Then all of a sudden, it seemed to happen

For years and years, months , weeks, days on and off, then a break, then days, then weeks we would try and encourage our amazing son to feed himself. He’s never wanted to touch food, hold food, look at food, be near food, never self feed.

For whatever reason, I had to capture this night and this week in my blog so I could remember the same week his baby sister regressed with her eating due to a 7 day gastro bug, he seemed to decide he was ok with doing this self feeding thing at home. Its not perfect, but it’s actually happening. It’s hard to celebrate as you are so afraid he will stop.

This fortnight, it just became more spoons, more often, more at ease, more impromptu, more confidence, just out of the blue for us at home as he struggled more with mum/dad routine of us feeding him being challenged, but at therapy and school, it had been ramping up.

Then we finally started to see it pick up a pace, a beautiful, majestic, innocent (not seeking praise), simplistic pincer grip on the end of a desert spoon carefully lifting it up loaded with food by us, or small loads from him, to his mouth. It’s shaky, it’s not always clean or without a drop of food on the table or his lap, but he’s finally starting to feel his own independence and not have to wait for us. He can control his own hunger, he can feed his own belly.

What a week. I will celebrate next week. Just in case, lets just take this slow and let it sink in. 5 years on and this is really something we have dreamt of. A dream for him to do this. It’s a small start. It’s a sign of hope for the future. Maybe one day he will start to chew. I am just so hopeful after this crazy fortnight. The cling of the spoon on the bowl from the other room, on his own with his bowl, is a noise I will never forget.

“IT” is to eat. To feed. It is amazing. We are always working for it to happen or another kind of it. Just so grateful, what a reward for the rough months we have been having in other ways. This is so special. I don’t want to forget this covid lockdown, this gastro week and this clinking of the spoon on the bowl week. Amazing.