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Home › Articles › Feeding Baby › Who's the Boss?

Who's the Boss?

Eliminating Mealtime Struggles

By Toddie Downs

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It's high noon. The showdown begins. Parent and Baby square off – Mom with her trusty spoon, Baby armed with nothing but a turn of the head, a purse of the lips and an unerring ability to bat away any feeding implement. This dining room's not big enough for the two of them. How can a parent bring peace back to mealtime in this contest of wills?

OK, maybe your baby is not exactly Clint Eastwood with drool. And there are those dream infants out there who will scarf down anything that is put in front of them. But generally at around 8 to 12 months of age, many babies start refusing to eat or eat only a few bites before sending some very definite signals of "all done."

While this is a completely normal phase for children to pass through, in my experience as a speech-language therapist in a feeding clinic, I have seen parental reactions to this phase range from laid-back humor to full-blown panic. Using some easy behavioral techniques, however, parents can eliminate a significant portion – if not all – of the struggle and make meals a more pleasant experience for everyone involved.

Why? Why? Why?
What causes the struggle? What makes these children, normally so loving and sweet, turn into miniaturized tyrants and dictators?

According to Cara Cuddy, Ph.D., a child psychologist and director of the Pediatric Feeding Disorders program at Cleveland Clinic Children's Hospital for Rehabilitation in Cleveland, Ohio, children at this age are just beginning to develop a sense of autonomy, a knowledge that they are separate and independent from their parents or caregivers. As part of this development, she says, they begin to struggle for control of their own bodies. So what goes in or stays out of a baby's mouth is partially a measure of him exerting his independence.

Some of the refusal behaviors can mean more than one thing. Sometimes, a child bats the food away with the spoon to say she is bored with the applesauce and wants something else. Sometimes it means she wants to be done with the meal. And sometimes it means it is time to transition to new foods and textures. My 1-year-old son started turning his head and refusing baby food once he'd sampled some "big boy" food, which I interpreted as him realizing how bland baby food can taste.

Struggles may begin even earlier than 8 months with children who are hypersensitive to things being in their mouths. These children probably have not had a lot of experience mouthing different textures, such that even a very watery strained puree seems overwhelming to them, and they may react strongly to it with gagging or choking. The struggling behavior with these children is not as much related to autonomy as it is the discomfort associated with mealtime. Treatment by a certified speech-language therapist or occupational therapist will usually resolve these issues over time.

It Takes Two to Tango

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