8 mo old choking....

[B's Mom]

my ds will be 8 months old this saturday.  he is eating 3 puree meals a day.  i decided to try some finger foods.  i gave him some very small bites of soft cheese.   he seemed to be doing great with the first 2 pieces and then after the third one he bean to choke.  he would look like he got it down and then look like he was choking...he did a couple rounds of this and the ended up projectile vomitting on the kitchen floor!  i gave him a sip of h2o and the he projectile vommited two more times.  needles to say, we are all traumatised and i said that he will just have to eat purees for the rest of his life!  so, do you think he was not gumming them down and just swallowing?  he he just not ready yet?  was this a fluke?  i freaked out about having to try this again.  my instinct is telling me to wait a while.

[Freya'sMum]

Hello! Sorry that you've had to have such a traumatic experience , but let me reassure you that this is quite a normal thing for many babies to do .

Are you certain that ds choked (ie, a piece of food got into his windpipe and he stopped breathing), or was it gagging (sort of coughing up the food that resulted in the vomiting)? Gagging is a very normal, very safe mechanism that we all have to stop us choking, and it can be triggered by lumps or liquids (as you've seen) and looks much more distressing and unpleasant than it actually is.

So, my thought is that perhaps you need to introduce ds to more solid solids in a different way. Allow him to have a bit more control over eating lumps by simply putting a few finger foods on his tray, perhaps while you and dp are also eating so it's 'normal', and allow him to explore and play with them, no pressure on him to eat them at all. At some point he'll try exploring them with his mouth, if he has teeth might have a nibble, might chew it around a bit then spit it out, and then at some point will have a go at swallowing something. By allowing him to do it in this slow way, ds is less likely to gag/choke than if lumps are put into his mouth by someone else's hand or on a spoon - it will also give him more confidence.

Click on this link for some Finger Foods for Young Babies ideas.

In order for you to manage your anxiety, you could book yourself on a basic first aid for children course with the Red Cross, or St John's Ambulance or similar, they run local courses, usually free or for a very small charge, and would cover things like how to react if your lo does actually choke, and this would help you to feel more confident about what to do if it did happen. What you want to avoid is letting ds see how stressed this incident has made you, because I reckon he will be far less bothered by it than you are, and you don't want him to think that there is anything scary about food or eating, it needs to be a relaxed, enjoyable thing to do!

Let us know how you get on,

Ax

[B's Mom]

thankyou, thankyou!  i am feeling a bit better about it now.  i have also been considering the whole gagging thing.  after the holidays we will give it another go and just let him explore.  will keep you updated!