Seeking Help with 5 Month Old Eating Habits.

I know you said you've added cereal to his diet. Try for breakfast adding cereal, formula, and for the flavor he seems to like try adding some stage one fruit flavor. Maybe this will help add a little variety to his meals. You would think they would come out with more flavors of food for the little ones. Also try flavoring his formula with some baby food. Hope this makes sense and helps.

Ask your ped if you can add CoaCoa to the formula...all kids love chocolate milk. It would probably only take 1/2 teaspoon to get the flavor of chocolate.

It comes in a powder form that most cook desserts with.

C.,

I am a lactation consultant so some of my adivice may not seem to apply to a formula fed baby but.....this is a baby we are talking about. The World Health Organization AND the American Academy of Pediatrics both recommend ONLY breastmilk (preferably) or formula for the first 6 months. NO cereal, fruit, cocoa or anything else. Babies will regulate their own intake to their hunger. By what chart is the doctor saying your child is "underweight?" The World Health Organization has come out with new charts for height and weight for both boys and girls. It is based on a breastfed infant which is the gold standard for human growth (formula is an artificial food so therefore the growth is not the same and shouldn't be used as the standard). These charts show that we have been overfeeding our babies no matter how they are fed. No wonder our society has such obesity problems (here in Georgia over 30% of our 3rd graders are overweight!)

My advice is to feed your child formula to his hunger, forget forcing the solids until he seems hungry for them and when you do start solids, give the baby real, nutrious food.....not that nasty tasting, library paste looking cereal! Offer bananas, mashed ripe avocado (great food-low allergy causing, good healthy fat, lots of nutrients and calories,), green beans, sweet potato..... If he is active, alert and meeting his developmental milestones, he is fine. Stop worrying about how many ounces......I guess that is one of the beauties of nursing, you don't know much the baby takes in and as long as the baby is healthy, it doesn't matter! You don't eat the same foods or the same amounts on a daily basis, neither does the baby!

Enjoy your baby, offer him formula to hunger, healthy foods when he is ready and don't focus on ounces of formula he is "supposed to drink" so food doen't become a battle ground that sets up life long problems.

Hope this helps.

Try adding a little fruit in his bottle along with the cereal, this helped with my infant. Also you can use stage two formula, which is formulated for babies 4 months and older.
These tpye of formulas give babies, who eat solid food, the extra nutirnents that they, need when eating solid food.

My son went through the same thing. Doctors worry about babies being underweight because iron in the milk help the brain develop. Babies that don't drink enough have lower iron of course. I started my son out on vitamins that you just drop in his milk once a day, gave him all the milk he wanted and tried differnt cereals until he was old enough to eat stage 2s. I also along with the cereal added a little juice to the milk to flavor it. If he don't care for one thing give it a week and try again. Baby's taste change all the time.

I am going through the same my daughter is 5 1/2 months old.She also didn't eat that much up until recently.Now she drinks alittle more and i try to feed her cereal before she drinks.She is still underweight,24 in and 13 lbs.Don't rush him into foods. "he doesn't drink as much as an average baby" is a bunch of poo.Infants eat what they want,how much they want,when they want.

Hi, I know how stressful it is to have a child considered underweight. This is how it was with both my first and third. Maybe to get him to drink more formula always offer it first before the solid food. There aren't much calories in solid food and especially since he is only 5 months if he doesn't eat many solids its just fine. My baby didn't start solids till 6 mos. Talk with your doctor but if he still is severly underweight you may be able to wake him at night to feed him. (if hes sleeping through) Best of luck.

Erin

My son didnt drink that much formula when he had an ear infection. Both my twins are under weight and my DR said formula is what puts the weight on them and they had to have cereal in their bottles due to reflux which filled them up quicker which in turn made them drink less. They get all their nutrients from the formula, maybe just focus on that for awhile, he is just 5 months. I hope this helps, every baby is different.

I would suggest changing his formula. He might starting eating better than. And make sure the daycare is feeding him exactly what you feed him. When my daughter was that age i had to change her formula because she wouldnt eat so just try that

I know people say that kids should keep their formula intake the same but you are giving the child more solid foods and so it will happen or at least that is how it worked for my kids the more they ate the less they drank until they got to the graduate foods then they would eat a whole one and have a whole sippy cup of formula or milk you may also want to try mussy table foods along with the jar foods