Week Derailed

It's been a rocky week with my son Arthur being sick.  He's had a stomach virus for the past week and a half.  I could barely get Arthur to eat... finding myself at the receiving end of the good picky toddler eating advice I try to give others, and not doing too well with it this time around.  About all I can get him to eat is Cheerios and follow on milk.  At a grazing rate at best.

Monday got very interesting because Arthur started vomiting and so he had it coming out of both ends. Concerned about his hydration, my husband and I made the call to take Arthur into A&E (Emergency Room).  He was weighed, temperature taken, blood pressure and heart rate taken, and his blood sugar was measured with a heel prick by the nurse.  His sugars looked good.  We waited to see the doctor.  She more or less gave him a full physical, checking to see how well his skin plumped back, checking his abdomen and his little boy parts.  Everything looked fine, though she wanted to consult her seniors.

About fifteen minutes later, a nurse shows up with a cup for a urine sample.  Okay... definitely different from what would have happened back in the US (they would have cath'd him immediately and then I may have had a small battle to fight to make sure they didn't retract him in the process since he's an intact little boy), but I'm willing to try less invasive ways of getting urine samples.  Let me tell you... convincing a 15 month old to pee in a cup at 1:15am in the morning is a true challenge.  I'll give you a hint: get him drinking.

We struggled with this as Arthur didn't like the nipples on the hospital bottles; they didn't have sippy cups on hand; and he was refusing anything from a syringe.  They were about to admit Arthur into the hospital for the night if we couldn't get him to drink.  I sent my husband home to get a sippy cup while I soothed our sorely over tired toddler.  Arthur gleefully started drinking chilled water from his sippy cup and then the magic happened... I got him to pee in a cup.

We got enough urine to test and they did find a little something, so he was sent home with some antibiotics.  I didn't start him on the antibiotic until today since I wasn't sure if he was over his vomiting.  Tuesday, he would have gone to nursery, but I held him back because I thought he was too sick to go.  He did vomit again last night, not nearly as bad as on Monday.  And then he vomited again today when he was at his grandparent's house for a few hours while I got a shower and caught up on sleep.

We have another doctor's appointment set up tomorrow morning to make sure she's informed of what happened on Monday and to get some further advice.  The A&E doctor wanted us to get Arthur to drink sugary drinks, but he's refused anything but follow on formula.  Eating solids hasn't improved either.  And I'm concerned because Arthur is looking skinnier.

At times, Arthur even rejects the follow on milk.  Its like he's gained a sense of how much he can drink now before getting ill.  Consequently, I've been having to talk and cuddle him to sleep rather than being able to let him fall drowsy on the bottle.  This isn't a terribly bad thing-- I've been wanting to bottle wean him at nap time and bedtime at his pace anyways and this sickness is certainly accelerating that pace.

I'll sit still, Indian style, with Arthur positioned in my lap exactly as if I were nursing him.  I cannot relate the number of times I still wished I nursed him, especially since he's so ill anyways.  Both the comfort and the nutrition would do a world of good for him.  Its even possible he wouldn't have gotten sick in the first place if he was still drinking my milk.  My husband tells me, I shouldn't blame myself-- we didn't have nearly the amount of support that we have now.

So tonight I came to a decision and its a bit unconventional, but you know what?  It certainly couldn't do any harm.  When my next baby arrives in October and once this baby and I have nursing down, I'm going to start giving Arthur my milk again.

And while that's out there, I'll say something else too.  I am doing placenta encapsulation-- by hand, out of my own kitchen even.  If it prevents the PND (PPD) that I experienced with Arthur and boosts my milk supply, more power to me.  It shouldn't harm me, nor anyone else.  So, I'm going to do it.  I made that decision several weeks ago but have been sheepish about saying much on it.

Picky Toddler Eaters

After the elation of watching your sweet toddler explore all of the wonderful flavours and textures that the world of solid foods has to offer, it inevitably happens.  Your little muncher who so impressed you with her huge appetite begins tossing food aside.  Or spits it out entirely.  Or offers the food to the pets.  Or does a number of other things that ultimately result in becoming a picky eater.

The best advice anyone has for this is to just keep offering foods and fallback on the favourites.  Even the pickiest toddler has a few favourites they like to eat, such as bananas or pears, or cheerios, or even toddler snackie foods.

