Switching from bottle to solids

[anonymous]

Hi everyone!

I wish I could join, but I currently can't access my email so I hope you don't mind the annonymous......

Anyway, I have a ten month old who looooves his bottles. We have no problem getting him to take 30 oz. a day which I am happy about since he needs the calories. My problem is switching him to solids. He will not eat Cheerios, and isn't too crazy about solid food. I guess my question is, since CFers need so many more calories and formula has more, how did you make the transition? What times did you do bottles and food? Right now we do four 8 oz. bottles, and try for lunch and dinner with baby food, but he just doesn't seem too interested. My goal was by age one to have him eating all regular food, but he barely even eats the baby food and I am just always so stressed with the calories. Any advice would be GREAT!

Thanks,
Carrie
mom to Sam

 

[anonymous]

Hi have you tried blending up the solids you tried to give him in a blender until he get ues to the taste than try the regular way once he get the taste of it in his system. For baby food non of my children took to it at all. Someone once told me to try mixing the baby food up with the baby fruit to see if that works.

T.T

 

[damiensmom]

I wish i could help but im having the same problem

 

[anonymous]

Carrie,
Try not to stress!! I am sure you are doing a great job. What I ended up learning was that as a mom I could only present healthy, high calories foods at appropriate times. Actually eating the foods and how much went down was my children's responsibility. If I got anxious or upset about how much they ate then it only made problems worse. Kids want control and if they don't get it they tend to back off eating.

A great book for you to read is "Child of Mine" by Ellyn Satter. You can get it from Amazon.com:

<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0923521518/sr=8-1/qid=1156809289/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-5797292-3299245?ie=UTF8
">http://www.amazon.com/gp/produ...97292-3299245?ie=UTF8
</a>
It really helped me understand how to properly feed and encourage my 2nd child (also with cf). I was not going to make the same mistakes again. My first child. Sophia, was diagnosed with cf at one month has always had a lot of problems eating. It started with a severe, undiagnosed milk allergy. She was on a feeding tube for 3 months as an infant because she refused to eat. Anyway, she started to take her bottles at 7 months old when we switched formulas. After that I was very controlling of what and how much she ate. Big mistake. I also listened to the dieticians (often clueless on how to actually feed a child) and had the impression that it was my job to "get down 1200 calories."

The book really helped me get my son to be a really good eater. Also, I was determined to feed him like a child without cf. If he didn't eat, fine, he would eat later. And he did, he often would eat a lot later. After all that is what my friend's did with their kids and their kids ate well. I still have to feed my five-year-old daughter most of the time. My son can shove his dinner down in 5 minutes, but my daughter is still waiting for me to feed her first bite.

I also think that transitioning from baby food to cut up fruits, veggies, and meats is the way to go by the end of their first year. The earlier they learn to feed themselves the better. It might be hard to watch since it seems like they don't much in and their weight might not be so great for a few months. But in the end they will eat better down the road and the weight can come on then.

A great way to transition from the bottle is the Nuby cup. I got them at Walmart or Right Start. Here is a picture:

<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.netkidswear.com/12oznunogrcu.html
">http://www.netkidswear.com/12oznunogrcu.html
</a>
Sharon, mom of Sophia, 5 and Jack, 3 both with cf

 

[folione]

Let me just second the suggestion that you just start offering everything you can think of but not let yourself get stressed & obsessed with transitioning away from a bottle of milk. I think all of us parents of CF tots know what you mean about the concern about getting enough calories: there were definitely days when I was very frustrated about my son's food development and wished I could just do what my mother did with me: leave me a plate of food and tell me to eat it or go hungry.

Obviously that was not something I'd do with my boy so I eventually just made peace with the idea of letting him have as much milk as he wanted until he decided it was time to change. He turned 3 last April and still drinks 16-24 oz a day of blended yogurt smoothie + whole milk + half/half. He is a picky eater but along the way from 1 to 3 has been a big fan of scrambled eggs, cheese omlettes, "pirate booty" (wierd puffed rice product), sunflower seeds, french fries, etc. - but never was much of a fan of packaged baby foods and still won't touch fresh fruit or vegetables. But he's healthy and happy and somewhere around the 50% mark on the weight chart.

 

[amber682]

I could have written that myself 6 mos. ago! My son was the same way, and he never really liked any baby food I had to spoon feed him. Instead of trying to get him to eat meals when we did, I just waited until he was hungry and wanting formula, then tried giving him some finger-foods first. Try not to get to stressed about the little amount they eat, I heard their stomachs are only about the size of their fist. Then once he was done picking at the food, I'd give him his formula. That way he didn't fill up on formula. He drank about the same amount your son does a day. At a year his nutritionist switched him from formula to pediasure instead of milk. That eases my mind because if he's having a really picky day I know he's still getting enough nutrition. Eventually he started eating more food, but still drinks about 20-30 oz. pediasure, and over the last couple months I've been able to get him on more of a three meals a day, 2 snacks routine. Also, I could try giving him a food like ten times and he wouldn't touch it, then all of a sudden, one day he'd eat it. I read it can take 10-15 tries to get them to like a food. Eventually it got easier, but he still would happily live off of pediasure, rice, and cheetos if I'd let him! Sometimes I'd have to let him feed some to me so he'd try it, or I'd make a big deal about,"Mmmm, look how good this food is, it's so yummy. Here try a bite!"

I hope this helps a little, I know how frustrating it can be. Like I said, I was in the same situation a few months back. He still has his picky about food days, like last week when all he would eat of his supper one night was green beans, but he'll atleast eat some of his three meals a day now. And it helps Vinny if everyone is sitting at the table together all eating (especially Daddy, he loves to copy everything he does). <img src="i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif" border="0">

 

[Ratatosk]

DS had texture issues and his food had to be smooooooth. Any chunks like ground meat or toast and he'd gag like he had a hair ball. At daycare, they just ground up whatever everyone else was having and he'd eat that. Home is a different issue all together. So we'd either have to grind up his food very very finely or give him stuff that slid down easily -- yogurt, stage 2 foods doctored with butter, salt..., spagettios. He did like mandarin orange slices though, but they probably slid down easily. We also kept him on formula until he was about a year and a half old because he was such a finicky eater. I'd given away all his sippy cups and either used bottles or cups with a straw because he hated the sippy.