A lot of kids who are medically fragile also have trouble eating...this is known as oral aversion. In a nutshell, they just are not interested in eating and a lot of times they just don't like the way food tastes in their mouths. There's a lot more involved with oral aversion that I just won't be able to address in this post so I'll leave you some links.
With Gus, I worked very hard to avoid oral aversion and I think he would have done well if he had survived. From early on, I had encouraged him to "feel and taste" different textures. He loved chewing on things and I was very pleased with this.
When he was a bit older, we started giving him little bites of food...not much because we didn't want to cause him to stool too much which is common with Short Bowel Syndrome. Two of his favorite things to eat were Gerber Vegetable Puffs and cheese puffs! I know, I know....cheese puffs are not healthy but keep in mind here that Gus was not able to absorb anything so there was no chance he would have absorbed anything "bad". In fact, the cheese puffs were great because of the saltiness. Veggie and Cheese puffs are good because the melt away. When he would suck all the flavor out of the cheese puff, he would often tuck it behind his ear! I miss that!! lol!!
Of course, you'll want to check with your docs before trying these things out!
Mealtime Notions
Solid Foods
Help For Kid's Speech
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