Nutrition for children up to a year: diet and diet

2024 Author: Priscilla Miln | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 00:21

Every mother wants her baby to be active and cheerful. It is no secret that the activity of the child, his he alth and well-being largely depend on nutrition. The nutrition of children up to a year should be balanced and complete. The growth, development of the baby, his immune system directly depend on the right diet. A growing child's body must receive a certain dose of vitamins, proteins and carbohydrates daily. The lack of vitamins causes hypovitaminosis and beriberi. Overfeeding contributes to obesity, and a lack of protein in food can cause malnutrition. In many ways, the correct organization of baby food for a baby up to a year depends on his parents.

Types of nutrition for children up to a year

So, in order. Nutrition for children up to a year is carried out in three ways. Natural, artificial and mixed. Each method corresponds to its own diet for a child up to 1 year old. Below we will consider all three methods in more detail.

Natural feeding

Natural feeding - feeding the baby with breast milk. The breast milk of a woman contains all the substances necessary for the life and growth of the baby: unsaturatedfatty acids, lactose, proteins, fats and carbohydrates. The nutritional value of breast milk is very high. The immune elements contained in breast milk protect the baby's body from infections until its own immunity is developed. Lactose, contained in large quantities in breast milk, has a positive effect on the formation of bone tissue and the functioning of brain cells. In addition, during sucking, the muscles of the maxillofacial apparatus are correctly formed in the child. The diet of children up to a year with natural feeding is free: the child eats when he wants to. With this mode, lactation is maintained at a high level, which has a positive effect on the he alth of the mother.

After two to three months, you can switch to a flexible meal schedule: start a meal every two to three hours. From six months, the first complementary foods are introduced, but the proportion of breast milk should exceed the proportion of complementary foods. According to the famous pediatrician Komarovsky, you should not introduce the first complementary foods into the baby's diet before six months in any case.

Artificial feeding

Not every woman can breastfeed after giving birth. There may be several reasons for this: lack of lactation, intolerance to the components of breast milk by the child, mother's illness, defects in the child's sucking apparatus.

How to feed a child under 1 year old in this case? Mother's milk differs in its composition from the milk of domestic animals (cow, goat, buffalo). Therefore, the newborn is fed with ready-made milk mixtures, in the compositionwhich includes dry animal milk mixed with various cereals (rice, oatmeal, buckwheat). The mixtures also include various vitamins, fish oil, vegetable oils, prebiotics, nucleotides, and minerals. Modern milk mixtures are also hypoallergenic. Complementary foods start at 4 months, when the growing body of the child lacks the nutrients contained in breast milk. With artificial feeding, it is necessary to monitor the baby's weight gain monthly. It should gradually increase.

Disadvantages of artificial feeding:

• Mixtures do not contain those immunomodulatory elements found in breast milk. Therefore, the mother must follow the measures for the prevention of diseases in infants: do not take him to crowded places; keep the children's room clean, ventilate it; wear a mask to a newborn if a family member is infected.
• Nutrients from breast milk are absorbed faster.
• Artists from the mixture may experience allergies, dysbacteriosis and iron deficiency anemia.

Recommended interval between meals for artificers: 3-4 hours with a 6-hour break at night. In total, 6-7 feedings are obtained per day. Dr. Lukoyanova recommends calculating the required amount of food for the baby, based on the calorie counting method. A he althy baby up to six months needs 115 kcal / 1 kg of weight per day, after six months and up to a year - 110 kcal / 1 kg. Knowing the calorie content of infant formula and the weight of the child, you can easily calculatedaily portion size.

Mixed feeding

With a mixed type of nutrition for children under one year old, nutritional mixtures are added to breast milk in a 1: 1 ratio. There can be several reasons for mixed feeding:

• mother's illnesses;
• cracked nipples that make breastfeeding painful;
• Contraindications related to certain medications.

The pediatrician usually recommends a mixed type of nutrition for children born prematurely, newborns who are underweight, as well as children with diseases of the central nervous system who have a weak sucking reflex.

Recently, doctors recommend putting orthodontic nipples on feeding bottles. These nipples are shaped like a female nipple, and the baby hardly notices the difference. The diet for this type of feeding should be clearly defined.

Nutrition in the first days of life

Feeding infants under 1 year of age in the early days has a number of features. The first feeding of the baby takes place within the walls of the maternity hospital. The newborn sucks colostrum from the mother's breast - a female secret that stands out before birth and for five days after. Colostrum is fatter and thicker than milk, more nutritious. Three to seven days after birth, a nursing mother has transitional, then mature milk.

First food: where to start? According to the WHO resolution of 2002, the first complementary foods for breastfed children should be introduced at six months. The exception ischildren:

• weighing less than 3 kilograms;
• with intrauterine growth retardation;
• with various diseases.

For formula-fed and mixed-fed babies, complementary foods are introduced from 4–6 months.

