Question
How should a child over five months and twenty days old introduce complementary foods? What are the effects if they do not drink breast milk?
Answer
Hello, a five-month-old baby can start introducing complementary foods. Here is a guide for introducing complementary foods:
- Begin by letting the child get accustomed to liquid foods such as soup and juice to spark their interest. These liquid foods can be diluted from adult soup and adjusted to the child’s body temperature, served before breastfeeding. Juice can be fed directly with water or mixed with formula milk.
- Gradually increase the quantity and variety of complementary foods. When introducing new foods, it should be done step by step, starting with small amounts and slowly increasing. Impatience may lead to failure. At four months old, you can start introducing egg yolks, starting with 1/4 and increasing to 1/2 after a week if the child digests well, then gradually to a whole egg yolk. At six months old, children can start eating whole eggs. Do not introduce two or more new foods at the same time. When introducing a new complementary food that the child has never had, wait until they get accustomed to it before introducing another new food.
- From thin to thick, soft before hard. For children between one and three months old, liquid foods such as rice porridge, vegetable soup, and juice can be consumed. As the child grows older, gradually introduce more solid foods such as thin porridge, soft noodles, and biscuits. If the child does not like the new complementary food on the first feeding, they may never like it again. Therefore, the first feeding of new complementary food should be made softer and more palatable to make it easier for the child to accept and avoid vomiting due to too hard food.
- From fine to coarse, from particles to chunks. The introduced complementary foods should be made finer…