Baby lead weaning terrifies me.. anyone else?

[MumofHennHals]

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Well don't do BLW if you don't want to, it's not the law.

Agree with PP, I was far more terrified (for good reason) of my primary school kids choking on grapes/cherry tomatoes/lollipops (I've only just stopped cutting up grapes for my 10YO and he has to sit at a table to eat them) than choking while weaning.

I started on soft finger foods like banana, melon, mango, pasta shapes, rice cakes etc and gave them porridge, mashed veg or dhal with a spoon. I also did a St. John's Ambulance course (half a day) on infant first aid which included dealing with choking and was clear on the difference between choking and gagging. This was good for lots of reasons, not just weaning.

And I worked FT from 10 months and 8 months with both of them (to address another PP's point). Neither of my kids would eat commercial baby food or purees and both of them are adventurous eaters and enthusiastic cooks since toddlerhood (sushi, curry, frogs legs, seafood etc)

This is an odd and disingenuous anecdote which I think shows a lack of knowledge and perhaps misinterpretation on your part.

As a PP said the majority of their calories should be from milk and this offered regularly. Milk has way more calories than puréed fruit or veg. Milk is the correct way to 'get nutrients in and fill their tummies'.

It sounds like the problem is the parents didn't wean correctly full stop, nothing to do with the food they were offered.

I know one baby who just has food. Refuses formula and has definitely not lost weight. Proper chunk. Think every baby is different. They been told by professionals they can stop trying with the formula.

Hmmmm I didn’t breastfeed (pumped to 8 months) and went back to work full time after mat leave but did BLW. I did it partly because I found it easier, could not be bothered pureeing stuff. Didn’t realise I was letting the brand down!

This x 1000.

Baby led weaning is popular in the UK and US, claiming it leads to children eating a diversified diet. The UK and US are by far the two countries in the world with the ultimate worst dietary habits.

BLW is messy, labour intensive and wasteful. Not to mention my DC hates bitty foods and won't touch any of it.

If it doesn't take your fancy, don't do it. We did purees but most spoon fed from our own plates. Worked a charm and veggies go in because stews etc. No food gets thrown. DC managed to spoon feed at the exact same age as all other kids. Doesn't eat more or less foods thsn the average.

And I don't need to clean up the mess. Win win.

I wouldn't say it terrified me but it frustrated the crap out of me, it was too messy, too fussy, too much wasted time. It was ALL THE RAGE when my kids were weaning 10+ years ago, not sure if it's still as popular now? Anyway we mostly pureed, with the odd appropriate finger food to nibble on, they weaned fine and can eat for England now.

Just do purées then. No problem at all. I did mine on purées.

Baby led weaning is part and parcel of a particular brand of parenting that also encompasses extended breastfeeding and mum being a SAHP for several years, plus having infinite budget for food waste and infinite time for cleaning. It comes with mottoes like "before they are one, food is just fun" because there's no need to care how much food is actually going in or hoe long it takes. It's very lovely in theory but totally incompatible with the kind of lifestyle where you have a limited time to get your baby fed, clean and delivered to nursery before getting to work on time, or collected from nursery and fed quickly before he gets too tired and grumpy to focus and you have to start the bed time routine.

Feeding a baby for most is messy regardless if you do BLW, pouches, jars, etc. Babies bat spoons away, throw utensils, their bowls and bits of food.

There’s also waste with jars and pouches due to the containers so how is that perfectly fine but a few bits of food is worse? How much were you feeding your baby/ babies that there was so much food waste?

I’ve done pouches and jars, BLW and mixed feeding. I found it easier to siphon off a teaspoon of my own meal vs sitting down and spoon feeding. It meant I could eat and baby could eat and they would have the consistent experience of us eating together. What they didn’t eat, I would eat. What ended up on the floor took a paper towel to clean up regardless of the feeding method. Cheaper with BLW when I’m only continuing to buy what we already have vs buying baby food every week.

I do find pouches are great when we’re out and we can’t stop and sit down and DD can suck on one while I’m running errands so understand why people use them, but you making out that BLW is so much harder/worse is disingenuous.

What a pile of twat

Try not to worry about it too much, OP, it was absolute lifesaver for us, I did it as soon as mine hit 6 months! It meant that when we went on holiday to Majorca a month later he could sit in the restaurants with us and eat normal food as well as going out for a pub lunch at home. There is an app called Baby Led Weaning which I have used constantly since then, it gives hundreds of finger food ideas recipes which you can make in as little as five minutes. He started sleeping 12 hours uninterrupted every night shortly after and is now nearly one and loves his food! He eats everything and anything, loves eggs, fish, vegetables... I never bothered with the puree and I'm so glad because meal times are a doddle, he sits with his little plate and does it all himself while we eat! Honestly please try to embrace it, it really can make life a lot easier, especially in the long run!

