So food is for fun for now, but what needs to change once she's 1?
I wanted to try eliminating lunch so she will eat more at dinner and therefore sleep better, but she's nearly one so does that mean I can't muck around with solids anymore?
Milk is the main source of nutrients until 12 months and then food starts to play a more important role. But there is mo magic day when one becomes more important suddenly iykwim. So if it takes to 13 months to get your food sorted I don't think it's that big of a deal.
However, I'm not sure skipping lunch in hope she eats more dinner is a good idea. i have found that food intake never made a massive difference to my girls sleep but when they became more active they started sleeping better. Im not sure what you do in regards to milk the moment, but perhaps you could cut down on the breast/bottle and offer food first then milk. Or offer a little less at lunch but not skip it all together?
DS has now taken to eating dinner at lunch time and lunch at dinner time he doesnt sleep any better or worse he just seems to eat more in the day by night hes to tired to eat heaps
We haven't done BLS, my bub is almost the same age as yours and we were having huge issues a couple of weeks ago, where she was refusing solids (unless it was yoghurt), and I was topping her up with bottles. (She refused breast at 8mths, and I had been comp feeding since 3mths, she also has reflux so is on thickenend formula and losec). I would give her bottles through the night just to get her to sleep as I am working 10 hour days and I needed to sleep and at that stage was surviving on 5 hours broken sleep. I spoke with my baby health nurse who suggested "be cruel to be kind". I stopped the overnight bottles and tried to get more food into her. Took a couple of days but she was sleeping through the night, the last 2 nights she's woken and I've given her a small bottle which she's only drank a bit out of before falling back to sleep, the bottle was the last resort after numerous attempts of settling with her dummy or just letting her try to self settle She's also teething so I think they were giving her a little pain. The nurse also suggested getting rid of the dummy, but i'm not up to that just yet, maybe over Christmas when I have a few days off and it won't matter if I don't sleep properly.
Last night she refused to let me feed her and frustration overtook me and I just let her be, filled her up on bottles instead, tonight she took a couple of spoonfulls, before refusing again, out of desperation I plopped a couple of spoon fulls on her tray and she grabbed it up with her fingers and fed herself, so I guess tomorrow I'll be doing up some vegies, but not mashing them. She ate a plate full of vegies, a cup of custard (which she let me feed her), a tub of mixed fruit and followed it off with a bottle, I'm hoping she'll sleep well tonight.
Hope that helps you.
Breakfast is a meal I don't fight with, if she doesn't want it (and I offer food before bottles), I let her down and give her a bottle - my kids all need to be awake a while before they eat - lunch time I offer a variety of foods, if she eats them, wonderful, if not, well HER choice. She sleeps beautifully of a day and night time is my concern. I also give her a bottle after lunch, but then no other foods til dinner time. She is offered water all the time and usually her sipper cup is in her reach.
See DD probably eats (in a whole day) one cracker, three broad beans (insides not skin) a tiny shred of chicken, a bite of bread, one carrot stick, one cube of cheese..
That would be about it. And plenty of breastmilk.
Just seems like nothing, you know?
And when my friend babysat her, DD ate HEAPS of solids and slept beautifully. ?????
i am going to start putting the pieces in her mouth directly, coz I think she just feels she has better things to do than sit around eating. She just forgets about it.
What about introducing cows milk? Do i need to do that?
Personally I wouldn't advocate putting the food in her mouth, it could be dangerous and I also think you're losing the whole idea of bls that way.
What time are you feeding her dinner? For a long time, if I gave DD dinner after 5.30 she wouldn't touch a mouthful, and by moving her dinner slightly earlier she would happily eat. I've also found that DD is a grazer - she much prefers to eat pretty much all day, and I'll happily give her a snack an hour before dinner, or something to nibble on while I'm cooking, which is always the worst time of day for her being cranky. Now she eats loads throughout the day, and I don't stress if dinner's not doing it for her that night. I do usually have an avocado and a couple of cruskits on stand-by at dinner time just in case she's not into what we're eating though!
ETA - I reckon it's just a learning curve too, I'm sure in a couple of months she will have learnt so much more about eating and you will wonder what you were stressing about. I am still regularly astounded by DD's progress at 14 months.
You don't *have* to introduce cows milk, but you can if you like. I used to offer the girls water with meals but they never really drank milk while I was still bf'ing.
What happens when she's one?
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