Please help! LO gags and vomits with finger foods!

[chars mum]

Really hoping for some help!
My DD is almost 1 and I think she is getting really tired of baby cereal and jarred food...trouble is, she very often gags and vomits whenever I try to give her more solid foods.   I do my best to mash or flake the food up for her but it doesn't seem to help.  The only thing she is OK with seems rice rusks and squished bananas and I can't just feed her those day in day out!  Would really love some advice, thanks!

[*Natasha*]

It took my DD1 a while to get use to chuny food as well what sort of food are you offering?

[chars mum]

We try mini cream cheese sandwiches, flakes of fish, potato chunks, etc.  Having a bit better luck these das with cheerios soaked in milk and yesterday some chunky jarred toddler food (she gagged but didn't vomit, managed to get a drink into her first). 

[jess, lukeys_mom]

regarding the gagging, it's quite normal for lo's to gag while they are getting used to solids. not choking obviously, but making that soundless 'o' shape with their mouth and gagging is not uncommon, it actually helps them learn how to do it.

i am not sure about the vomiting - is it happening every time? just with certain foods?

can you try giving her very small finger foods? what worked really well for us were slightly mushed peas or beans, cheerios, very small steamed pieces of veggies and small pieces of fruit, and rice cakes. also i would take thin slices of cheese and cold cuts and roll them up for him to hold and bite. also i would take sandwiches and then much the bread between my fingers so it would flatten and break off small pieces for him till he got used to bread.

for the record, my ds never ate the chunky mixed jar foods, he would pretty much spit them out and react badly. single foods always worked better.

[Spectra]

My son is the same way and he just turned one.  You said she seems fine with Rice Rusks, have you tried bread or other items that she can manipulate herself?  If I smash up carrots and sweet potatoes and feed them to my son he will gag and vomit too.  However I give him rice cakes and bread and he will gnaw on it and sometimes swallows.  This is good as it gets him use to eating things with texture.

In regards to the fruits and veggies I've been added a Tablespoon at a time of real mushed up sweet potato with a whole jar of pureed foods.  Sometimes he will gag, but he is much better and is getting use to it.  Perhaps this will help you?  Doing it slowly and try giving her more stuff to handle on her own.

[chars mum]

Thanks so much for your replies ladies!  Just to answer some of your questions: no, she doesn't vomit every time, in fact we have been vomit-free for a few days now.  Think it was happening with foods that were too dry.  Took your advice and cut everything up into super small pieces and so far so good.  Also been making sure food is moist.  She has started wanting to put her food into her mouth on her own too which is great, messy but wouldn't expect otherwise!  Also been giving her loads of time to chew/gum and swallow which I think is helping too.  Just makes meal times rather long and she gets antsy sitting in her highchair for so long!
Trying to move away from jarred foods so introduced scrambled eggs yesterday and they went over pretty well.  She still likes her jarred fruit, as such we are keeping those for dessert.

[Spectra]

That's awesome!  So nice when things start going in the right direction.

[jess, lukeys_mom]

i hope it continues to go well chars mum. by the way just wanted to add, does your lo eat yogurt? my ds loves it so i've found that for a great many foods i serve that he's not into eating, i can mix with some yogurt and he spoons it right up.
keep us posted!

[chars mum]

Thanks for the encouragement ladies! 
My LO seems neither here nor there about yogurt, perhaps if I tried one with a bit of flavour rather than plain she may take to it a bit more.  Do you use a flavoured type?

[jess, lukeys_mom]

i use plain, but introduced it at 7mo so he is really used to it. you can get the plain kind and spoon some applesauce or other fruit puree through it.