8 Month Old Won't Eat Anything Solid

My son was the same way. I had heard that if they don't learn to chew early on, they may have troubles later on, so I always worried about it. We just continued to give him what he liked as well as crunchy and textured foods. When we first gave him soft foods with very small chunks of other, more solid foods mixed in (cottage cheese, fruit yogurt, cream of chicken soup, etc.), he'd spit out the chunks, but eventually, he learned to eat them. He NEVER liked the advanced stages baby foods. (I wish I took this advice), but don't make yourself crazy about always feeding him exactly the right thing. Eventually, he'll eat textures and solids and fruits and vegetables and sweets and whatever else. If he's hungry enough, he'll eat.

By puffs, do you mean the Gerber Finger Foods Fruit and Vegetable Puffs? If not, we had good luck with these.

Here's the best advise I can give you concerning food and eating. I have two girls, one 5 1/2 and a 2 1/2 year olds. They both have been picky at one time or another. I have found that if I'm feeding food to my girls that I need to eat it as well. I also sit down with them when they eat usually or in between them. If they are not focused on eating I've fed them. But if they are not hungry, don't force them to eat. I know it is not a GOOD thing to force kids to eat when they are not hungry. Healthy snacks is just as good as any healthy meal. Another really great resource is the Super Baby Food book, which I used mostly for my 2 1/2 year old when she started eating.

I do daycare and i have a now 4 year old who is very sensitive to textures and when he was an infant we started with baby cereal and when he got bored and wouldn't eat anything else with out gaging we added small amounts of step 1 baby foods to the cereal and continually keept adding more baby food and less baby cereal and eventually he was on regular food and we did the same with solid food like cheerios only we soggied them up with milk and gradually we lessened the soggieness and he now love cheerieos still to this day and he also dosn't like his mashed potatoes to runny or hard he will gag on them. I hope this helps i know it took us (his parents and I) a long time to find something and the consistancy that worked for him.

Don't push too hard. He will eat it when he's ready.

My daughter had a really sensitive gag reflex and wouldn't touch any solid food until almost 14 months. She hated rice cereal, cheerios, etc. She never did eat rice cereal or baby food. When she was finally eating solids, we have to cut things up REALLY small for her until 2.5 years old. She's now 3 and eating just fine. My doctor said the breast milk/formula was the main source of nutrition until at least a year and it wasn't a problem.

Hi Jeanna,
If this is really bothering you might want to check with your doctor. Personally, I don't know if I would worry about it too much. He just might not be ready for those types of foods. My son didn't start on solids until he was well into his 6th month, but by the time he was 10 months he was a little eating machine. A lot changes in just a few weeks/months. Don't stress! I think sometimes we expect our little ones to jump right into solid foods because we have a schedule in our minds as to where their development "should" be. If he is getting his beast milk/formula and has good poops I would just try to relax and keep offering new foods (even if he doesn't eat them). Flavor up the cereal with applesauce, fruits, and veggies. It'll work out, just let him take his time.
Good Luck,
Jackie

Unless he's getting weak or unhealthy I wouldn't worry about it. He's ONLY 8 months old. He is probably just not ready for solid foods yet. Remember that all babies/kids are different and that just because someone else's 8 month old eats solid foods doesn't mean that yours has to.

We seem to be on the same boat! My 8-month old daughter is very similar in that she won't take any pureed food (ie. gerber) and would gag everytime. I tried all kinds of flavors with no success until we finally gave her some mac and cheese and she loved it! She also likes those puffs that melt her mouth and supplement her formula with these easy to chew snacks. She just prefers the texture and motion of chewing table foods over pureed so I just make sure to give her tiny pieces at a time. She also won't take food in baby spoons and prefers the teaspoons - go figure! It was frustrating in the beginning but after figuring out that she seems to prefer table food, I calmed down a little bit. Don't worry he'll get there soon...

My only suggestion is breast milk. My son never ate anything solid until after his first year and basically went from nursing straight to table food. He never would eat baby food from a jar or made in a food processor and rarely would even eat cereal even when I mixed it with my breast milk.

Try some of those biter biscuits. Maybe he just needs something he can hold onto and chew on so it doesn't go straight down his throat and he can take it out when he wants to. It's be more like a teether toy than a snack and maybe he would start to like them that way. They're messy but it makes for great pics :o)