To think that our 13 week old ds, who is long for his age and weighs 15lbs would need...

[mameulah]

...weaned before the rest of the majority of his peer group?

Or do I not understand the whole weaning thing?

It really feels like everyone thinks I should be feeding him porridge and baby rice. I am interested in the baby led weaning thing but I can't imagine how I am going to keep him going only on milk for the next three months.

What do you think?

Two other things...

1. Guidelines are for general usage. They apply to healthy babies. They include the caveat that any early weaning should only happen on medical advice and where necessitated. Severe reflux necessitating intervention such as weaning, just as a single example, is not a representative case of normal weaning. Any child with potential metabolic disorders or serious health concerns isn't any kind of example to follow.

1. Anecdote is not data. I did x and I'm fine means nothing. Or my baby weaned at x age and is allergy free, means nothing. It isn't cause and effect. I stepped out in the road earlier without looking and didn't get run over. Doesn't mean I recommend it! The research covers the population, not individual cases.

The op asked about weight/length in a presumably, healthy and thriving baby and whether it's related to readiness to wean. It isn't.

And for clarification, guidelines have been 6 months for 10 years and were 4-6 months for years before this.

DS was 10lb 7oz at birth and was so hungry. If your baby is draining a 9oz bottle of hungry baby formula and still crying for more an hour or 2 later then its time to get the baby rice out. I weaned at 16 weeks but 2 days later his bottom 2 teeth came through so that was probably what had caused all the crying that week. My DS was better developed than babies his age. He was sitting up by then (albeit with bumbo), had teeth etc so I believe his gut was better developed too.
I was weaned at 10 days and so far so good!

Very odd willough it does sound genetic if all bar one if your children were the same.

Op teeth don't matter re weaning, some babies don't get teeth till 12mths and babies will naturally chew and gum on all sorts and especially food once ready and they have hand eye co ordination etc.

DD had no teeth until 11 months. DS got his first at 5 months. 6 months is the average to get their first I think. We did blw with both, both eating well irrespective of teeth!

Makes no difference. They chew using their gums at first. They can manage any food we eat from 6 months except no honey, watch sugar and salt contents and no whole nuts.

I wondered the same think, ds is just over 15 pounds at 10 weeks and I was worried that maybe my breastmilk wouldn't be enough for him, dp pointed out that it was my body/milk that grew him this big in the 1st place, there is no reason why I shouldn't be able to satisfy his hunger.

We are doing blw, have been for about 3 weeks. My DS didn't have teeth( one appeared yesterday!!) he begun with just sucking everything, so I use to steam everything so it was mushy, but just about held its shape. After about 10 days of this, he got the chewing thing and now pretty much eats everything as we would except really raw stuff- carrots etc.

I did use to exaggerate myself chewing and swallowing I front of him, but I don't think this was needed- plus I looked very odd!!

Spoke to HV about teeth, no teeth until 18m is considered normal!

Our paediatrician told us 6 months and able to sit in the high chair without flopping over. That way their digestive system would defiantly be ready to handle food other than milk.

Thank you, thank you. Everyone, this is very helpful.

Right, I geddit. No weaning until our ds is six months old. I am sure that my dh will agree with this when he has read all of your advice.

I am still really interested, and honestly a bit intimidated, by the idea of baby led weaning. How did it happen in your family? Do you all decide 'today's the day' or do you make a point of eating appropriate food in front of your baby?

Any really good tips or disasters that you can share so we can successfully wean our ds? (when he is six months old!)

Its your Dh, the baby's dad whose suggesting this???

Where on earth did he get the idea that such a young baby should be weaning?

DD is 9mo and still on mostly milk. Has 2-3 'meals' a day which are basically bits of what we have eg cottage pie, sausage casserole etc.
Never gave purée. Just introduce little bites of food, finger foods and she got on with it.
Only has 2 teeth and is fine with hard, soft and chewy textures.

Willo can I ask about your ds? He put on 5-10lbs a week? So at 5 weeks he weighed between 35-60lbs? Or have I totally misunderstood that?!

Weaning is like magic isn't is?

