When did you feed your baby solids?

[smkiya]

DS is 5.5 months old, and we introduced rice cereal into his diet a month ago at the doctor's request. He is very small for his age less than 5th percentile. He tries to take water bottles and food from me, and smacks his gums whenever I eat while holding him.

My question is, how did you introduce baby food and at what age? What did you progress to after rice cereal? How often did you give them these solids? Right now I give him the rice cereal once, maybe twice per day. I breastfeed, but he also takes formula from dh when I'm not around. Sometimes I'll give him a bottle to help fatten him up. TIA!

 

[justhat]

With my first I started cereal at 6 months, did rice for a week, then oatmeal, then the mixed grain. Then I started carrots, peas, sweet potatoes, etc. Each one for a week at a time. We did cereal once per day, then the fruit/veggie once per day in addition.

With my 2nd I started the cereal at 5 months and followed the same progression. With him, however, I didn't need to wait a full week between foods. My daughter was a bit sensitive so we did a week to be sure there were no reactions, but my son didn't have this issue so I think we only had to wait 3-4 days for each food. He also liked eating a lot more than my daughter so he got the fruit/veggies twice a day, along with the cereal in the morning.

 

[harleyquinn]

Hi!
I've been doing some research on the topic. I don't plan on starting until 6 months. All you need to do is goggle 'introducing solids' and you'll get tons of great info from professionals.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

I nursed my kids and for all but DS's pediatrician, the docs were fine with a delayed introduction.

With my first I made everything including the cereal. She began eating at about 6 months and the next 4 months was spent learning. At about 10 months or so we begin doing "meals" as a replacement for a nursing as a meal.

The second was the same way--except I didn't bother making the cereal.

The third was the same--except his pediatrician kept bug bug bugging me about it.

All ate regular foods prepared so that they could eat them.

There are some excellent baby food books (or you can google baby food introduction and get some suggestions) so that you can find out what foods are safest to introduce at particular ages.

From what I can recall--good first foods are:
mashed banana, avocado, sweet potato, apple or pear sauce

Meats in a jar gross out most people-my kids just ate regular meat when they were ready. For my oldest--that was about age 2 and only chicken. She refused red meat until about age 4 or 5. Her doctor was a vegetarian and didn't mind at all

For my others, it was younger.

When you introduce foods, it is one at a time--and often you have to offer the food 10 different times (either once or twice a day until you have 10 offers) to know for sure if baby doesn't like it or simply is reacting to the act of learning to eat something new. It was funny--my oldest HATED green beans and her disdain for that did not change one bit. But most other foods she would eventually eat in baby food form.


Anyway, do some googling and you'll get some great tips and if you have some baby books, it might have info in those. We used to do Publix Baby club and we would always get mail with different things about baby's development and I think we got something about introduction of solids that had a nice chart.

The baby food websites might even have something similar. (Gerber, Beechnut, Earth's Best, etc.)

 

[JoiseyMom]

We started solids at 6 months..first with cereal then fruits bananas, apples, then orange fruits and veggies. Also 1 new food for a few days to watch for allergies. We also went with organics...

 

[smkiya]

Thanks everyone for the replies. I did google, but there's nothing like hearing about what 'real moms' do/did. I would have probably waited until 6 months, but his doctor thought he was ok at almost 5 months to start, to help increase his caloric intake. I think I started dd at 6 months, but that was a few years ago and my memory is fading.

 

[golfgal]

Our oldest was 5 months our twins were 4 months. We started on rice cereal and then veges with fruit last. We were told that if you give them fruit before veges that they might not take the veges because the sweetness of the fruit tastes better. I took my cues from them and how hungry they seemed. We started our oldest when he started waking up in the middle of the night hungry. Our twins we started because our pediatrician said it was ok and to give me a break from feeding them (I nursed them mostly). The twins were totally self feeding by 9 months and our oldest was around a year.

We would introduce something new each week to make sure no allergies.

