Raising my child to eat on his own before he is one year old is the best decision I have ever made

I was chatting with a mother some time ago. She said that during the Spring Festival, her husband and she were raising a one-year-old baby at home. It was fine if she was tired, but feeding her food was really overwhelming. The baby didn’t like to eat the pureed food that she had worked so hard to prepare. He vomited it up while feeding, making a mess all over his body. He kept grabbing for the spoon. By the time he finished feeding the baby, his own food was cold. Everything this mother said seemed familiar to me. When Su Bao was first introduced to complementary foods two years ago, I was a very conscientious mother. I cut vegetables, cooked them, pureed them in a blender, and then fed them in bite by bite. It took at least an hour to eat a meal. Later, I went to an American mother\’s house. It was summer. During the meal, her 9-month-old son was shirtless and wearing a bib. She broke the food into small pieces and put them on the dining chair, and the baby grabbed and ate them. The adults were chatting, laughing, and eating their own food. They just wiped the children\’s mouths from time to time. I quickly asked my friend for advice and asked her how she managed to get her baby to eat independently. That was the first time I learned about Baby-led Weaning (BLW for short, a very popular concept of independent feeding of infants in the United States). As soon as I got home, I started practicing with Su Bao. By about 9 months old, Su Bao was able to eat finger foods skillfully. When Su Bao was one year old, I basically completely freed myself from feeding him. After this first experience, I started introducing finger foods within 7 months of Guozi. By the time Guozi was 8 months old, except for yogurt and pureed meat, which he was spoon-fed, he had achieved more than 80% independent eating, and I felt much more relaxed. Why should we train babies to eat independently? There are many benefits to independent feeding from infancy, and it\’s not just because adults don\’t want to feed me, although I was somewhat motivated by that in the beginning. But after carefully studying BLW, I learned that babies can eat independently: 1. Develop chewing ability early and exercise oral muscles, so that the baby will eat more easily and speak more clearly in the future 2. Exercise fine motor and hand-eye coordination, and be able to sense when eating The materials of different ingredients are also excellent sensory stimulation. 3. The most important point is to cultivate confident children. Spoon feeding is passive eating, and the baby cannot control how much or how fast he eats. Self-directed eating allows the baby to control his or her own satiety and stop when full, allowing the baby to accurately perceive and respond to his own needs. When can he start? In fact, judging whether the baby is ready to eat independently mainly depends on whether the baby has the ability and willingness to eat independently. For example, many mothers will find that babies after 6 months like to grab toys and stuff them into their mouths, or they like to grab the spoon during spoon feeding. These are all signs of their willingness to eat independently. As for the ability to eat independently, American feeding expert Gill Rapley\’s suggestion in his book on BLW is: if the baby can sit firmly without assistance, can pick up things more accurately and put them into his mouth, chewing on toys will occur on the cheeks. Then you can try finger foods. In fact, even if the baby\’s teeth have not yet come out, finger foods can be introduced after adding complementary foods at 6 months, because the teeth are actually under the gums, and the gums are already very hard at this time. How to do it? It only takes three simple steps to help your baby learn to eat independently: 1. Prepare and eatAppropriate Food When you first add finger foods, cut the food into shapes that are easy for your baby’s little hands to grasp. For example, cut carrots, pumpkins, bananas, etc. into long strips of 5-6 cm and about 1 cm in diameter. I will cut broccoli into torches, leaving a long handle underneath. Vegetables should be cooked but not too soft, otherwise they will break when the baby pinches them, which will reduce the success rate of independent eating. As your baby develops better grasping skills, or around 9 months of age, you can offer smaller pieces of bread, cheese, and vegetables. Macaroni about 5 centimeters is also a good choice and can be eaten directly. It is best to put 1-2 pieces of cut food on the small table of the dining chair for the baby, and put new pieces after eating. If you put too much at once, your baby may scratch randomly without a goal. Some foods pose a choking risk and are not suitable as finger foods. They are not even recommended for babies before the age of three, such as nuts, tablespoons of peanut butter, and whole grapes. 2. Prepare the tools to use. It is a headache to eat a set of food and change a set of clothes. Like Guozi, when he first started eating on his own, he created a disaster scene every minute. But with the right tools, cleaning will be easier. It goes without saying that a dining chair is necessary. After your baby starts eating with a spoon, you should choose a suction cup bowl, cup, and an easy-to-grasp spoon. Su Bao and Guozi received complementary food before he was one year old. The standard equipment is a triangular cotton bib (to catch the juice flowing from the chin to prevent it from flowing into the neck and making it difficult to clean), and wear a waterproof long-sleeved blouse, preferably There is a pocket in the belly to collect fallen food. If your baby likes to throw food and water cups, it is best to spread a few old newspapers or plastic sheets on the floor to make cleaning easier. 3. Trust your baby to feed himself. The next most important and difficult step is to let go. I remember that when Guozi started to eat on his own less than 7 months old, he would be unable to grasp the food accurately, or he would finally pick it up and bring it to his mouth and then drop it. Guozi would squeal in anxiety, and my hands would feel itchy watching it. Want to help her. I believe that everyone will encounter this situation at some point on the way to introducing finger foods, but at this time it is best to hold back and let the baby try it on his own, so that he can make progress through continuous practice. For babies who have just introduced finger foods, even if they only eat 5% each time, 95% fall to the ground, which is normal. Note that finger foods are only safe for babies to eat by grabbing them with their own hands. Some mothers may find that when their baby first starts eating finger food, if he puts too much in his mouth, he may retching. In fact, this does not mean that the baby is choking, but the baby\’s body\’s self-protection mechanism to swallow the food. Vomit it out. Adults must not put pieces of food directly into the baby\’s mouth just because they want to help the baby. This may cause the risk of suffocation. Of course, whenever the baby eats on his own, an adult should accompany him throughout the process, just in case. If you insist on letting your baby practice for 1-2 months, you will find that your baby\’s ability to eat independently will improve significantly, and because you are in control of how much, how fast, and how to eat, your baby will enjoy eating more. In short, looking back now, let both children learn to eat independently and develop self-confidence.Snacks free adults from feeding and allow them to spend more time with their children. It is truly one of the best decisions I have made in my parenting journey. Maybe you can try it too.