We met with Arianna's new nutritionist last night. I asked her nanny to plan on staying late so that the two of us could present our experiences with Arianna and eating.The conclusion - she drinks too much and it's filling her up.
Um.. ok, I feel stupid.
When we started transitioning Arianna to solid food she was drinking the bare minimum of breast milk: 18 - 20 ounces a day via bottle. I was very concerned of starting solid food because she already didn't drink enough. I never though I would hear the day that she drinks too much milk. I did alot of research and everything I read, at the time said that food was simply in ADDITION to the milk she was already taking in. So our solution was to let her drink everything she wanted, through out the day. Currently she is drinking 30+ ounces a day of milk/eggnog/apple juice/PediaSure. We let her drink all she wants. As a matter of fact the only 'food' she will ask for is her 'baba' (sippy cup). We will usually leave a full 12 oz. sippy cup of apple juice in her crib at night and it will be gone in the morning.
So... the nutritionist is having us do some big changes.
- No eating in front of the TV
- Set a time limit to the meal
- Make her eat what we eat but offer one food we know she will eat
- No sippy cups in the crib
- No sippy cups outside of meal time
- She always eats at the table with at least one other person
- No distractions and include her in conversation
- When she starts fussing or playing with her food - she's done.
I hope it works. This morning we got her out of the crib, she immediately started with "elmo, baba, baba" because she's used to eating breakfast while watching elmo. Shawn made toast while I got her changed and we sat her in the high chair with 1/4 of a piece of toast (one toddler serving out of the 4 per day she should get, btw) while we all sat at the table. She also got a container of Le Creme yogurt and a small sippy cup of milk. She drank the milk, played with the toast and had 3 spoonfuls of yogurt...
I'm optimistic and hopeful. I also feel a bit like a failure because this is common sense stuff and we've been doing the exact opposite for over a year...
I wish kids came with a manual, seriously.
UPDATE:
Talked to the nanny...
...SHE'S EATING!! SHE ATE A SNACK AT 9:30 AND PART OF HER LUNCH AT 11:30!!!
I feel like crying... doesn't take much these days, of course.
7 comments:
Jen,
Sometimes I don't like to comment on things because I don't have a premie.. so I feel kind of weird and like I shouldn't, but in regards to this I will. Ross and I were talking about the previous won't eat post (before this current one was posted) and we both came to the conclusion that if she continually grazes throughout the day on small things.. she will never work up an appetite because she never gets empty.
What we did for Willow was to setup a feeding schedule. She gets up in the am, changed and dressed and then plunked into the high chair. (no tv/radio/toys) She starts off with fruity cheerios while I get the milk ready, ~5oz (in her bottle-still), which she feeds herself, then I give her 5/6oz of 3rd food oatmeal or mixed cereal, then a 3.5oz of 2nd food fruit. Then ~4oz of half juice/half water in a sippy cup. Then she is done. I dont feed her snacks or more juice until lunch. I do leave a sippy cup filled with water on her table for her to drink as she needs to.
I feed her lunch ~4hours after she has had her breakfast. Pretty much same routine except oatmeal/mixed is replaced with a 3rd food meal live veg beef, chicken noodle etc.. once she's done with that I feed her some of what I am having for lunch (usually cold cuts and cheese) then the fruit, then the juice. I usually add on a cookie at the end.
She takes one nap now, so it usually is from 2-3 until about 6-7 averaging 3 hours. Then she gets up and has dinner.. then hangs out with us until bed time.
You probably don't really need to read all this but the entire thing is to stress a routine schedule. She gets up, she gets breakfast, plays, gets lunch, naps, gets dinner, plays, goes to bed.
Repeat... :)
In regards to the bottle in the crib.. if you have a hard time getting her to give it up, start watering it down with water and giving her less and less.. It really isn't good for their teeth to have something like that overnight in their mouth.. but water is actually good for them!
I know hind sight is 20/20, but just wanted to give you some insight.. hope this helps!
Dianne
Hey Dianne!
Thanks for the post- this is exactly what the nutritionist stressed to us - a routine. She does have a routine during the week for the most part - eating breakfast/lunch at the same time. Dinner varies followed by a bath but her bed time is pretty set at 7:30.
So now we're supposed to concentrate on an actual feeding schedule - which we hadn't before because we concentrated too much on caloric intake. If she wasn't going to eat actual food we were going to maximize the calories she would take in - drinking. That's another reason we did the bottle at night - to maximize what she would 'eat'. In hind sight (which is always 20/20 huh?) it would have been better to set limits on her liquids and concentrate on her eating...
Oh well... now we know (and knowing is half the battle! hehe) and can start concentrating on her self feeding techniques.
It's hard for me to think that her eating could be something as simple as not giving her the chance to WANT food... but it sounds like it is :)
I hope Willow is doing well - we'll have to get together again and let the kids play. Either way Arianna's birthday party is in March at Little Gym in Walpole and we'll send an invite your way - I bet Willow will have a great time too :)
Jen,
So happy to hear she ate. Good luck this weekend and fill me in on Monday.
Sally
Will do Sally! :)
When will you no longer be 'anonymous'? hehe
Get working on your blog girl! :)
Wow...that's so great! It's wonderful to see how fast Arianna caught on to the program!
We are in the same boat as you guys started out in...about 20 ounces of highly fortified milk and some prune/peach/miralax cocktail each day (maybe 4 ounces?) On top of that, about 12-14 ounces of puree per day. All in front of the TV or, in the case of the nap bottles and bedtime bottle, half asleep. I hope we can get to toast some day...and maybe losing the Elmo component of mealtime.
Won't it be nice to get rid of elmo? I was actually singing the songs to myself one night when I went to bed... I knew I'd had enough.
heh
I VERY proud of Arianna!
It is hard. I don't give the kids anything to drink other than their formula, and I wonder if that's okay. They have tried egg nog from a sippy cup which Edwin loved and Serena could care less about. My theory was not to let them fill up on calories from juice, and to encourage eating (more calories) as much as possible. They have consistent times when they take a bottle, but are also offered formula many times throughout the day, it's their only source of fluids.
Is this wrong/right? I don't know. I know our nurses make comments like "you don't give them juice do you?" Should I be? They have a fruit or veggie at every meal,so isn't that enough?
These are questions I plan to ask the pedi on Monday for their 15 month well visit. They will be about 1 year adjusted age and we have to see what they will have next since whole milk I doubt will be enough calories for them.
Anyway don't feel bad, who knows about these things?
I'm glad she was into snack and lunch and I hope the trend continues!
And as for crying, it comes so easily to me as well...imagine being pregnant...okay waterfalls!
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