what we are expecting our Bubs
to do when they're eating solids,
the next thing I want to talk to you about is timing of having solids.
So generally, initially you'll only give them one solid meal a day. Um,
and generally it's recommended that you give it to them after a breastfeed.
Now I know you'll be thinking, but they're not going to be hungry.
But when a baby is really hungry,
they're going to be really cranky and want to have the breast milk or the
formula milk.
And that's because they know that that's very easy and it solves their hunger
problems straight away.
After breast milk they're going to be more likely to be quite happy to sit at
the high chair and explore food.
And there is going to be enough room in their tummy for them to have a small
amount of food, which is perfect. After about nine months,
that's when you swap that the baby will have solids prior to a breast milk or
formula milk.
And that's because they're increasing the amount of solids that they will be
eating. So in the first few months when you're introducing solids,
make sure you do it when your baby's quite happy,
which is generally after a formula feed or a breastfeed.
My next tip is to use a highchair, I know this is kind of common sense,
but sometimes people will feed their baby holding them in their arms because the
baby's nice and calm. But when you're spoon feeding your baby in your arms,
they aren't actually able to see the food or look at it or smell or touch the
food, which is really important when they're learning to eat.
The other thing is that they can't actually see you and during mealtimes
your,
the person that's going to show them that food's okay and not a scary thing,
and that you're going to show them how to actually eat the food.
So they need to be able to see you. So first tip is to use a high chair.
Now that leads me into my second tip,
which is that we need to make sure that when they're seated in the highchair,
they're supported posturally. So kids at this age generally have the ability.
So at six months, I'm talking about. They have the ability to sit upright,
but they might only be able to hold it for a few minutes or they'll use their
arms and prop themselves on the tray.
This means that they can't actually use their arms to play with the food because
they're so busy trying to sit upright, or if they are in the high chair,
they start to fall to the side,
which then means that the head is not in the middle of their body,
which means it's really hard for them to eat food and swallow it.
So we want them to be sitting nice and straight in the highchair and be
supported as possible. So that they're actually focusing on the skill of eating,
which in itself is really difficult rather than skill of sitting upright.
My next tip is to turn off all distractions in the room that you're feeding your
baby, the solids. So if you've got music on or the TV on,
or you've got really busy family around in the kitchen,
which is quite distracting for your baby,
try and have it so that you can turn off the TV, turn off the music and that,
um, if any other family members around they're sitting at the table too,
because they can socially model to the child, how to eat the food.
Mealtimes themselves are extremely difficult for babies.
And you know,
now that your baby is really highly distracted by any noise or by
any visual distractions.
So turning off all distractions will mean that your baby can focus on mealtimes
and ensure that that experience is quite enjoyable and pleasant.
If you're playing a TV and you're just, spoon feeding your baby,
then they actually, aren't focusing on the skill of eating.
They're just kind of in their own little world.
And they're not even thinking about opening or closing their mouth or what
they're swallowing or even looking at the food.
It's kind of an automatic process.
So they're not actually engaged in that mealtime.
So generally I wouldn't recommend having the TV on when you're feeding your
baby as attraction for them to look at.
We want them focusing on the activity itself.
The next tip is embrace the mess.
Now I know this is very hard for lots of parents.
My husband finds it extremely difficult,
and that is mealtimes themselves in the first few months,
even up to the first year.
And when you give your baby spoons at 12 months of age gets even messier,
but they're generally really messy experiences.
So we do want your baby to touch the food. We do want them to look at it.
We want them to play with it.
We want it to accidentally touch the food and then they might put it in their
mouth and swallow the food.
All these steps are really good in helping the baby kind of go, Oh,
that's what it might feel like.
This is what the food feels like when it's in my hand,
that might be what it feels like in my mouth.
And as the food textures get more complicated,
they will generally touch the food first. And then they'll know that, Oh,
maybe I need to mush the food a bit more when it's in my mouth. Well,
I recommend that when you're introducing solids to your baby,
I would actually smear some of the food on a tray,
or if you're using a high chair that, that goes straight to the dining table,
put some on the dining table and then I would show your baby how to actually
play with the food. So I would start putting my fingers in the food,
banging It around, and then your baby will actually copy.
We want them to touch and play with the food.
It prepares them for what's going to come and makes it so that it's not so
scary for them. And mealtimes themselves,
eating food is actually really, really complicated task.
There's actually 32 steps to eating.
So one of the first step is looking at it and smelling the food,
and then interacting with your hands and then slowly getting it to your mouth.
So placing the food on the tray, gets them to look at it, smell it,
then they interact with their hands.
