How to feed a baby at 7 months
In the first year of life, the child develops very actively, as the baby grows, the digestive, circulatory, nervous systems, musculoskeletal skeleton are formed, and tissues and organs grow rapidly.
When deciding what to feed a child for 7 months, you should know what physiological processes in the baby's body occur in this age period. In accordance with them, the diet of a child of 7 months is formed to provide the body with the necessary nutrients.
Despite the individual development of each baby, there are general patterns that are important to consider in order to understand why and what to feed a 7 month old baby. So, after six months in children:
- By the age of 7-8 months, the intestinal microflora is practically formed, which makes it easier to adapt to new types of food and process them more successfully;
- Frequent regurgitation of food stops. The valve between the esophagus and the intestine is almost formed, and the child spends most of his wakefulness in an upright position, which contributes to better retention of food masses in the intestine;
- Motor activity significantly increases, the baby crawls a lot, tries to stand, actively prepares for walking, spending a lot of energy in the process. Only breast milk or adapted milk formulas are not able to provide the child's body with nutrients for normal functioning and growth in the required volume;
- Teething begins at 6-7 months, for the formation of which babies need additional intake of calcium and vitamins necessary for its assimilation.
Therefore, it is necessary to introduce new products into the diet of a 7-month-old child, which in sufficient quantities will provide him with nutrients, vitamins, micro and macro elements.
How to feed a baby 7 months: menu
Despite the fact that the main food for a 7-month-old baby is still breast milk or infant formula, to improve the quality of nutrition, cereals, meat and fish dishes, cottage cheese, kefir, cheese, mashed potatoes from various vegetables, and fresh fruits should be added to the diet.
It is important, before feeding a 7 month old baby with a new complementary food, to track his reaction to unusual food. To do this, each new dish is introduced gradually, starting with a small amount, and if there are no allergic manifestations, poor appetite, or digestive problems, the portion size can be increased.
Consider at what time and what to feed a 7-month-old breastfed baby. Approximate daily baby menu:
- 6: 00-7: 00 - breastfeeding;
- 10: 00-11: 00 - vegetable soup with meat broth (20 g), mashed vegetables with half a hard-boiled yolk and a teaspoon of vegetable oil, preferably olive or corn oil (150 g), meat, fish or liver soufflé (10-30 g), fruit juice (5-6 tsp);
- 14: 00-15: 00 - breastfeeding, fruit juice (5-6 h spoons);
- 18: 00-19: 00 - buckwheat, rice or oatmeal porridge cooked in milk or water (150 g), freshly prepared baby curd (4 teaspoons) or kefir (50-70 g), fruit puree or scraped apple (3 tablespoons);
- 22: 00-23: 00 - breastfeeding.
Milk cereals are a good source of vegetable protein, starch, fiber, minerals and vitamins; if a baby is allergic to cow or goat milk, porridge is boiled in water and diluted with expressed milk or infant formula to medium density. Buckwheat contains many vitamins and iron, and rice contains starch; these cereals lack gluten (gluten), which usually causes allergic reactions in children, so they are the first to be introduced to the menu. You should start complementary feeding with cereals by preparing them from one cereal, in the future you can use a cereal mixture. After buckwheat and rice, you can start feeding with oatmeal, but this must be done with special care, since oatmeal contains gluten and can provoke allergies.
Before feeding a 7-month-old baby with semolina, it is important to know that semolina contains a lot of proteins, the biological value of which is extremely low, starch and gluten. It has practically no dietary fiber necessary for babies, and is low in fat. Therefore, in modern pediatrics, it is reasonably recommended to introduce semolina into the child's diet as late as possible.
Vegetable puree is prepared in the same way as for younger children, but from 7 months it can be mixed with chopped boiled meat (rabbit, veal) or beef liver.
Be sure to have baby curd and kefir in the daily diet at 7 months, which you can cook at home or take in the dairy kitchen.
How to feed a baby at 7 months if milk is gone
In the seventh month of feeding, the mother may begin another lactation crisis: at the same time, if the recommendations of the pediatrician are followed, milk usually arrives again. But if lactation is not restored, it is necessary to decide what to feed the baby at 7 months, if milk is gone.
The baby was naturally breastfed for up to 7 months, which is very good. This means that in the first months of life he received all the necessary nutrients, and due to the antibodies contained in breast milk, he strengthened his immunity well. The child is quite ready to switch to feeding with milk formulas without much harm to health. When switching to artificial feeding, you should choose the most suitable formula for your baby and reduce the number of feedings from 6 to 5 times, since it takes more time to fully digest the formula.
How to feed a 7 month old baby with artificial feeding, approximate time and menu:
- 6: 00-7: 00 - mixture or children's kefir (200 g);
- 10: 00-11: 00 - buckwheat, rice or oatmeal porridge cooked in milk or water (150 g), freshly prepared baby curd (4 teaspoons), 5-6 teaspoons of fruit juice;
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14: 00-15: 00 - vegetable soup with meat broth (20 g), mashed vegetables with half the yolk cooked hard-boiled and a teaspoon of vegetable oil, preferably olive or corn (150 g), meat, fish or liver soufflé (40 g), fruit puree or scraped apple (3 tablespoons);
How to feed a 7 month old baby - doctors' recommendations - 18: 00-19: 00 - mixture or children's kefir (200 g);
- 22: 00-23: 00 - if in the previous feeding there was milk mixture, then give kefir, and vice versa (200 g).
By the age of 7 months, the baby is confidently sitting, so all food, except for breast milk or formula, should already be given to him from a spoon. It is good to purchase a special children's chair and put it in the shared kitchen. Thus, your child will learn the skills of adulthood, better socially adapt and get to know the world around him. You should also not stop the baby's desire to pick up a spoon on his own and try to eat.
You have correctly identified what to feed your baby for 7 months, if your baby is active, develops well, learns the world around with enthusiasm and does not experience problems with digestion. He receives a sufficient amount of balanced nutrition, which provides the body with the necessary nutrients for growth and development. In the seventh month, babies gain on average 500-600 g of weight and grow 2 cm.
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