Chew And Spit

[wsieving]

First I would like to say that I feel like a board hog, and I promise I will be more productive (replying to posts and etc.) after I've become more familiar with this condition. I feel terrible because all I've done so far is bleed everyone for information. I hope nobody minds .

Now on to the topic at hand... We have noticed that DD does this a lot, especially on days that we struggle to get her to eat (which is most days). We'll finally get her to take a bite of something and she'll chew it until all of the flavor is gone, then spit it out. We think maybe she knows that her tummy feels bad and that the food may make her tummy feel worse, so she chews it all up but doesn't swallow it. Am I crazy, or is this something that toddlers just do? My oldest two never did that, but maybe it is just a toddler thing.

Did anyone's children do this? It is so frustrating because she doesn't hardly eat anything at all anyway, really I don't know how she has the energy that she does. Yesterday was a good day. In the morning she chewed up a couple of french toast sticks, didn't eat until lunch and then had half of one of those little frozen salsbury steaks, later snacked on about 5 cheeze it sized gerber crackers, than ate the cheese off of a slice of pizza for dinner. On bad days she doesn't eat half that. We are waiting to go gluten free until the 19th when she goes to see a specialist in Kansas City. We are going to request after they draw blood that day for the go ahead to a gluten-free diet since we have decided against letting them do an endoscopy anyway.

[MarsupialMama]

We had to fight to get food into my 1 1/2 year old (at the time), and she didn't want to eat ANYthing. Half the time she would try to spit things back out, which was very aggravating. Mostly things like fruit with skins, so I started peeling all those. But she didn't like the texture of almost anything, except very pureed foods and mashed potatoes. We could get those down her because they basically just slide down before she had a chance to spit. She didn't have a chewing problem - she just had NO appetite and didn't want to eat.

I would suggest blending stuff up, making smoothies, mashed potatoes (with olive oil for extra calories) and we try to add pureed dates and honey now to many things (like cereals) because our dd seems to take sweet things very well (what child doesn't?) and it gets the extra calories in, but doesn't rob her system of nutrition like sugar does. (There is a BIG difference between fruit sugar & unrefined honey and then sugar)

One thing my daughter can't get enough of is a carob (or chocolate if you want) pudding. I take some dates and blend them with water until they are smooth, then add one avocado and a banana and a few Tablespoons of carob (or choclolate) powder. She eats and eats the stuff. If you don't have dates, add an extra banana or some honey to make it sweet enough. This gets in lots of raw easily digestible fats and carbohydrates, and carob helps the bowels move as well. If you want some protein in there, blend up some nuts, like almonds, with water at the beginning too (this gets them smooth).

The trick for smooth blending is to take the hard solids like nuts and BARELY cover with water. Almost equal amounts solid and liquid. Then, after it is blended, you can add more water or milk (whatever) to make it thinner.

[wsieving]

Carob pudding sounds like a great idea! I'll have to try that! On days she truely does not want to eat, it will not help (she will even turn down ice cream these days), but on days she decides to eat I bet it will be a hit! Thanks!

How long did it take her to get her appetite back after going gluten free?

[mardigan]

  wsieving said:

First I would like to say that I feel like a board hog, and I promise I will be more productive (replying to posts and etc.) after I've become more familiar with this condition. I feel terrible because all I've done so far is bleed everyone for information. I hope nobody minds .

Now on to the topic at hand... We have noticed that DD does this a lot, especially on days that we struggle to get her to eat (which is most days). We'll finally get her to take a bite of something and she'll chew it until all of the flavor is gone, then spit it out. We think maybe she knows that her tummy feels bad and that the food may make her tummy feel worse, so she chews it all up but doesn't swallow it. Am I crazy, or is this something that toddlers just do? My oldest two never did that, but maybe it is just a toddler thing.

Did anyone's children do this? It is so frustrating because she doesn't hardly eat anything at all anyway, really I don't know how she has the energy that she does. Yesterday was a good day. In the morning she chewed up a couple of french toast sticks, didn't eat until lunch and then had half of one of those little frozen salsbury steaks, later snacked on about 5 cheeze it sized gerber crackers, than ate the cheese off of a slice of pizza for dinner. On bad days she doesn't eat half that. We are waiting to go gluten free until the 19th when she goes to see a specialist in Kansas City. We are going to request after they draw blood that day for the go ahead to a gluten-free diet since we have decided against letting them do an endoscopy anyway.

Speech Language Pathologists work with kiddos this age & can help with oral motor/chewing/food texture aversions etc. It might be worth having an eval done. If nothing else, the SLP could offer suggestions to use at home.

[wsieving]

  mardigan said:

Speech Language Pathologists work with kiddos this age & can help with oral motor/chewing/food texture aversions etc. It might be worth having an eval done. If nothing else, the SLP could offer suggestions to use at home.

I don't really think it's that she doesn't know how to chew then swallow. This is something new she's been doing the past 2 months or so. I am hoping that once we get her on a gluten-free diet and her appetite returns that she will stop doing that.

Does anyone know how long it usually takes for kiddos to get their little appetites back after going gluten-free?

[MarsupialMama]

Well, like EVERYTHING ELSE in the celiac realm, it depends on the individual. But my daughter gained her appetite back around 3 weeks gluten-free.

[mommida]

My daughter did that when she was first diagnosed. I brought it up to the ped. gasto. His opinion along with her blood tests, was PICA. When a person is anemic (low iron levels) there is the need to chew non food items. The need to do this chewing can be dangerous as non food items are involved.

Hope our experience helps.

Laura