 

[harleyquinn]

Thanks everyone for the replies. I did google, but there's nothing like hearing about what 'real moms' do/did. I would have probably waited until 6 months, but his doctor thought he was ok at almost 5 months to start, to help increase his caloric intake. I think I started dd at 6 months, but that was a few years ago and my memory is fading.

Sorry, I didn't mean to be unhelpful! I got distracted. I wanted to post some of what I read there and on the New Moms thread here, but I see you're getting tons of responses now.

 

[DISNEY1975]

I have 3 kids, 18, 15 and 5!

All were monster children, two oldest weighing 10.2 lbs at birth and my 5 year old weighing 8.3. I started cereal at 4 months, then onto the baby fruits and veggies at 6 months. As I remember, the jars of gerber, and Im sure all the others, had "stages" written on them. Once your child seems to be inhaling the stage 1, it is probably time to move to stage 2 etc..

One thing I do suggest, start with banana, peas, carrots etc. Once your baby gets a taste of the apples, sweet potato, peaches, pears and all the other sweet stuff, it will be hard to get him.her to eat the meat/rice/carrot non-sweet ones.

Let me just say my 18 year old raided my 5 year olds Halloween bag this year...and my 5 year old didnt care too much.

Live and learn!!!

 

[Nette]

We started with sweet potato baby food at about 5.5 months. Boy did the daycare hate me when I refused to give them cereal at 4 months to feed her. I really didn't give her much cereal at all. I think we bought one box in her whole life (she's 7 now). We also only bought baby food for about 1 month. She really preferred real people food cut into tiny pieces. Canned veggies (watch the salt) cold were her favorites. I think by the time they're 6 months or so they really are able to gum most stuff.

Good luck! It's always fun to try a new food... especially Lemons. (yes, I'm mean like that - But DD loves lemons now.)

 

[SDFgirl]

I started my younger DD on rice cereal at about 5 months. At first I only fed her the rice cereal at one meal per day, just to get her used to it. Gradually I added more feedings until she was eating rice cereal 3 times per day - roughly around breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Once she did that for a few days, I started adding veggies. Started with squash, then sweet potatoes, then peas, green beans, bananas, and pears.

I never did the thing where you wait three days with each new food to look for possible allergic reactions. I feed her a new food each day, mixed in with things she's already tried.

She's 5.5 months now and this is her schedule:

7:30am - Breakfast: nurse, cereal, and a fruit (about half a container is what she usually eats)
11:30am - Lunch: nurse, cereal, veggie
3:30pm - Dinner: nurse, cereal, veggie and fruit
7:30pm - Nurse only and bedtime

Hope that helps!

 

[waltskids]

6 months- DD will start solids next month. With DS we started with banana, sweet potato, veggies etc. Never did rice cereal at all. We also start plain whole milk yogurt at this age too. Also at 6 months we began what our dr. called 'cheerio therapy'. We would break a cheerio in half and allow DS to move it around his mouth. He soon began eating whole cheerios and then moved on to finger foods rather quickly (soft ones of course). This also allowed him to practice his pincher grasp. The textures never bothered him and we never did baby food, just mashed up food that was too solid for him or we would cut it into small pieces. By 10 months he ate what we ate, with the exception of some food that would be considered unsafe or a choking hazard.

 

[Calliaz]

One of the first solids I used was avocado. It's bland and very nutritious. Perfect for adding weight and a low allergen risk.

You might want to read Super Baby Food. I got some good information there.

http://www.superbabyfood.com/

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

Also--I know many of us mentioned regular foods as opposed to jarred food. It isn't as difficult as it seems.

I had a baby food grinder for the beginning.

 

[DMickey28]

My DS started cereal in his bottle by the time he was 3 months old, with the peds backing.