• Eat with your toddler to encourage eating by monkey’ing you.  
• Make sure there are no other distractions at meal time such as the television running.
• Relax.  If you’re stressed about your toddler eating, he’ll know it.  Mealtime is time for sharing, enjoying each other’s company, and enjoying the meal—emphasize that about the time you’re spending with your toddler.
• Encourage food play.  Maybe by accident your toddler will manage to get something into her mouth!  And then decide it’s not so bad!  I did this with my son just last night when he was acting like, “Ewuh, this spinach ricotta canolli is sticky!  Oh hey, it tastes pretty good!”
• Try preparing the same food, but a different way.  My son will have little to do with sliced bananas, even though bananas are one of his favourites.  If I break the banana into bits, he's able to hold the bits easier and eat.  Try rolling food in 'cheerio dust' if you suspect its a problem with being able to hold the food.  So sometimes, something as little as piecing out the food differently makes all the difference.

Most of a toddler’s nutrition can still reasonably come from breastmilk, follow on formula, and whole milk.  And while variety is one of the keys to better nutrition, don’t stress out if your toddler goes through stints of ‘eating bad’ for two to three days.  You can resume perfectly balanced healthy foods as soon as the picky behaviour ends.

Causes of Picky Toddler Eating

Wonder Week – sometimes when a toddler is hitting a developmental leap, a slight eating regression happens.  If your toddler is cranky, clingy, and crying (per the Wonder Week website and books) and you’ve ruled out everything else, it’s likely that your toddler is embarking on a mental leap.  These typically last for about two to three days, at most five to seven and your toddler should resume his old eating habits afterwards.

New Stress in Household – toddlers will regress not only eating, but also other behaviours if there is significant stress in the household.  If you are seeing picky eating in addition to other behaviour regression—say for example, you’ve taught your toddler to stop biting others, and she decides to take up biting again—it’s more likely the result of some new stress in the household.  If you address the stress, your toddler will likely revert back from regressive behaviours.

Teething – if it hurts to eat it, your toddler won’t.  Look for the classic signs of teething such as swollen gums, ruddy cheeks, drooling, runny nose and light cough, slight fever and address those with an infant pain reliever or cold teething rings.  Try offering foods slightly chilled that’s been mashed up a bit more than usual.  I don’t recommend oral teething gels in general; some contain an ingredient known as ‘benzocaine’ (ethyl p-aminobenzoate; trade names Anbesol, Cepacol, Lanacane and others) which has shown to be linked to SIDS.

Cold or Sickness – if the toddler’s nose is stopped up, it’s trickier for her to eat since she’s having to take food and breathe through her mouth.  Also, if she’s not feeling at her best, your toddler may simply not have the patience for newer foods and may simply be reaching for what she knows as comfort foods.  Treat the cold or sickness as normal or according to your doctor’s instructions.  Your toddler should be back to loving food as soon as she’s feeling better!

Asserting Independence – it might be that your toddler is simply exerting his independence.  This is a good thing!  When toddlers are able to express their likes and dislikes with comfort and confidence, it’s a sign of a child who’s very secure in himself and in his relationship with you.

If your toddler’s pickiness with food lasts for more than a week, contact your doctor for advice.

Easy Table Foods to Start With

Multigrain Cheerios – I think this is an easy stand by in any house hold.

Toast, Margarine, and Jam – Make it just like you like it.  Remove the crusts.  Then pull bits from it that are the size of your thumbnail at first.  Later as your baby gets better at eating, pull larger bits.  Even later, make Toast Fingers.

Ripe Pear – And when I say ripe, it’s ripe enough to shave pieces off with a spoon.  Rather than cutting up slices or cubes, just eat the skin off and use the spoon to make thumbnail sized shavings to offer.  Later, include the skin.  And then when your baby is really good at controlling their portions, offer whole slices.

Banana – Break the banana up with your fingers into thumbnail sized bits.  Later, when baby is confident with controlling how much goes into her mouth, offer larger pieces.

Steamed Broccoli Florets – The florets are the ‘green leafy part of the broccoli.  Steam these on the stove or in the microwave until the florets are brightly fresh colored and comes off of the stem easily with a fork.  Flavor these as you would your own steam broccoli with margarine and spices (but hold the salt!).  Offer the florets to your baby.  Later when baby is a better eater, offer some of the stem.

Steamed Asparagus – Same instructions as Broccoli.

Squash, Carrots, and other Nutrient Dense Roots – Steam, boil, or roast until these are soft enough to mash with a fork.  You can leave these as chunky or as mashed as your baby likes it.  Flavor these as you would eat them.

