[klriggins]

13 month old "L" has made some progress in speech therapy. He can now eat stage 1 applesauce, peaches, pears, sweet potatoes. Oh and sometimes that Yo baby yogurt with cereal and such in it. On a good day he will eat all of it off a spoon (maroon spoon) and others he refuses, will only eat out of a medicine dropper. Still have to keep water with a straw to wash it down. And today he even ate 3/4's of mango desert off a spoon. Yay!

Concern is, he WILL NOT. NOT. Eat anything green, or squash. Not just that he refuses and makes an ugly face, but he literally gags on it. I've tried thickening, i've tried thinning...They've increased the concentration of his formula in hopes of gaining weight, and I'm worried he's not getting everything he needs since all he will eat is fruit and the occasional sweet potato. Any of you have any ideas of tricks to sneak it in there?

[athikers]

My two year old eats stage 2 and 3... but, I'm just glad he eats right now and we are weaning his feeding tube.

Tucker also only eats fruit... at least until very recently.

Here are a few things to try.

First and simplest... does he automatically gag, even on the FIRST bite of it? If not, try to give him one bite of something he LOVES then one bite of green stuff, then another bite or two of something he loves, then sneak in another bite of green stuff.

If that's not possible (it was not with our son until YESTERDAY!), do this.... its slow and painstaking, but worth it.

Open your container of whatever he loves and put one teaspoon of whatever green veggie he does not like into it and mix it VERY well so you have an entire jar of yummy food with just ONE teaspoon of yucky food in it. If he tolerates it, which he should, then next time add two teaspoons, then three, until you are having to remove some yummy food to get the "yucky" food in. We can do this with Tucker, but only about 1/3 yucky to 2/3 yummy... otherwise he won't tolerate it. But, that gives him some variety.

Here are some examples from our house, oral aversion central...

For breakfast, kiddo has banana yogurt stage 2 (which he loves) with stage 3 oatmeal (he does not like) mixed in. Right now we can mix in one giant scoop of oatmeal and he still eats it. So, it takes about 3 days maybe four to use up the one oatmeal, and he eats an entire jar of the yogurt each day.

For his second feeding, he gets regular yogurt (it took awhile to tolerate it) with tiny fruit pieces mixed in (again, you will have to work up to this).

For his third we do a fruit and veggie every other bite or so. I'm thinking again, it will take about three days to go through a veggie jar... because its yucky of course.

For dinner, we again mix in a higher texture (minced pasta maybe) into a flavor he likes.

Oral aversion is hard work and something a lot of people really don't get. I can't tell you how many times I've heard "Just stop feeding him, he's a big boy, he will eat" Umm... no, he'd starve to death.

Hang in there and pm me any time! I've done this twice now, once with foster son and once with my soon-to-be adopted son, so I know a LOT of little tricks!!!

Also, if your kiddo has such aversions they should still be on a complete nutrition drink, not just whole milk. PM me if you want suggestions on this part.

Also about the gagging... if you can get it further back in his mouth it might help... it also might make it worse. So all you can do is try. The theory is if its a TASTE aversion and he tastes less of it, he is more likely to swallow.

[HopefulMommy]

I would make sure he is on a multivite. It took me 3 to find one that the princesses would accept. Now I mix it in her Juice in the am.

I would also look into fish olis and add them to food as well. Helps with brain and eye development with some research on helping with attachment and ADD/ADHD issues.

You sound like you have your hands full!! Good luck!