Feeding My 9 Month Old Solids

whenever you are ready to feed him his jar food, put him in the highchair and put some cherrios or kix cereal or other easily grabbed finger foods on his tray. Goldfish are good too. Canned veggies and fruit are good. Only put about 4 pieces on there. Let him experiment with them as you fix his jar food. If he gags, don't react to it. Only react if he has a positive thing done like putting some in his mouth or grabbing it. You can even put crackers on his tray or pieces of bread. Most of it will not make it to his mouth, or he may put it in his mouth then spit it out. All this is normal and ok. It's part of the process.

It may seem like it will take forever, but seriously it happens so quick if you just make it part of the routine.

I wouldn't force him. If he's teething and/or doesn't have many teeth yet, this may be one reason he's rejecting the more solid foods. My daughter is nearly 12 months old and she still mostly prefers pureed. She does like chunky applesauce, small bits of cheese, orange, etc. Just go slow :)

My daughter didn't like anything but pureed foods until she was almost one. I also tried around 9 months but she just refused. I waited and tried it again and now she eats whatever I give her. Don't force it on your son. He'll be ready at some point. Good luck!

Hi M.~
I too am having the same problems with my now 10 month old-he chokes on the puffs, and even wagon wheels, once he's gotten a piece off-although not as often as the puffs. I have just switched him to stage 3 foods, which offer small pieces of veggies in it. As long as I only give small bites at a time, he seems to be doing better. We still have a little gagging at times, but he's trying to "mush" the lumps off to the sides. Having all that pureed food mixed in with the chunks seem to help.
Don't worry, He will be eating solids before you know it!

There is no special trick. Each child is an individual and his reguritation and/or choking on thicker foods is a innate reflex that nature has developed to protect him. When his system is ready, he'll be able to eat all different textures. Your job as a mom is to offer nutritous choices in healthy portions, not make your child eat something. So sit back and relax and it will come in time.

My LO is 11 months and still has issues with thicker textures. We started with the Yogurt Melts first and then moved onto the Puffs. The Yogurt Melts can be cracked in half to make them smaller and they melt pretty darn fast. Once he got the hang of them, the Puffs were no problem. I have tried thicker cereal and thicker yogurt, but my LO gags. We still puree everything and give stage 2 foods. I am planning on trying stage 3 over the next couple of weeks. At 9 months, I would not worry too much about it. As a previous poster said, each baby is different. Your LO will come around when he is ready, just like mine will come around when he is ready.

BTW-The Yogurt Melts are so yummy! My husband and I like eating them ourselves. :)

I would wait a couple more months. There is no rush to start him on solids. He's just not ready.

Don't try to force it on him. When he is ready, he will let you know. Try putting a few cheerios or similar cereal on his high chair tray and let him put it in his own mouth.

What does his dr. say? That's who'll give you the right advice for your baby. If his sucking mouth muscles are not developed, he won't be ready to chew. They don't know what chewing is until they progress from formula, maybe milk, cereal mixed in milk, then they start chewing on their bottle nipple. Four months is young to chew. Does he even have teeth yet?

My first child resisted anything solid until someone suggested plain cheerios. It worked well. They " melt" and I think the holes in the middle provided me a bit of reassurance about choking (whether warranted or not). Anyway, she loved them as a snack for months and I was gradually able to intro other things.

My little guy just started doing solids. He doesn't like lumpy avocado, beans or peas though. He will do applesauce or lumpy bananas. I gave him a little hard boiled egg yolk yesterday and that seemed to "melt" as he gummed at it. He did like it...And I have heard to do those tiny pasta stars or circles. Mix with baby food...

Hi M. - my son is also about 9 months and is having the same problem. He gags and sometimes even throws up when I give him something with more texture than the stage 2 pureed food. What's working for us is to mix the chunkier food with the pureed food. Also, I make chewing motions with my own mouth and he tries to copy me. I think he just doesn't understand sometimes that he needs to chew, not swallow. He loves feeding himself cheerios and will chew those. Mashed avocado has also been successful - it has more texture than pureed food because it's thicker but not chunky. I think he is learning to chew from that. Plus the avocado is really quick and easy to mash up. I give it to him on a spoon or in one of those mesh bags for him to feed himself. Good luck!