Other Tips…

I found that if I was eating at the same time as my son, he'd monkey me more and do much better.  I had to slow down my eating quite a bit and I've started including things like clementines and oranges into my meals (not his, not yet, their too acidic and cause diaper rash) so I have to take time peeling and eating for myself while he's eating.  Our meals generally took at hour at first.  Now we're down to about 30 minutes until he seems done.

Anything you can put a light gravy or sauce on to help make it slippery is great too.  You can get very small sized pasta, prepare it like you would for yourself.  Take a tablespoon of cream cheese.  Grate a kids snack wedge of cheese.  Melt those in the microwave and add whole milk to consistency and you've got a great, easy to eat baby pasta.  Just add or take away sauce to your baby's preference.

We went a long time too where I was offering a full range of foods.  I offered a puree or yogurt, a helping of 10 month chunky jarred food, and something off of my plate and I went with whatever he seemed happiest eating.  A lot of food ends up on the floor or goes uneaten, but this is how learning happens.  If I was anxious about my son not getting enough fruit or vegetables, I'd stir in a little vegetable puree into whatever he was eating.

When I was seeing next to no gagging, I gave my son larger bits and now he has a really good handle on how much he can put in his mouth or bite off.  But he still sometimes tries to bite off a little bit more than he can chew.

Just try to relax and keep working with it.  The doctor might prescribe your baby some vitamins if you're concerned about nutrition and may recommend that you stay on the formula until your baby comes around to eating more solids.  Technically, babies are still suckling well into 2 or 3 years of age and many can expect to have primary nutrition coming from breast milk or formula until then.

The Basics in Transitioning (or Starting) with Solids

I’ve always been big on nutrition.

During pregnancy, I was advising other moms on healthy diets—how to cook and eat whole foods (not the organic store chain, but rather brown rice instead of white, using more legumes, etc).  I was super annoyed when my pregnancy blood work came back showing me borderline gestational diabetes and borderline anaemic in spite of my stellar eating habits.  I’m proof positive that hormones can and will screw you over in that department anyways, but it’s still no excuse to slack on a healthy diet!

Later, I was huge on breastfeeding (or rather, exclusive pumping), taking vitamins and continuing to eat right in order to provide my son with the best nutrition—putting wheat germ on my cereal… the whole nine yards.  It shouldn’t have been any surprise to friends after that I’d be super keen on my son’s diet when he transitioned from breast milk to foods.

The question always comes up: what do I feed my toddler?  And there are many answers to that with a whole array of options that can sometimes be confusing or difficult to break down.  The purpose of this post is an attempt to make it all a little simpler.

First, I want to put down some ground rules that seem to get forgotten in all of the hoopla on toddler nutrition.

Until your baby is 18 months to 2 years, breast milk and/or baby formula will very likely be your baby’s primary source of nutrition and calories.  So if your six month old isn’t keep up with the champion Baby-Led Weaners eating chicken straight off the leg, you are so far from alone… and in fact, the six month old eating chicken straight off the leg is the odd ball out.  So up until 18 months to 2 years, solids are for fun.  Relax, introduce them and see how much enjoyment your baby gets out of them!

Variation is the key to better nutrition and to keep things interesting.  But always have your fallbacks ready.  Try introducing a new food, or an old food presented in a new way, every week.  Some things will fly, some won’t.  A lot of food ends up on the floor.  Don’t sweat any of that.  Now is not the time to be talking to your baby about starving children in African nations.  Now is the time to keep eating interesting and fun.

Don’t be afraid of mess.  Fearing the clean up after only holds your baby back.  It may seem like a lot of work at first, but once you’ve done it a few times, you’ll quickly see how fast and easy post meal clean up can be.

Encourage without pressure or stress.  Babies are little empaths, reflections of you.  If you’re stressed over meals, that teaches baby that meals are meant to be stressed over… and they’re not.  If you’re having difficulty with the process (fear of gagging, fear of baby not being able to control their portions, etc.), take a break from trying to re-examination in yourself what the issue is and try to overcome that on your own before trying again.  Or sometimes a little exposure to the issue helps.

For example, I had a great big huge fear of my son gagging and choking and I wouldn’t be able to save him.  It would keep me up at night with worry.  What I discovered was that I was PPD and I couldn’t find it in myself to trust my son with his food.  So when I got treatment for the PPD and when I did other activities with my son so I could learn to trust him better, I was able to trust him more with his food.  Now I fully know that he knows how to handle himself with his food.  It took some time and a little exposure, but under different, less stressful circumstances.

So with those ground rules in place, on to the adventure of eating!