Introduction
Some babies and children can find it difficult to move from smooth and pureed foods to more textured, lumpy foods. Often children will show frequent gagging, retching or even vomiting when eating lumpy foods. This is very normal and should not be a cause for concern. Pushing food out of the mouth is babies’ and young children’s safest and most effective way to keep themselves safe while they learn how to manage new textures. Babies and toddlers usually grow out of these behaviours but while it lasts it can be upsetting for them and for their families. This sheet has some ideas to try to help your child overcome this type of behaviour.
What is gagging and retching?
Gagging is a normal human reaction – it’s an inbuilt reflex behaviour that the body uses to protect itself. When a piece of food enters the back of the mouth, the body senses that it is too big to swallow and will gag or retch to move the food forward and out of the mouth. In this way the body protects itself from choking.
Gagging is an important part of learning to eat solids foods. Just as when a baby is learning to walk, they will fall over many times – gagging helps the baby to learn how to chew and break down solid foods. Every time the baby tries to swallow a lump that is too big, they will gag and learn that next time they need to chew more before swallowing.
However, when a child has experienced difficulties with early eating, such as reflux and frequent vomiting, or tube feeding, the many nerve endings in the mouth can become over-sensitive. This can cause an oversensitive gag. The gag reflex can even move forward in the mouth, so that the child will gag with food just touching the front of the tongue or the lips.