Signs by which you can determine that the child is ready for the first feeding:

• baby's weight doubled by 4-5 months;
• 4 hours after feeding shows restlessness and demands more food;
• when feeding begins to swallow food, and not push it out with the tongue, as before;
• shows interest in parents food.

Complementary foods from 4 to 6 months

Artists are given complementary foods from the age of four months. It is necessary to take into account the moment that the stomach of a baby of this age is not able to digest the food of an adult. Therefore, all components of complementary foods should be of a pasty consistency, cereals are introduced after the eruption of the first milk tooth, solid food - after the appearance of three or four teeth.

Starting from 4 months, in the menu of a child up to a year old, you can enter:

• Pure stewed vegetables without s alt. Puree can be from carrots, broccoli, potatoes, green beans, spinach, zucchini, pumpkin. Then you can add sweet fruit purees from bananas, pears, apples, avocados to the diet. Some vegetables such as cabbage, turnips, onions, artichokes are high in fiber and can cause flatulence.
• Unsweetened compotes from berries and fruits (apples, pears).
• Kisely.
• Egg yolks.

From 6 months you can givepre-boiled cow or goat milk, kefir.

Important! Don't add two ingredients to your diet at the same time!

Here's what pediatricians say about the volume and nutrition of children under 1 year old (at the age of 5 months):

1. Total food intake at this age should not exceed 900 g/day.
2. The total volume of mother's milk (mixture) should not exceed 0.7 l / day.
3. Fruit puree and freshly squeezed fruit juices - no more than 40 ml/day.
4. Vegetable puree - 15-150g/day (for breastfed babies); 10-100 g/day (for artificial people).
5. It is allowed to add butter to cereals and mashed potatoes up to 4 g / day. The oil must be exclusively natural without the use of chemical additives.

Important! Each product is introduced into the diet gradually, in small portions. If you experience allergic reactions, you should immediately consult a doctor!

Porridge in the diet of a 6-7 month old baby

Porridge is an important element of the child's menu up to a year. From six months, pediatricians recommend including milk porridge in the child's diet. With dystrophy or underweight, you can introduce them into the diet earlier. Porridges are cooked in milk or water. For their preparation, rice, buckwheat, corn, semolina, oats, millet, pearl barley and other cereals are used. But not all cereals for children up to a year are useful. Cereals from cereals containing gluten (wheat, barley, oats, rye) can sometimes cause allergic reactions. Therefore, in the first months of complementary feeding, babies are fed cereals from gluten-free cereals (buckwheat, rice, corn). From 8 monthsyou can give oatmeal, from 9 months - millet, barley and pearl barley. Children are fed with semolina porridge, starting from one year. Milk of animal origin can also cause allergies in a child, so it is advisable that cereals be boiled in water or breast milk.

Give preference to homemade cereals, as fast-cooking cereals may contain vitamins of chemical origin.

Give porridge to the baby in small portions, half a teaspoon in the morning. At the same time, monitor the reaction of the child's body during the day. If there is no allergy, then the serving can be increased to 150 grams.

How to cook porridge?

The groats must first be washed and dried, grind in a coffee grinder or blender to a powder. Then pour into boiling water and cook until tender.

Cool the finished porridge to room temperature and only then feed it to the baby. For taste, you can add any vegetable or fruit puree to the finished dish.

Complementary foods from 7 to 8 months

Starting with fruits and vegetables, you can gradually introduce more protein foods into the diet from the age of seven months:

• Minced meat (beef, rabbit, pork);
• Chicken eggs.
• Beans, peas, lentils.
• Dairy products (yogurt, kefir, cream, custard). Preferably low sugar.

Exceptions are: sausages, canned food, smoked meats and offal.

At this age, the baby is already trying to eat food on his own. You need to make sure that the pieces of food are small, otherwise the baby may choke.

Complementary foods from 8 to 11 months

Children's diet during this period may include starchy foods such as bread, baked goods, pasta, potatoes, rice, fish, eggs, meat. It is necessary to ensure that there are no bones in the fish, and skins on the sausages. It is advisable not to give sweets and chocolate until a year old.

Feeding a one year old baby

The diet of a child at 1 year old should include a variety of useful components. The composition of food should include amino acids, phosphatides, vitamins, minerals, organic acids.

Baby after 12 months does not need breast milk, as before, so many mothers are trying to wean the baby from the breast. Although breastfeeding may continue up to three years.

The diet of a 1-year-old baby is not much different from the diet of an 11-month-old baby, except that the portion size increases. Consider an approximate menu for a day of a one-year-old baby:

• For breakfast milk porridge with natural butter, dried fruit compote.
• For the second breakfast, cottage cheese with berries or fruits, cookies, yogurt.
• For lunch, vegetable puree, two steamed cutlets (meat or fish), fruit juice.
• A glass of yogurt or kefir for an afternoon snack.
• Dinner stew with lean mashed meat, juice.