to wonder why some people can't wait to wean?

[NobbedaBuilder]

I have a fb friend whose little boy is 12 weeks old today. She posted a status saying she was thinking of weaning him last week because he had been looking at her while she was eating. She got a load of comments saying - 'you know best', 'I weaned my baby at 5 days and they're fine' and 'don't speak the the evil hv they will just tell you to wait' and lo and behold yesterday there were pictures up of him looking 'cute' with baby rice all round his mouth.
Now I quite understand that some babies are ready before 6 months and that some medical conditions may necessitate very early weaning but why the hell would you choose to wean against advice, at 3 months, because your baby was looking at you while you ate?
I weaned both dd and ds at around 6 months. For quite a while before that they had been looking at food (amongst other things) and probably would have tried to put some in their mouths had I let them (as that's what babies do with everything). DS was also sitting up at 4 months - I could have interpreted these as 'signs' they were ready. As it turned out ds wasn't even that bothered about food until about 7 months or so.
I realise that some people have to wean early but if you don't have to why would you take the risk? I know the advice used to be 3 months then 4 and then 6 but 4-6 months is the most up to date advice based on all the research we have at present. Most people seem to take medical advice at face value in other areas. You would take a painkiller for a headache, for example, without speculating that in a few years research might conclude that painkillers are ineffective for headaches.
If the baby is perfectly contented just having milk the only reason I can see that parents would start weaning is because they are either ignorant of the risks (not the case with fb friend as she discussed the risks on there and went ahead anyway) or over-excited about their baby entering the next stage of their development.
Sorry for the rant it just made me really cross that this childs health is being put at risk due to his parents impatience.

Of course you're going to get the odd rogue idiot HCP, but these are WHO guidelines we are talking about here!!!

Fifis I didn't say weaned at 2 weeks FFS, I said some put a spoonful of baby rice in their baby's bottle. I have seen people recommending this on other forums to help babies sleep through.

Gaston you are comparing the opinion of one overzealous HCP with scientific consensus and tons of research on weaning. Of course and individual can make a mistake in any profession.

In fact I was in a taxi a few weeks ago and the taxi driver was telling me he put custard in his baby's bottle for the night feed from day one and it was obviously the right thing to do as the baby slept through

an individual that should say.

trixy there was a thread on Netmums a while ago where a woman was asking if she should put rice cereal in her 10 day olds bottle - she didn't even get hugs on there! But wha can I say - mum knows best

Because in the 70's they put stuff in babies bottles. Many older woman still think this is correct as their kids suffered no ill effects. Infact my MIL told me to do it. Obviously i didnt as i listened to the guideline which were 4 months.

Someone on my facebook started weaning before 8 weeks. I know this as there is a picture of her 8 week old baby eating ice cream.

I asked the baby's gran who said that 'yes, he has been having baby rice twice a day, hungry baby milk at night, and that was real ice cream, not a joke picture'. I'm a bit shocked about the whole thing to be honest. Apparently the mother has been weaning on the advice of the gran and has been lying to the HV about it.

I can see why people want to wean early though - it makes sense in some circumstances as it'll be right for some babies. I think there's a 'too early' though.

I'm very excited about weaning DS as I'm hoping that we're going to have lots of fun with food. I plan to wait until 6 months but we'll see how it goes. He's currently 12 weeks and showing absolutely no interest in food. He's just gained the motor skills to move things to his mouth, but he has been sucking his fingers for a while. I don't imagine it's because it's hungry - it's because he's a baby and babies like to put things in their mouths.

I saw on facebook a conversation between two mums about the same thing. Both babies were about 3 months and one was advising her to put rusks in the bottle and start giving baby rice.

I had to remove her as a friend to stop myself from commenting WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU?.

We have come so far in the last decades with medical research, I can't understand why you'd just disregard it.

Don't get me wrong I was excited at the prospect of weaning mine - especially my first. But that's surely not a reason to wean. The baby is going to be drinking just milk into adulthood - you will get to enjoy it at some point.

I have many more instances of HCP getting it wrong, contradicting themselves, changing their advice day to day, I wouldn't trust many of them as far as I could throw them. Like I said I went though all this ten years ago and it was a completely different experience even those few short years ago.

I'm not saying any of you are wrong to do everything by the book, and god knows there is a whole bookshop full of them, but would it be so wrong to trust yourself as a parent instead of checking on the internet, checking in the book, checking with all of the NCT group. I find it incredibly sad that most new parents I meet don't seem to have the confidence in their own ability as a parent to make their own choices for their own children. Weaning being only one of those choices

God I know being a parent is hard, and yes I have made mistakes, many, but the dc still have all their fingers and toes. I think it would have made it so much harder if I had thought for one minute, my friends were scrutinising and questioning those decisions instead of supporting me. And before and you perfect new parents start I am not a lentil eating woollen jumper wearing loon just an old wrinkly one

I was desperate to wean because both DS1 and DS2 slept all night from around 8 weeks and started waking again at 16 weeks. DD did the same but started waking again at 20 weeks and after a week of feeding again in the night I weaned and she immediately slept through again.

With DS1 held off until 21 weeks and again slept through the first night after giving solids. Yes milk it higher in calories but food takes longer to digest. Gave DS2 goodnight milk with added cereals at 24 weeks and again he slept though the first night he had it after consistently waking in the night from 16 - 24 weeks.

Well she's a fb 'friend' as in I know her but I don't think either of us would class each other as friends. And Gaston whether you like to think it or not your friends won't agree with everything you do and they will have opinions on it - just as I'm sure you don't agree with everything your friends do. That's life. The people on here who say they never judge are lying.

Maybe it's not a good thing that you are feeding your baby something that takes longer (ie. is harder for them) to digest. Even if it does mean you get an extra bit of sleep (and it isn't guaranteed that you will either - plenty of studies show that it doesn't make any difference.) Why would you want to fill a growing, developing baby's stomach with something that has less nutritional value than milk?

I weaned my DD at 4 months. I was desperate to get her onto food. In hindsight I realise that was just a symptom of PND - it was mainly triggered by problems BFing, which I'd naively expected to be easy. She was mix-fed but I really hated giving her bottles, I felt like a failure (this is NOT indicative of me judging others BTW - just what I felt about myself because I hadn't met my expectations). So I basically wanted to give her food as I felt it was better than formula IYSWIM. I really enjoyed making purees, she wolfed them down and is healthy and a good eater, so I don't regret it too much (what'd be the point anyway, it's done now!)

DS was different though. I had better support and after 2 weeks of top-ups he was EBF (and yet he's the one with terrible eczema/possible asthma... Grrrrrr). Still got PND, but no guilt about feeding. However he weighed nearly 12lbs at birth, and so many people (including MWs and HVs!) said I'd need to wean him early. By that time though I'd read more and talked to more BFing mums (did a peer support course too) and knew it wasn't necessarily the right thing to do. He did show interest in our food, and ate some mushy avocado at 5m, but wasn't excited about it, so we waited until around the 6m mark and then mainly gave him finger food, which he wolfed down. Again, no regrets there.

Food is a terribly emotive issue, especially where our DCs are concerned - of course as parents we are desperate to nurture them, and food often equals love. You often get grandparents putting pressure on the parents to do things their way. Coupled with a much more multicultural Britain, it's not surprising there is a wide variation in weaning methods/schedules nowadays.