Honey Thick Smoothies for 1 Year Old with Dysphagia

Always consult your child's feeding therapist or medical care team regarding the safest options for your child.

My son was diagnosed with dysphagia in October 2017 with a barium swallow study when he was just over 1 year. He had deep penetrations of liquid in his trachea with every swallow, no matter the thickness of the liquid. His epiglottis is slow to move into place to protect his airway.

For his own safety--to prevent respiratory illness such as pneumonia--he was prescribed a thickened liquid regiment. We now thicken all of the liquid he consumes to at least honey thick (also called moderate thickness).

The Speech Language Pathologist (SLP) who administered the swallow study and gave us our education afterward told us to thicken using Simply Thick (or the homemade version, which we actually use) but told me NOT to google it.

How can you hear something like that and not immediately google it.

I did. And I found news articles and warning that linked the use of Simply Thick in infants to necrotizing enterocolitis and even 22 infant deaths.

The SLP had assured me it was safe to use with my son since he was over 1 year old.

It still TERRIFIED me, so I began pursuing other options. Surely there were natural ways to thicken using real food.

It took weeks of experimenting to come up with a consistent recipe for his go-to smoothie. He drinks 16-24 ounces of this smoothie every day over 2-3 bottle feeds.

Blender recommendation:
I have a Ninja and use the NutriNinja cups to prepare this smoothie. Since the blender cups are only a 16-ounce capacity, I blend the spinach, blueberries, strawberries, oatmeal, and part of the banana in the blender cup. I empty most of the contents into a shaker bottle and add remaining ingredients, blending again. I shake the two portions together in the blender bottle.