Good feeding practices for infants and young children are among the most fundamental determinants of their health, growth, and development.
Good feeding practices will prevent malnutrition and early growth retardation. On the other hand, poorly fed children have a great risk of infection and impaired cognitive functions. The transition from an exclusive breast milk diet to one with an increased variety of foods is required to satisfy nutritional needs. Poor nutrition and mistakes during this transition may increase the risk of nutritional deficiencies.
5 common baby-feeding mistakes first-time parents should avoid
Monotonous feeding
Feeding one type of food is one of the common baby-feeding mistakes, especially during the introduction of complementary foods. This can be boring to the baby and can cause food refusal. Most parents feed their babies with cereal-based porridge and forget about the other sources of energy-giving foods. Some of these sources include potatoes, arrow roots, rice, wheat meals, and pumpkins among others.
You should practice food diversification by giving the baby different sources of carbohydrates, proteins, and a variety of vegetables and fruits. You should at least change the type of food fed every day. Having a meal plan for your baby will help in food diversification and reduce poor feeding.
Preparing tasteless foods
Most parents make baby food by boiling almost all the time. This makes the food tasteless and boring. Prepare appealing food for your baby. Babies also have a sense of taste and smell like adults do.
Boil what needs to be boiled and fry what needs to be fried. Add a little healthy cooking oil and a pinch of salt for taste and flavor. You can blend bananas, berries, mangoes, and any other sweet fruit to add flavor and sweeten porridge. Also, you can enrich porridge by adding a blended boiled egg. Always opt for natural ways to add taste and flavor and limit added sugars to enhance good feeding habits for your baby.
Late introduction of proteins
It is common to find a child having meat soup and not the meat itself. This is due to fear of allergens and reactions associated with meat. Intake of a little piece of lean meat or organs such as the liver will not harm your child. Animal proteins such as meat, eggs, and milk provide essential amino acids that the body needs. Lean red meat helps in the production of hemoglobin by red blood cells.
The introduction of protein should be a few weeks after the introduction of complementary foods. Timely introduction can help reduce and prevent the occurrence of nutritional anemia among young children. It also helps in cultivating good feeding habits early in your child’s life
Use of more than 3 porridge flour cereals
It is common among parents to mix baby’s porridge flour with different ‘things’ such as omena, cassava, yams, and groundnuts among others. In their view, these ingredients are meant to fortify and make the porridge more nutritious. However, most parents don’t know that feeding the baby with ingredients of mixed porridge flour has different cooking times. We normally cook our porridge for 20 minutes. These 20 minutes are not enough to cook omena, cassava, and groundnuts properly. This leads to indigestion and is harmful to your baby.
It is recommended to use single cereal flour or mix not more than 2 cereals. This makes it easier to identify allergens in case of any allergic reactions. For example, you can mix maize and sorghum flour.
Introduction of complementary foods and frequency of feeding
Complementary foods should be introduced at the age of six months. At this age, the baby needs energy and nutrients that exceed what breast milk provides. Those foods should be hygienically stored and prepared. Use clean utensils, bottles, tits, and hands to prevent diarrhea and vomiting.
Also, parents should take active care in feeding their babies by responding to the baby’s signs of hunger and encouraging the baby to eat. Feeding needs to be consistent with the appetite and satiety of the baby. At different ages, babies require different feeding frequencies per day and different amounts of food per serving. As a child advances in age, the frequency of feeding increases gradually.
Feeding a baby, especially for first-time parents, can be overwhelming sometimes. Mistakes are made because of a lack of access to the right information. Having the right information and following it can make feeding easier and more fun for your baby. Good feeding practices during infancy and childhood promote healthy growth, improved cognitive function, and physical activity. If you are a new parent, avoid the above mistakes and you’ll be on the right track to raising a healthy, bouncing baby.