My baby is five months old. Her doctor told me to start introducing all the cereals at 4 months. She likes the rice, oatmeal, barley, and wheat cereals. However, when I started to introduce the Gerber baby foods, she hates them. She starts screaming and refuses to eat them. I do not believe in forcing a baby to eat, so when she screams, I offer her the cereals instead- and she eats all of it. Now, all she has to do is see the baby food container and she screams! Has anyone else ever had a baby who wouldn't eat baby food? What did you do? Were they picky eaters as they got older? So far, all I've tried are the green beans and bananas, but she did the same thing with both of them. She would eat them the first two days, then refuse them after that. I've thought about making baby food, but I'd prefer not to if I can help it.
She shouldn't even be on any solids until 6 months. Forget it for a month. If she still won't eat it, give her table food. My daughter was completely off baby food before she had any teeth.
Have you tasted those jarred baby foods? They're NASTY!
I gave my daughter the same fruits and veggies I ate, seasonings and all - just mashed them up for her.
Just wait a week. She will open up to them. Studies show it can take over 10x of 'introducing' a food to a child before they will actually embrace it. Sometimes it's the texture, other times it's the taste of why they refuse. I ended up mixing baby food with the cereal to kind of ease my kids into the transition. Actually, making baby food is cheaper and healthier, and a lot easier than you may think.
I'm one of those that firmly believes 6 months should be the VERY youngest to introduce solid foods. My second baby refused ALL solid food until he was about 9 months, then he would oNLY eat toast. I finally started putting stuff on the toast (mashed avocado, even veggies on the toast which sounds gross to me but he loved pureed carrots/etc. on the toast so I went with it, lol!) Then at 14 months something clicked and he decided he could eat more things and started eating more regular. Now at 2 he eats pretty well (not as well as my first but pretty good). Don't forget to try things you don't like with them (I hate avocado and shrimp but both mine love them!). Google "child-led weaning" and I think it's a really cool way to introduce solids. That's kind of how my second did it without me realizing it had a name, lol! Good luck! Don't force solids though, I promise they will eat solids eventually - just be patient and give her time...
My daughter HATED baby food. She only ate a few of them and only for a few weeks. I would try mashing up bananas and making your own if you want to. That might work.
No, my daughter is not a picky eater. She eats a wide variety of foods. She is more choosy about vegetables, but she will eat a few of them (corn, zucchini, other squash, tomatoes).
Good luck. It is a phase that will pass. I looked at it as it was easier for me and I saved a lot not buying baby food!
My daughter never really ate jars of baby food... I just mashed up what we ate and fed it to her on a spoon. Peas were her favorite.
Make your own or give her things off your plate. Some kids never like baby food. My friend's son ate maybe 2 jars his whole infancy. They just started giving him mushy food and he took off with it. Maybe mush up a real banana and see if she likes it better. Bananas in particular smell funny in the jar.
She's not ready! Put the baby food away for at least another month, then try again.
My daughter would only eat applesauce, pears, and blueberry/apples. I got her to eat sweet potatoes once, but I added brown sugar and butter since she wouldn't eat them plain. And, I always heated them up. I would hide the jar and put it in a bowl. Also, have you ever tried the green beans? I did, and they make the formula taste and smell good. I will never try to give them to a kid, since they are so icky. Try mixing the fruit with cereal to introduce the taste and texture to her. Good luck!!
Have you tried warming the food. I noticed some mom's give baby food room temperature. I always warmed my kids foods. I couldn't imagine eating cold green beans. If you have and she still refuses you can try mixing the the bananas in the cereal. She really doesn't need the food so don't stress. You could lay off and reintroduce in another month. Formula and breast milk have all of the nutrients they need so food is really not necessary. My kids were the opposite they loved the fruits and veggies and hated the cereal so I mixed it up. They also hated the green veggies most kids LOVE the orange, sweet potato, squash, because they are sweeter etc. Good luck!!
My 7 y/o daughter never ate the baby food. 5 months old is too young anyway. Try it again after 9 months, but now that she hates them, you may have to skip that stage. I ended up giving away all of my daughter's food to a neighbor. She wouldn't even eat the desserts... ever. Best wishes and God bless!
My kids never liked baby food, pretty much didn't start taking ANY solids until 10 to 12 months. They all get there eventually. Just take a break and try again in a month or two :)
My daughter did the same thing. She didn't really start eating cereals and baby foods until 7m because of it. I would try for a few days and if she spit it out or complained, i'd stop and try again a week later.
My son did something similar. We used to feed him meats and veggies from a small plate. We'd feed him fruits from a small dish as dessert. He'd complain about the veggies but down the fruits. One day we switched them up and he refused the fruits on the plate but downed the veggies in the dish...
One thing you could try is to not feed her straight from the jar. Put it on a plate. If you are already doing that, treat the plate like it is your food and you are feeding her from your plate. Kids always want what their parents have...
She is WAY WAY too young to be having these solids yet. Baby food is only to introduce the idea of chewing and swallowing to a baby. They need the nutrition from formula for the 1st year. The other stuff is just to supplement and train them to not choke when starting to eat table food.
Just keep the cereal for now, it should still be a runny liquid and not even anything thick enough to chew. She should not really be getting these other foods until she's at least 7-8 months old.
I mix my baby food in with baby cereal and milk or water to make it soupy enough. Have you tried that? It might work like that, served from a bowl instead of the baby food jar. Also do you warm the cereal up and not the baby food? It could make a difference as well.
Try taking them out of the jar first. And keep trying different stuff. As another mama said, smash up veggies and fruit you eat, just minus salt and butter. My last one started refusing a few months ago and still has no teeth at 9 mos. but he eats just about everything I do!
next time dont let her see the jars! try mixing fruit with cereal try diff flavors my youngest liked vegetables more than fruit but I think most kids like fruit so you have to try diff things
I started my daughter in June at 5.5 months on baby food. I did two days of rice cereal and she was like okay sure why not. Then when I started her on sweet potatoes she ate them for two days and we took a break and then tried avocados and she loved them. We ended up eating that for a week since she liked it so much. But then wham! She decided she hated food. She would stick her tongue out and gag herself. So I stopped feeding her for about a week and a half and started again. She now is eating again. She loves squash, sweet potatoes, green beans and peas. But she won't even think of eating avocados now. Kids go in spurts of what they want and don't want. She might get a tummy ache from the food and so she doesn't want it. I would back off for a while on food. If she is fine with cereal stay with that. I only did the two days of cereal and never gave it again. I work full time and make a few of the foods for her myself that is easy. Squash sweet potatoes that type of stuff you stick in the over bake and dice it and puree it. But beans peas etc the hard stuff I leave it to the experts!
I hope this helps!
Try avocados mashed up or bananas. My daughter would eat half an avocado a night at that stage. Now she won't touch them at 4 yo. :-P
try mixing the baby food with the cereal like vegies with the barley or wheat cereal and fruits with the rice or oatmeal cereal or mix half a jar of a vegie and half a jar of the fruit also try and open the jar and put it in a bowl before putting her in the chair so she doesnt see the jar
make your own food. MUCH cheaper, doesn't take much time (I did it as FT working mom) and it makes transitioning your child from baby food to finger food to food you eat A LOT easier b/c the taste never changes, just the texture.
I can give you tips if you want. seriously, it's not hard. I hate to cook, I'm not very good at cooking, and I made all my own baby food and my son is a rock star eater.
