To think most people don't understand baby led weaning

[Londonforestmum]

I hear so often people say they are doing a mixture of baby led weaning and spoon feeding. I'm not saying one is better than the other, but this is 'traditional weaning', which always advised finger food from 6 months as well as purées. It's not doing a bit of both. BLW means you let your child feed themselves all the time. To say you're doing a bit of both is like saying you're a bit of a vegetarian because you eat some plant based foods alongside meat?

BLW also doesn't mean children don't use a spoon, you can use a spoon straight from the start but you just preload it for them and then let them hold it / put it in (or somewhere near lol) their mouths.

I think maybe people feel under pressure to do BLW but don't want to so they say they're doing a bit of it. There is nothing wrong with doing traditional weaning (purées and finger food) though!

Oh god
most of humanity is in fact doomed then to choke to death or binge eat themselves into oblivion
oh wait
....

It’s so unimportant that it doesn’t matter even if people are misunderstanding it. The child gets fed. Who cares what it’s called? Once your child gets a bit older, it’s rarely mentioned again.

Observational studies have found that BLW infants appeared to have more awareness of when they were full and were less likely to be overweight (although this study relied upon a questionnaire completed by mothers). This difference has been found by other studies to persist into the preschool years, even after variables like socioeconomic status were taken into account. However, one randomised controlled trial of 206 infants in New Zealand found no difference in infant weight or appetite regulation.

Yes sounds utterly damning, especially when earlier the article said it’s hard to separate confounding factors..

Anyhow we eat every meal at the table, my youngest was EBF and both my kids have drawn remarks about the variety of food they will eat (mushrooms, bitter greens, curry, three bean soup etc)

Really doesn't matter - I did purees on top of toast or rice crackers etc - as we were given purees jars - most of which we couldn't use as turned out pfb reacted to one common ingredient - as she fed herself which she'd have done anyway.

Did similar with next with fewer purees - he got fed once by MIL with spoon to point he was sick - so does one spoon feeding cancel out BLW.

Youngest was behind my back constantly given food by older toddler siblings - as she asked for it and apparently they couldn't say no - I was in the room they were sneaky.

They all grew up fine.

I have more issue with vegetarian label being misused as wedding guest made huge song and dance about being vegetarian - small wedding did restaurant afterwards and it limited our choices of venue. Then she had a fish starter - and then a poultry main - cheese was also in there - apparently to her vegetarian meant not eating red meat.

Part time in the job I always had thanks! Just a pedantic person who manages to mask it just about in real life for everyone not to hate me 😂I'm not constantly thinking about the issue. But overheard it again on the weekend and it just sounds silly to me.

Who gives a shit?
if someone wants to call themselves vegetarian and eat chicken nuggets when they’re drunk I don’t care about that either, just let people live.
is this you being competitive that people aren’t doing BLW ‘properly’ by your standards? Get a life if so

Mmmm I think you wanted to self congratulate while making it clear to other women they’re unworthy of your special ‘BLW’ sticker because they once spooned some porridge into their baby’s mouth.

BLW is letting your child feed themselves all the time. It doesn't mean no purées (giving purées on toast for DC to eat themselves is still BLW), it doesn't mean no spoons. It really doesn't matter, but personally I like to know I'm using the right phrases for things. Most people probably don't care.

Does it count if they hold the pouch themselves to suck the goop out?

Yes.

Your just coming across as sanctimonious

Ha ha I get why this thread annoys people but for some reason I find the misunderstanding quite irritating too. I am a bit of a pedant I think.

If you don't care how others feed their kids then why do you care how they describe it?

Someone saying they do BLW when they apparently haven't doesn't take away your 'achievement' or whatever you think it is.

I've just read that article and it mostly issues cautions about why the methodology in trials is unavoidably cominated by other factors, the fact that trials are few, the fact that people in trials are shown how to prepare food to lower choking risks...
I thought the last paragraphs were most relevant to this thread:

Ultimately, whether they're self-feeding or spoon-fed, infants always should be in control of whether and how much they eat, says Chouraqui.
"This is not baby-led weaning. This is the normal way to do it. The normal way to do it is not to feed them like you feed a goose to make fatty liver," he says. "All paediatricians would say that – never force a baby to eat.
"If a baby does not want to eat, okay – we'll see at the next meal."

who cares? How can this possibly bother you?

Same here, we just called it eating

Yes but spoon feeding purée can mean that the child doesn't realise they are full until they have already had enough. No one is suggesting actual force feeding.

I was evangelical about BLW when my 2 were weaning and I was a purist about it. Yes, you are right, BLW is not a mix of spoon feeding and self-feeding.
My 2 are now teenagers and there's a LOT more important stuff to worry about, I would save your energy for that!

Maybe! I was happy with how I did it and would do the same next time!

It's not that people are pretending to do BLW though, it's that they don't understand the phrase. And that type of thing annoys me in all sorts of areas of life.

Ah great, I'll keep working on him being able to open the on his own then.

@Londonforestmum but surely it isn’t set in stone what BLW means. Also surely it isn’t truly baby led as you still decide what and how much you put in front of them

Opening a bottle, or preloading a spoon doesn't mean it's not BLW. They don't have to actually make the food (open tins of chopped tomatoes for the spag bol etc) for it to be self feeding. But yes practicing opening packets is probably not wasted time!

As this was based on a questionnaire filled out by mothers (no Dads involved in feeding?), then I would suggest the results are pointless as it's likely they all referred to BLW differently anyway!

It really doesn't matter, but personally I like to know I'm using the right phrases for things. Most people probably don't care.

The right phases according to who though?

@Londonforestmum do you spend all your time worrying/being annoyed by things like this rather than just getting on with life and enjoying time with DC rather than trying to compartmentalise every aspect of parenting