Starting Solids

Solids start on the ordinary timetable. The World Health Organization recommends beginning complementary foods at around six months, with breastfeeding continuing alongside — and that applies to your baby as much as to any other.

There is no diabetic diet for an infant. First foods are the ones any Indian family would offer: soft khichdi, mashed dal, rice, well-cooked vegetables, curd, ragi or suji porridge, mashed banana and other soft fruit.

What does change is the glucose pattern, and it changes quite noticeably. Milk arrives fairly predictably; solid food does not. Expect readings to become more variable for a few weeks, and expect doses to need adjusting. Tell your team before you start weaning rather than after.

• Introduce one new food at a time, a few days apart, as you would for any baby.
• Check glucose a little more often during the first weeks of weaning, so patterns become visible.
• Note what was eaten next to the reading — this is when a feed log earns its keep.
• Keep milk going. At this age it is still the main source of nutrition, not a supplement to the solids.

Frequency builds gradually: roughly two to three meals a day between six and eight months, then three to four with a snack or two from nine months.

Avoid making food a battleground. Refusing new foods is normal infant behaviour and not a diabetes problem, and pressure at this age tends to make it worse rather than better.