When baby led weaning doesn’t work SLPs are called in for support. Often parents are concerned that their child is rejecting food when initially presented to them. The child spits it out &/or gags on it and may show limited to no interest in eating solids. Parents have told me that they have to trick their child into eating by doing a song and a dance, adding a video, singing etc. It’s not uncommon and it should be known that because the Internet does an amazing job portraying all of the ease during feeding times it fails to portray all of the challenges and breakdown of mealtime and feeding.
Eating solids is a transition point for babies in many ways. Speech pathologist know that there are signs and checkpoints for readiness of solids that a baby must go through in order to start eating solids. If you are trying baby led weaning, it may be the first time your child is gaining independence in eating and the first time they are able to take in the size and amount of food that they wish to. Many kids play or throw food overboard and do not bring food to their mouth.
Eating solids is a point where we realize that the child may have a real feeding problem and it may not be that they don’t want the food, it might be that they are having trouble managing the food. Parents are confused is it that the child is not interested in the foods presented… is it the size, shape, flavor 🤷♀️? Why won’t my child get on the #BLW bandwagon?!
In my experience there can be a dark side to baby led weaning. While baby led weaning is a common practice, it is not a very well researched practice. That means it is hard to determine the size, the texture and the amount of food to present your child. Parents experiment with what they think the right size pieces are during transitioning food types based on what the feedback they observe in their child’s behavior and age.
I’ve also seen a lot of cranky babies during baby led weaning. When it works, BLW is a nice method for some kids and for some it doesn’t work AND THAT IS OK. I typically get called in when it doesn’t work. Please don’t feel alone and reach out for support, I will get back to you!
