Baby-Led Weaning

 

 

My youngest child is almost 14 months old. He still breastfeeds for the majority of his calories and nutrition each day. He even nurses during the night a few times. He was never interested in baby food and doesn't eat any baby food now. (The only exception to this is the Gerber Puffs that he loves to snack on. These are a great first food for babies! They're easy to pick up and stick to baby's fingers so he doesn't drop them. They melt in the mouth pretty quickly and come in several different flavors.)

 

Zeke had not shown a big interest in any food until a few weeks ago, and I never pushed feeding him. He is interested in the food on my plate, and may or not accept a few bites from me. For the longest time, he would not even pick up bits of food from the table or his own plate!

 

The past few weeks, he has shown much more interest in food. He even accepts food from my fork and has been picking up bites of food from his own plate! He has eliminated a few nursing sessions  during the day and night with a little encouragement from me. This has been the key to getting him a bit more interested in food.

I have been trying to offer him food before he nurses. I never force it, and I don't make him eat a certain amount before I nurse him. I try to read his cues. If I can tell he is opposed to eating at that time, I let him sit in his seat for about three or four minutes. If he hasn't eaten anything, I will take him out of his seat. He may or may not nurse after that.

If he seems interested in eating, I'll leave him in his chair as long as he is still picking up food, playing with it, and is happy. Sometimes, he will sit there for fifteen minutes or so, even if he has only tried five or six bites. Sometimes, he will sit for five minutes and eaten ten or twelve bites. I sit at the table with him, sometimes eating and sometimes just talking to him. I do try to encourage him a bit by saying, "Let's try this carrot," or "These noodles are yummy!"

Some of the foods he has enjoyed eating are corn, peas, carrots, applesauce, small cereal, noodles, rice, toast, and potatoes. I have offered him meat, but he doesn't usually want it.

Cutting out a few nursing sessions wasn't hard, but it also wasn't easy. The first one I cut out was his first-thing-in-the-morning session. I try to put him in his chair with a few bites of whatever we are eating for breakfast, usually pancake or eggs or cereal. I also give him a cup of juice. (We use Motts for Tots, which is already diluted with water and has 40% less sugar than regular juice.) When he gets out of his chair, he has usually forgotten he wanted to nurse.

He nurses around 3-4 times during the day now. He nurses himself to sleep for his two naps, usually around 10:30 or 11 and 3:30 or 4. He also nurses himself to sleep at night. During the day, when he walks over and "assumes position" as my mom calls it, I try to distract him with a book or toy. He loves to be read to, so a book usually does the trick! If he is very persistent and fussy, I may nurse him for a few minutes.

Nighttime nursings are the ones I am having trouble cutting out! He sleeps with my husband and I, and he used to nursing anytime he gets woken up or even just semi-woken up. I'm trying to rub his back or sing him back to sleep, but sometimes he starts screaming! It's so easy to just nurse him back to sleep - it takes just a few minutes of quiet nursing as opposed to several minutes of loud screaming.  I'm trying to remind myself that I will feel much more rested when he sleeps through the night, but it's not easy to remember when he's crying.

I am hopeful that he will continue to try new foods and cut out most of his nursing sessions by himself.