My baby is not interested in solids

Carrie Lauth:  Hello there this is Carrie Lauth of www.naturalbabyworld.com with your natural baby tip of the week.  This was sent in by a visitor to my website she wants to know:  my eight month old baby is just not interested in solid foods what should I do?  Is this a problem?  

This is what I wanted to say to this mommy.  Relax mommy!  There are several things that could be going on with your baby.  #1: if your baby is breast fed it’s quite likely that he’s just very content getting momma’s milk and doesn’t see a need for anything else.  Interesting enough starting solid foods for some babies has more to do with a developmental milestone or a social thing.  Some babies are very aware that mommy and daddy are doing something that their not able to do and when they are about four months old they might start reaching for your fork just like they reach for the paper in your hand, toothbrush or pencil or what have you. 

They are just aware that something is going on and they want to participate.  It doesn’t necessarily mean that they are ready to start solid foods.  It’s best to wait until baby is about six months old but if your baby is older and not really showing much interest in solid food for instance if after feeding or attempting to feed your baby, he or she makes a face, spits the food out, thrust out that tongue, just doesn’t show much interest doesn’t grab the spoon or route for more, there could be several things going on.  Number one - your baby just may not be that interested and that’s perfectly fine it doesn’t mean anything is wrong.  Number two - if you have a family history of food allergy some babies will actually as a protective mechanism not show much interest in solids and that’s actually a good thing. 

Some babies who are breast feeding can go even a year without eating much solids and I’ve known babies that have even went longer than that – about 14 months – before they were really eating more than just one or two different kinds of solid foods.  It just so happens that those were highly allergic children so maybe it’s just some kind of protective mechanism.  If your baby is still doing the tongue thrust which means that if you put a little bit of food in their mouth and they just immediately stick that tongue out and shove it out then it’s quite likely that they are just not ready so you might just want to wait a couple of weeks before trying again! 

Now you may be getting some family pressure, maybe from the grandparents, the in-laws, whatever, a lot of people just love to feed a baby and they may be pressuring you to start giving the baby solid foods  even though your gut is telling you that this child is just not ready.  Here’s a little tip that you can use and this comes in handy no matter what you are trying to do.  Tell your in-laws or relatives say you know what, The Dr. has actually recommended that we do X – well whatever the X is, if you and your husband are fine with that decision then it’s really nobody’s business.  You can go and find a parenting book that was written by a Doctor that supports your decision. 

For instance if you pick up your baby every time your baby cries and the in-laws are just absolutely convinced that you are going to raise a spoiled brat who is going to make everybody’s life miserable and go to prison you can always point to Dr. William Sears books on attachment parenting.  You don’t have to throw the book at the grand parents but what you can do is say well actually we’ve consulted with our doctor and he recommends that we respond to our babies cries because studies have shown that babies cry less when they are picked up.  There you go, Dr. William Sears told you to do that, you read his book.  So that’s my little parenting tip, my natural baby parenting tip this week.  What to do if your older baby is not that interested in solids.