Warning! This is not for the weak of heart. It takes guts to see a little baby gag and wait patiently until she spits the offender out herself.
So part because I’m lazy, and part because I like doing things anti-main-stream, we decided to forgo all the mush and purees with Alina and just start her on real food directly. We simply offer her some of our food and she’s free to grab, play and eat. There’s a book on baby-led weaning and lots of resources online, but we skipped the book and are just winging it.
But before the fun starts, we had to make sure to learn how to help a choking infant, how to do infant CPR and what a choking infant even looks like in the first place (side note: gagging is a very normal and natural reaction in babies, presumably there to help them through the weaning stage).
Anyway so far in the category of edibles she’s tried yoghurt, mango, mango seed, an apple, fish soup (I can’t believe she loved it), potatoes, a lemon wedge (despite the squishy expression, she sucked that wedge empty!), and today, some of my Chai with frothed milk. Yeah I feel slightly bad giving her something with a bit of caffiene in it, but the expression on her face was so adorable “Whoa, GIMME MORE”.
In the non-edibles, she’s tried paper and cardboard (I’ve had to do a thorough cleaning after I found out she’s been eating tiny pieces of paper), and a cherry tree branch and blossoms at her grandparents' place. Now her grandmother announced it safe so we let her go at it and boy did she love it. She was chewing on that branch for a good 15 minutes, eating leaves and blossoms, looks like a happy little bunny!
Next on our adventure list are avocados, sweet potatoes, egg yolk and lamb chops. Chicken bones are not suitable because they’re too brittle, so we’re going for lamb. I’m going to test it first, if I can’t break it with my teeth, she can have it.
AAAAHHH!!!! I had a fully thoughtful comment that took me 20 minutes to write all ready to post. And stupid blogger had an error that made it disappear!!!
ReplyDeleteI'll write it up again after breakfast :/ bah.
Okay. So that's really interesting. And cute.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to go technical on the evolutionary baby feeding, that's not really how it goes. Primitive and indigenous mothers feed young babies real food by sitting with them during a meal time, and from the same food that the mother is eating, she'd chew out a bite, spit it out, and feed it to the baby.
This has several healthy evolutionary purposes:
First, the baby learns what is food and what isn't. You can bet that prehistoric mommy didn't let the baby run around and try out whatever, because (and I learned this recently upon reading a lot on gardening) a lot of everyday plants are extremely poisonous!!
So while the cherry branch and blossoms might've been fine, cherry leaves contain alkaloid poisons. The leaves and stems of the nightshade family (tomatoes and potatoes) are also poisonous. Raw beans, azalea, daffodils, delphinium, ivy, oak, apricot leaves, holly, yellow Jassamine, and the list goes on and on.
Azalea is so poisonous, that it is recorded that a Greek army was once poisoned and died when in one village, villages left jars of honey out for the army to find. The honey in that area is practically poison, because of the abundance of flowering azalea bushes from which the bees collected their nectar. So final word to the wise, when it comes to the garden and lots kitchen food, if you don't eat it there's probably a good reason, so prevent Alina from doing so.
Second, by chewing up the food, the bacteria from the mom's mouth and hands aids in digestion.
Third, appetite for food is encouraged once the family gets together for a meal, since the baby gets used to eating in a group. Think "Pavlov's Dog".
Youssef has started eating store bought fruit purees and homemade mushed veggies. Not ideal, but I figure if I can keep them from feeding him Cerilac and Bisquits with milk as meals (I'm 3/4 of the way there with that) then that'll be great! I've already taken great strides in extolling the virtues of egg yolk, bone stock, liver, and bone marrow in baby food (all nutrient dense and iron rich).
I think I didn't clarify exactly what we're doing :) What you described is pretty much what we're doing. We (or I) sit down for a meal and Alina sits down with me. If she's interested, she gets to try some of my food (assuming it is appropriate for her). I did not chew food for her, don't if I will, but even without teeth, her jaw is quite strong and mush fruit and veggies on its own. The idea is, we don't feed her, she feeds herself from our food when she's ready.
ReplyDeleteAbout the plants, of course I would not let her try whatever unless I'm 100% sure what it is! Martin's Mom knows A LOT about plants, mushrooms and the sort (a mountain child), so it was all under her supervision. Yes there are very pretty plants and mushrooms around the garden of which a lot are poisonous. So leaving Alina unsupervised in the garden is out of question right now. But interesting about the cherry leaves, his mom said they make tea out of them. Just in case, I won't let her taste anymore plants.
Oh cool.
ReplyDeleteWell, as to the cherry leaves, it's a bit of interesting science. They, among many other plants such as peach leaf and rose leaf, apparently contain cyanogenic glycosides which releases hydrogen cyanide when the fresh plant matter is damaged, such as being chewed, exposed to frostbite or drought, trampled, wilted, etc. Animals who eat very large amounts of fresh cherry leaves, or as little as 2 ounces of damaged leaves, can get clinical cases of poisoning.
However, many cultures eat such plants but get rid of the toxins by chopping it up and grinding it in running water. Making occasional tea with fresh undamaged cherry leaves also causes no harm, as the prunasin, the cyanide precursor in them, is nontoxic. It's only when the prunasin molecules are split that the cyanide gets released.
Off note, now that I've gone into it, I can't stop reading about this stuff! I find it fascinating!