Too small? - wean to help them gain. Too big? Wean to help them lose.

It's tempting to think that maybe (as in many areas of infant care) a lot of HCPs don't really know what's going to work, but hey - it'll probably do no harm so worth a go...

I think you need to research how early weaning can impact his long term health/digestive problems.

I am trying to imagine a 60lb 5 week old... My 5 Yo is 15kg or about 30lb.
I think willough may have made a slight error there.

My DC was weaned at 5.5 months but had no interest in food. I weaned because of immense pressure from my DM, HV etc that feeding her more would get to sleep a bit better. It didn't and she had no interest and literally at nothing until over a year. She eats really well now and after I cut milk feeds out at about 18 months she are fairly well.

For the record I was weaned stupidly early, fed evaporated milk from 6 weeks old and I have a dairy intolerance, bad hayfever etc. My dd thankfully has escaped the hayfever but was dairy intolerant from birth so I guess it was hereditary rather than dietary.

BLW was nice and easy and messy and fun.

With mine I gave them a few bits, fruit/veg/bread sticks/cheese, the DDs picked them up and sucked or chewed them, then threw the remains on the floor . They also had a bit of whatever we ate.

I knew to start when DD1 swiped something off my plate. With DD2 she crawled across the room and swiped a cake of a visiting toddler then sucked the icing (early crawler).

They could both sit up and were given (or snatched!) tastes from just under 6mths.

I started blw when DD was 1 week under 6 months as she kept on grabbing bites from whatever I was eating when she was sat in my lap. She didn't really eat anything more than a few sucks until 7.5 months though.

She had been sitting up for about a month.

They tell you when they're ready :)

We started putting DD in her highchair for meals at about 5 1/2 months as she really liked sitting with us, though we didn't offer food and she didn't ask.

We started offering food at 6 months but it took her a while to get the hang of it. that's the hardest part in my experience - watching your BLW child play with food while purée-fed babies seem to be gobbling huge amounts. But stick with it and they'll get there. And despite what some speshul snowflakes 'purists' insist, there's nothing wrong with a mix of approaches or breaking out the spoon just for things like yogurt.

DS3 was 17 lbs at the age your son is at now and fully breastfed. I gave him his first solid food at 28 weeks. Within a week he was doing three meals a day.

Why the rush to wean so early? Milk is much more calorie-dense than solids.

"If your baby is draining a 9oz bottle of hungry baby formula and still crying for more an hour or 2 later then its time to get the baby rice out."

Or time go give them more milk, which is more nutritious and has more calories than wallpaper paste baby rice.

DS2 was 11lbs at birth and I never had any idea how much he was taking at a feed because I was breastfeeding. Maybe if you can't see it you don't fret about it as much and it's easier to leave weaning until later.

Advice on weaning changes all the time. How on earth the eleven year olds in my son's class ever survived if all the stuff on mumsnet is true.

I believe that babies do vary when they are ready for weaning. With ds I was told to introduce baby rice at 16 weeks. He made it clear that I should stick the spoon where the sun doesn't shine as he was not ready for food. Infact ds did not eat unti he was 28 weeks old much to the horror of the health visitor.

With dd I tried to wait until 26 weeks, but dd had other ideas. She grabbed the food off my plate at 23 weeks and ate it!

Leaving weaning late is less work. Babies get the idea of food when they actually ready for it. Lots of mummies are extremely impatient and I suspect the weaning guidelines are made late discourage stupid mums from weaning their kids at 6 weeks.

Whether the OP son is ready for food depends on his physical development. Can he sit up yet or mouth objects?

"Advice on weaning changes all the time". it really doesn't.

Why would being heavy and large mean he needed weaning earlier? I don't get that at all. He's obviously doing wonderfully on milk, why switch him to something unproven? And anyway, milk is pretty calorie dense and easy to digest, why give him something harder to digest and often less calorie dense?

I'm not fussed about the perfect 6 month target, but I can also say with ample experience (old guidelines!) that weaning before 6 months did nothing to improve how well DC slept or what weight gain curve they were on.