our LITTLE guy

Well, It's official.  Zain is now, according to our pediatrician, a "failure to thrive" baby.  He has never kept up with his own curve (particularly in weight), and even though we've been feeding him special weight-gain formula for a month now, he is still not where he should be.  He is in the 5 to 10th percentile in weight, the 25th in head size, and 10 to 25th in length.  Every time I look at his little booklet and read the words "failure to thrive", I freak out a little bit.  We knew he was small and that he wasn't gaining much (any) weight, but we didn't realize how serious it had gotten.  We are recording everything he eats this week, then we see a nutritionist Oct 3rd to try to discern if the problem is diet or something else.  As we've tried extra hard the last few days to get this boy to eat, it has become really clear that we have not been feeding him enough and we haven't been patient enough with him.  The average meal is taking him an hour.  Oh my word.  Seriously?  He has to carefully chew and swish around every single little bite of smashed beans?  He is a very picky eater, and has major major texture issues.  He has gagged and thrown up over a single pea.  A bite of rice is enough to make him gag until he throws up too.  He is a milk junkie and loves to nurse.  Still.  He still wakes up in the middle of the night to nurse (I know).  From the very beginning, he has been less than enthusiastic about food.  Maya was an eating machine.  Any time you got a spoon near her mouth, she knew what to do with it, and boy, you'd better shovel fast.  Zain could not be more different.  At lunch today I started with some yummy homemade refried beans (protein?  yes!  fat?  a teaspoon of olive oil!  flavor?  salt and cumin-super yummy!)  From the first bite he locked his lips closed.  Then spit out the skin.  Okay.  Second attempt, some turkey veggie baby food from a jar (he usually prefers the baby food from a jar over my homemade baby food).  But it was a wee bit chunky, so no way.  Okay, third attempt.  Baby rice cereal and half a banana mashed.  Only a few bites, then he was no longer interested.  Okay boy, I'll bribe you with sweets!  Added some peaches (baby food kind from a jar) to every bite, and he finally ate something!  I am so frustrated at every meal, and sitting there for an hour, waiting for him to finish chewing a bite, is awful!  But what else can I do?  Have any of you ever had REALLY picky eaters?  What worked?  What would they eat?  What can I do about his texture issues?  What will help him gain weight the fastest? 

He doesn't look too skinny here, though, does he?