And then that actually accidentally put it in their mouth,
which is all great steps when you're learning to eat solids.
Now if your like my husband and you find this extremely difficult.
You might want to put your baby in a paint smock. They're really cool.
You can get little baby ones at the moment, which is fantastic.
So you just put those smock on that way,
their clothes won't get all dirty and you'll be more than happy for them to play
with the food.
The other thing is that you might want to put something on the ground and that's
just something that's wipeable.
So I use a mat that you can paint on and I just put that on the ground and then
you can wipe it afterwards. So then everything is clean after eating.
Now, the other thing that I know you'll find very,
very difficult is that I don't actually recommend that when your baby's eating
solids,
you use the spoon and scrape the food from their chin after every
spoonful.
And that is because if I did this to you and you've got a spoon and scraped it
up, your chin, you would probably shudder. Um,
and you would also think that's not a very nice feeling.
So we want mealtimes to be enjoyable for your baby,
which means we don't wipe their mouth until the end of the meal.
So at the end of the meal,
I would generally get a wet face washer and I would wipe across their face.
And that's, um, to ensure that they don't get turned off eating by me,
constantly scraping their chin. Now,
if your baby's one who likes to hold a spoon while eating or keeps trying to
grab your spoon, when you're trying to put the food in their mouth,
one way to kind of avoid that is to give them their own spoon to hold.
And then you use another spoon to feed them. If grab your spoon,
then you just keep changing spoons.
So you use one spoon place that's been in their mouth.
Your baby will grab that spoon.
And then you grab the spoon they're holding and then load that one up and keep
placing in their mouth. It makes sure that mealtimes continue to progress.
And it stops your baby trying to grab the spoon,
which then avoids a lot more unnecessary mess.
The other thing I recommend is that you actually sit directly in front of your
baby when you're spoon feeding them or feeding them in general.
And that is because babies learn through us as adults.
So they learn what to do with the food by watching us,
which is what they've done the first six months of their life when they watched
us eat. But when you're presenting new food to them,
they're kind of relying on you to show them that the food isn't something to be
scared of. You're interacting with the food yourself.
So you'll be playing with the food.
The other thing is that when you're sitting directly in front of them,
if you're spoon feeding your baby it ensures that you bring the spoon level to
their mouth. So if you're standing up when you're feeding your baby.
So if they're in a high chair with a tray and you're standing up,
you'll generally come with the spoon like this, which then means your baby,
doesn't get to see the food.
It also means that when you place it in their mouth and they close their lips,
you will actually bring the spoon up and scrape it off the top of their mouth.
Like in this video.
What I'm wanting is that we want them to work on the actual
skill of closing their lips when the spoon comes in to their mouth.
And that's because that's a really important skill to clear food off a spoon or
to chew food. You firstly need to be able to close those lips.
So when you bringing a spoon to their mouth, you want to make sure it's level,
and then you bring it in.
And what you do is when you bring the spoon to their mouth, you go, ah,
and your baby will automatically copy and they will go, ah,
and then you put the spoon in their mouth and then you go out and my mum, mum,
mum, mum, and remove the spoon as your baby copies that movement and goes,
mum, mum, mum,
and clears the spoon from their mouth which then clears the food off
the spoon.
So sitting directly in front of them means that you will ensures that you will
keep that spoon level and ensures that your baby's working on that lip seal.
Just a quick word on spoons.
When you're going to look at using a spoon for your baby in the first
few months,
I'd actually recommend getting spoons that are quite shallow in their bowl.
And that is because when your baby's working on that lip closure to remove the
food, they don't actually need,
to use a significant amount of lip closure to clear the food off the spoon.
It will be quite easy for them to clear the food off the spoon,
which ensures that they get success in that food is in their mouth.
If you use a spoon with a really deep bowl like this one, um,
it's actually really hard for them to clear the food off the spoon because they
have to use such force and such, um,
significant lip closure to clear that food off the spoon.
So shallow spoons are the best, when you're first starting out with your bub.
So that's it Mums and Dads, I've shared with you, my fail proof tips,
which will make mealtimes more enjoyable for your Bub and ensure they have
success.
If you're wanting to work out what your child's developmental milestones should
be at six months,
click on this video and I'll explain what you should be expecting for your Bub
at six months of age. Thanks for tuning in.
I hope you found the information helpful. If you've liked it,
hit that like button. Be sure to subscribe,
hit the bell to be notified when I release a new video every week.
Feel free to share this video with any other parents who might be thinking about
introducing solids to their baby or struggling with introducing their solids to
their baby. Tune in next week, as I talk about more parenting tips and tricks,
which will make your life as parents easier and give your child the best,
start to life.