He was 8lbs 13oz at birth and at his 4 week check up was 13lbs 13oz, 16lbs 12oz at 2 months and 20lbs 12oz at 3 months. He has always been over 100% on the charts from that first month visit. I breastfeed exclusively until 8 weeks and just couldn't handle it anymore so we started supplementing with formula at night only. Then when that wasn't enough we started with cereal.

I didn't start feeding him until he was about 5.5 months old.

 

[MomNeedsVacay]

Mine never liked cereals,so I tried them but quickly moved on to Stage 1 fruits and veggies!

 

[Piecey]

I gave Lucas carrots around 5 months. I've read online it's usually acceptable to introduce it at 4 months, but I waited until 5.

He's now had apples and peas... introduced on seperate weeks.
He doesn't really like cereal so we don't do much of it. I might start putting it in his bottles, though. He's just not happy on formula.

Lucas is 83rd percentile, though.

 

[puffkin]

Wow, we started super early compared to you guys!

I started DS on rice at 10 weeks. He was maxing out on formula(36 oz a day) and still hungry, so ped said if he would take it off a spoon to go ahead with cereal. It took us a few days to find the right consistencyn (thicker than you would think), but then he took it off the spoon with no issues! I never fed cereal through the bottle though and he was always a very clean eater. Not a lot of spitting it out and he NEVER EVER spit up.

We started veggies at 3 months and moved on to fruits at 4. He was eating people food by about 6 months. We always waited 3 days before introducing a new food. He also liked that disgusting jarred meat

DS has always been at the top of the charts for height and about 80 for weight, so he is a big boy! He also is a superb eater, and will eat just about anything! DS has always seemed a lot older than his age though and We have never had ANY issues with him eating or sleeping....its just his listening that sometimes gives us problems

 

[FormrCastMbr]

I did cereal in the bottle early on...maybe eight weeks. Then around 4 months started rice cereal and then green beans, peas, carrots, apples, etc.

I made alot of it...very easy with the food processor.

He is eight months now and has 2 - 3 feedings a day. Now he has some juice, cheerios, yogurt, cheese (cottage and mozz), banana, pasta.

He has also been big from the start and required more food. He is already 23.5 #s.

 

[Calliaz]

Everyone makes their own choices, but unless there is a good medical reason for introducing cereal early, I would not do it. The scientific evidence shows that introducing cereal early can cause diabetes and some postulate that in the bottle it can increase the risk of obesity. I am sure the truth is somewhere in the middle, but I wouldn't do it unless absolutely necessary.

See:

"Throughout most of human history children were exclusively breast fed for the early months. During the previous generation or two, when bottle-feeding became very popular, rice cereal was often put into the bottle at a very early age. What were the results?

Most children seemed to thrive. A small number of children, though, did not tolerate the addition, because their sucking and swallowing actions were not yet fully coordinated. They inhaled small amounts of the rice cereal into their lungs, which led to pulmonary problems.

I’m much more concerned about a subtler issue. Babies are born with a wonderful mechanism for knowing how much food they need. During the early months, they take their cues from the volume of what they drink. Adding cereal derails this mechanism. It forces them to take in deceptively large amounts of calories. It teaches them to overeat.

By starting with a spoon, resting between bites, and stopping when your child lets you know he’s full, you will be laying an excellent foundation for good eating habits throughout his life.

A major study looking for the causes of obesity found that short-circuiting young children’s self-regulation of how much they eat is a major cause of later obesity.1 Cereal in the bottle does just that.

Babies that are fed this way may appear to be unaffected – but those few weeks of added convenience may result in a lifetime of struggles with weight. This common practice may have contributed to our being the most obese generation in history." http://www.drgreene.com/21_861.html

and

"Two new studies in the latest Journal of the American Medical Association show a link between diabetes risk and a baby's age when cereal is introduced into the diet." http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/09/30/earlyshow/contributors/emilysenay/main575958.shtml

I say this even though I did introduce rice cereal briefly for reflux at 4 months (until I switched to a non-nutritive thickener).