Noah's Dad

Feeding Time Wasn’t Always Fun

Per the recommendation of Noah’s speech and feeding therapist we have been sitting Noah in his car seat for meal time.

Why?  Apparently a car seat can provide an ideal sitting position for children with low muscle tone or for those that are not yet able to sit up on their own quite yet.

During the first few months of Noah’s life my feeding time with Noah was quite frustrating for both Noah and I.  As a result of his low muscle tone I had to support his neck, head, back, and bottom while I held his bottle in his mouth while wiping the milk that spilling from his mouth (also a result of the low tone in his mouth and jaw muscles.)

Since you and I only have two hands, you can quickly see how this could be frustrating (or perhaps you know from personal experience) for everyone involved!  In fact, when Noah was just a few weeks old he had to have a barium swallow study preformed to determine if he was aspirating.

Our solution?   We begin to work closely with a speech and feeding therapist who developed a therapy plan that would dramatically improve his (and mine) feeding time.

Her first suggestion was to strap him into the car seat while bottle feeding.  The car seat gave him the support he needed, and allowed me to focus simply on feeding him (and staring at those big beautiful eyes!)  Even though I missed holding him, our feeding time together was much more enjoyable.

Time For An Upgrade, After Five Months

After about five months of feeding, physical, and occupational therapy Noah begin to get much stronger and was even able to eat without having to be strapped in his car seat.

In fact his speech therapist even said he was doing so well we no longer needed her services! I was overjoyed!

About a month ago we started feeding Noah non-liquid food, and used the car seat for feeding since it supported his body so well.

We asked our physical therapist what she thought about using a infant high chair so we could have him at the table during dinner with us.  She said since he was still learning how to sit up, a highchair would cause him to work to hard, and to wait until he could sit up on his own.

So we continued to work with Noah, carefully considering his needs so that we could make progress.

Last week at his physical therapy appointment we were happy to learn that Noah was doing so well he was able for a feeding chair upgrade!  That’s right, it was time for an upgrade (and who doesn’t like upgrades?)!

The therapist thought the Safety 1st Recline and Grow Stage 5 Booster Seat was a good choice, which we purchased, and tried for the first time today.  Noah seemed to do really well in it.  It’s really important for a feeding chair to  have multiple adjustments, and we are really happy with how adjustable this chair is. The tray is very simple to take on and off, and the seat-back reclines forward and backwards so that we can find the perfect sitting positon for our son.  It also has a nice seat belt to help keep him strapped in.  My only compliant so far is that the seat belt only goes around his lap.  I’d like it to go over his shoulder also to help keep him from sliding down in the chair. Since he is still developing his core strength he was a tendency to slide down while eating.  This isn’t a huge problem, and really the only thing I wish the chair had.

We are still fine tuning the seat for the the optimum eating postion, but for now Noah sure feels like a big boy in his new chair!  In fact he was so relaxed in his new chair, he was able to have a nice dinner conversation with his mom during dinner!

So what about you?  What has your experience been? What have you used? What types of chairs? Any specific products? I’d enjoy hearing about your experience!

-Rick