Parenting is a funny old thing. You want your children to stay little forever, but at the same time you can’t wait for them to hit certain milestones that mean they’re growing up (and most of the time you just want the latest horrific phase/developmental leap to come to an end). I think this is never more true than with weaning.
I remember when my daughter was tiny, my husband and I were eagerly anticipating her starting solid foods. We waited until she was six months old, sitting up independently and no longer had the tongue-thrust reflex, as per the guidelines (well, some of them) and then gave her some apple purée. She had one or two spoonfuls, was unimpressed and refused to eat any more, and this pretty much remained her relationship with food for the next two years.
We tried baby-led weaning, but she just wouldn’t eat anything at all – except for strawberries. For the first two years of her life, she pretty much lived on milk and cucumber (or “bugger”). On the advice of my GP I cut down how often I nursed her at 9 months to encourage her to eat. This did not work; she ate the same amount as before (i.e. very little) and didn’t even have my milk to compensate. I think she just wasn’t really ready for solids, not in any physical sense, just that she didn’t need them and wasn’t especially interested. One family friend (a paediatrician) witnessed my daughter’s performance at the dinner table once and just told me not to force it, that children don’t let themselves starve to death. This is undoubtedly true, but when you get to Day 4 of no meals, you do start to worry slightly…
She started eating proper meals a few months ago. Some days she still won’t eat, but generally she’ll have at least two meals a day now, which is a vast improvement.* She will eat pretty much anything if she’s in the right mood. She’s not a picky eater as such, she just would rather be doing pretty much anything else. As someone who has to exercise considerable self-restraint not to spend the whole day stuffing my face, I find this very difficult to understand.
So after our not-so-successful weaning experience with my daughter, when the time came for my son to try solid food, I was a little nervous.
We decided to start him on solids early because he was basically glued to my breasts and still waking up every two-three hours at night to keep up his fighting weight. If he was sitting on my lap while I fed my daughter, he would scream as the spoon went past him. He was definitely interested in food.
He was five months old, couldn’t sit up independently and still had the tongue-thrust thing happening. They say that your standards slip with the second child. They’re not wrong.
Thankfully, he loved food. Unfortunately, he had reactions. Soon after starting solids his eczema got really bad and when I gave him egg, he projectile vomited all over me. I have never seen so much vomit come out of such a small individual with such force. I was covered in sick, he was covered in sick and my bed where we had been sitting was also covered in sick. He doesn’t have egg anymore.
Apart from that though, feeding him is a breeze. After battling with my daughter to get her to eat anything over the past two years, it’s amazing to see the food disappear down his throat. I cook food, he eats food. It’s great. He eats a lot of food. There are definitely days where he eats far more than his sister.
Now if only he would sleep as much as she does…
* I do realize that I have jinxed myself and she won’t eat another meal for the next three months.
The Mulberry Bush 