[blparent] finger food suggestions for an almost toddler

Tue Feb 24 20:49:43 UTC 2009

Thanks, Melissa.  It's nice to know there are others who have gone through 
this, and survived.

Sarah had no teeth for the longest time, and then she popped three of them 
in the last two weeks, with more about to come through.  She's just on her 
own schedule, I guess.  It could be that her mouth is tender, although she 
doesn't show signs of that when she is feeding herself.  I have baby spoons 
coated with rubber, and those seem to work well.

Jo Elizabeth

"Don't throw away the old bucket until you know whether the new one holds 
water."--Swedish proverb
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Melissa Ann Riccobono" <melissa at riccobono.us>
To: "'NFBnet Blind Parents Mailing List'" <blparent at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 1:02 PM
Subject: Re: [blparent] finger food suggestions for an almost toddler

> Oh, can I ever sympathize with this one!  First of all, just take a couple
> of deep breaths and know this too shall pass...  I promise!
> Here are a few things that come to mind.  First, is Sarah teething?
> I noticed Austin was always particularly fussy about the spoon when he was
> teething.  ?Then all of a sudden he wouldn't mind being fed again.  This 
> was
> up until he was about 14 to 16 months old when he just didn't want baby 
> food
> anymore period.  I did find a plastic spoon worked much better for Austin 
> in
> general; I think it was maybe a little warmer and more gentle on his mouth
> or something.  So, you may want to try a different type of spoon.  This
> unfortunately might not solve the problem.  You might need to try more
> finger foods.  Cheese is a great source of calcium and she should be able 
> to
> pick up and eat small bites with her fingers.  Yogourt is great, but maybe
> it will have to be put on hold for a little while until she'll let you 
> feed
> her, or until she can feed herself with a spoon.  There are yogourt drinks
> which seem pretty healthy, though I admit I've never looked too closely at
> the nutrishinal facts; Austin sometimes gets them for a treat.  They might
> be something to try.
> Dole makes great fruit bowls with all types of mixed and individual fruits
> that are easy to pick up for little fingers.  Austin loves almost all of
> these, especially the manderine oranges.  Of course your other option is 
> to
> just dice fresh fruits and veggies very small and let her have at it.  The
> same goes for any type of meat.  This all depends on how many teeth she 
> has;
> if I remember right she doesn't have many at this point which could limit
> the choices somewhat.  Finally, try not to stress out too much about what
> she's eating and what she's not right now.  Toddlers go through all kinds 
> of
> phases with food from hardly eating anything to wolfing down everything in
> sight in everything in between.  As long as she's getting her basic food
> groups in during a week period of time, everything will balance out.  Of
> course I'm not saying to just give her junk food or just peas, but I am
> saying there is a bit of wiggle room.  So, maybe put the spoon away for a
> couple of days and give her finger food, then give it a try again.
> I hope this rambling has helped you a little.
> Melissa
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blparent-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
> Behalf Of Jo Elizabeth Pinto
> Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 2:27 PM
> To: NFBnet Blind Parents Mailing List
> Subject: [blparent] finger food suggestions for an almost toddler
>
> Hi, all.  Sarah and I just got finished with the lunch from hell.  Or at
> least that's the way I perceive it--she seems pretty satisfied with the
> world now that it's over--she's babbling happily and playing with the pots
> and pans in my kitchen cupboards like nothing happened, like her clothes 
> and
> mine, and our hair, and the high chair aren't covered with Gerber 
> spaghetti
> and meat sauce, like we weren't both near tears five minutes ago.  I feel
> like I got hit by a train and dragged for a little while.  A slight
> exaggeration maybe, but only a slight one.
>
> Sarah and I have been having battles lately over the spoon, most of which 
> I
> lose.  It isn't that she doesn't want food, she's fortunately not a picky
> eater.  She'll try anything.  The deal is, she wants to feed herself. 
> Fair
> enough, that's the end goal, right?  But the spoon is too cumbersome for
> her, so she resorts to her hands.  That's fine, as long as she's eating
> diced banana or sweet potato or bits of meat or hard-boiled egg yolk, or
> whole round peas, or Cheerios.  But those foods alone hardly make up a
> balanced diet.  She needs other things that are too soft and runny to pick
> up, like yogurt and such, and she absolutely won't allow me to feed her 
> with
> a spoon.  If I can manage to hold down her two wildly waving fists with 
> one
> hand, she flops her head madly from side to side so I can't get the 
> dreaded
> spoon anywhere near her mouth with the other, and she ends up with food
> behind her ears, across her eyebrows, down her neck--you get the picture.
> And you can imagine the screeching sound track that goes with it.  I'm
> finding it hard to be calm and patient.  This time, after many tries, I 
> gave
> up on the spoon altogether because I don't want the high chair to become a
> power struggle or a source of traumatic memories, and I sure don't want to
> cross the line into force feeding.  I had that done to me as a child and
> still suffer the effects.  I thickened the Gerber spaghetti and meat sauce
> with cereal so it would hold together and just let her shovel it into her
> mouth with both hands from the high chair tray, and then cleaned up the 
> big
> mess afterward.  Gerald can feed Sarah with a spoon, but she certainly 
> isn't
> willing, it's just that he can see the flailing hands and the dodging 
> mouth
> and sneak bites in on her.  But he isn't here most of the time, and I have 
> a
> responsibility to figure this out.
>
> Anyway, besides the catharsis of writing this all out when I feel I have 
> to
> tell most people most of the time that things are utterly perfect, 
> otherwise
> I'm afraid they'll be doubting me as a parent and, in the case of my 
> family,
> wondering if they should intervene--I guess my question is how do I 
> resolve
> this stalemate?  I know I should give Sarah more finger foods, and I'll be
> looking for every new idea I can get on that front.  But till she can feed
> herself with a spoon, how can I help her and the mealtime skirmishes that
> nobody really wins?  It's so odd because she has no wish to hold her own
> bottle or learn to drink from a cup, but she wants to feed herself no 
> matter
> what.
>
> Thanks,
> Jo Elizabeth
>
> "Don't throw away the old bucket until you know whether the new one holds
> water."--Swedish proverb
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