I didn't do it. I started on purees and porridge. This was 16 years ago though and advice is always changing. I made my own rather than using jars.

It meant that when we went on holiday to Majorca a month later he could sit in the restaurants with us and eat normal food as well as going out for a pub lunch at home.

You can do that however you wean. You don't get a form to sign at 6 months to say are you doing BLW OR purées? You can wean how you want and still give the kid a finger of toast or a floret of broccoli....

Not necessarily, I did BLW and I am the exact opposite of what you described. I did breastfeeding for all of about 4 weeks because I knocked it on the head, and have returned to full time work whilst my child is in nursery. The nursery provides his meals so no faffing before or after, and the nursery offers proper meals as well so he's already used to it without the faff of sitting spoon feeding him. I think that's a hell of a lot more time consuming and unless your prepared to offer processed jars of food everyday, constantly blending foods would be a right pain in the arse

@jkshdqpr I'm trying to help alleviate some of OP's trepidation around weaning her child by telling her some of the positives of having a fully weaned child who can eat their meals independently

Same here. DD absolutely refused to let me feed her and wouldn’t eat puréed anything, but would happily shove into her gob and gum away at it. Her first food was a pizza crust she stole off my plate. Has always been a good eater and happy to try a wide range of flavours.

DS wasn’t keen on chewing and was very happy to sit there like a baby bird whilst I spooned puree into his mouth. He had much blander tastes and much stronger texture preferences than DD for a long time, but we didn’t push it - adopted a policy off “you have to try everything, but you don’t have to finish anything”. He’s 10 now and really keen to try new foods and experiment with cooking. Says he wants to be a chef.

At the end of the day, as long as they are fed and eating a healthy diet, I don’t think the delivery method matters too much.

I bought every jar and pouch sold - worked our way through the age ranges. Spoon fed them. Didn’t want the mess and time for blw. DC’s grew up eating everything - never had time for fussy eaters. One meal prepared and everyone ate it.

So don’t do it. Purée is fine.

I don't really understand this because you can do this however you wean surely?

I've always done this with mine and yet I did /am doing a mixture of purees/and finger foods. My 1 year old has only ever eaten what we have eaten , just cut up into smaller bits or mashed together.

People act as if BLW is the only way to get them eating normal food and if you don't do BLW they'll just be having pouches or jars , when that's not the reality at all.

I don't understand the weight loss bit. I thought babies were supposed to be getting most of their energy and nutrients from breast or formula milk until the age of one? Were some parents incorrectly cutting out milk when they should not have been? I very much followed my child's lead on when they were ready to reduce or cut out milk feeds.

OP, you most definitely do not have to do BLW. I started with purees and then worked up to eating proper food. Do what works for you and baby. Some people get very hot and bothered by how other people are weaning but just learn to tune it out and enjoy your own feeding journey. My DS is now 19 months and happily joins in with all meals and has been eating the same meals as us for a good while. The puree days are now long behind us.

BLW is messy, labour intensive and wasteful.

It really isn’t. It’s considerably less faff than puréeing everything to buggery.

They eat what you eat. They get given a bit. They drop it - you pick it up and give it back to them.

It really isn’t. It’s considerably less faff than puréeing everything to buggery.

God it's been years since I've been on a weaning thread, I forgot how fucking boring it was.

You'll be fine OP, do what you want, it's shit however you end up doing it, but they have to eat eventually.

Purée is easy - go to supermarket and buy trolley full of jars

A few posts on this thread seem to suggest that BLW is a fad or new idea. My child did BLW and they are 19 now and it has been around a while then.
it was popular with all types of parents, I never co slept and only breast fed for a few weeks.
Also I think a lot of people say ‘choke’ when they mean gag or cough on the food. Choking is completely different.

We did a mixture of both.
Due to multiple food allergies the first taste of each food was a puree so I knew that no reaction was because of no reaction and not because she hadn't actually eaten it.
Then we would offer both pureed carrots with carrot batons. Some days she would have a spoon of the puree other days it would be the batons. Her weight was essentially static from 7 to 13 months as she barely engaged with weaning nothing more than a few mouthfuls a day and she didn't eat a full meal for the first time until 13 months. She was 20 months before she ate enough to start reducing her milk intake. It took until 18 months to identify all of her allergens so I feel this played a part in her slow weaning journey.

I would do a mixed approach again. Offer the same food as whole food and as a puree. We would some times use strips of pittas as an edible spoon with some puree on the end. She did better with big food. One day she stole a 1/3 of a cucumber from the fridge and spent the entire day eating it another time she had half an apple and spent the afternoon demolishing that

Get the recipe book. It's amazing and has all the info about it at the front. We loved it. It also made great play too.