To think giving babies solids under six months is not the essence of evil

[roseability]

Surely this is a worldwide recommendation (therefore a recommendation and not a set rule for all babies)

If we are talking about what is natural, wouldn't a mother have waited until baby was showing signs e.g. reaching for food, not satisfied on breastmilk/formula alone and then given the baby mushed up food from her own mouth? Not suggesting we should do this but the baby led weaning is surely an idea that can be adapted into the whole weaning process rather than an absolute rule?

I appreciate the idea behind avoiding allergies. However if you have no family history and you are avoiding wheat/dairy etc then what is wrong with a bit of baby rice and fruit/veg?

Is this recommendation more to stop babies under six months getting inappropiate foods? To avoid people mashing up highly inappropiate things and giving it to their babies?

Co sleeping is now challenged by FSIDS but many, many mothers do it. Breastfeeding is promoted as best but many mothers FF because it suits them and their babies best. Has this become yet another rule to which if you don't abide you are somehow less of a mother?

My own story - My DS was exclusively breastfed until 4.5 months. His weight wasn't in the right percentile and he was hungry (started waking a lot at night, reaching for food). My HV suggested starting solids. He had only baby rice and fruit/veg until six months. I never force fed him (he opened his mouth like a bird for it and then just stopped when he had had enough) and gave him lumps/chunks as soon as he was able. I loved cooking for him and he had a whole range of home cooked food. He is now 3.5 without any allergies and a great eater.

Of course some babies getting solids under six months will get allergies but I just feel this is putting pressure on mothers and stoppping them going by their babies' signs.

I know I am going to get slated but I am genuinely interested in mumsnet's opinion on this. Do I feel guilty for breaking the rules - of course! However I am worried to do things any differently with number 2 as DS is such a great eater!

I agree with you - a child born in the UK today will not have a life expectancy of 80. According to the Ageing Research Centre over half will live to be 100 years.

The NHS was founded in 1948 so I am surprised that it would have been doing a good job between the wars.

Yes, the life expectancy of 80+ does apply to people born in the 1920s and 1930s but this needs to be factored against - high neonatal death rates (women started having babies in hospital in large numbers by the 1930s and it was only then that death rates for both babies and mothers started to decline), poor hygiene, high rates of childhood mortality from diseases that are now virtually wiped out or easy to treat - polio, diptheria, flu, whooping cough, meningitis, ahem, measles. Plus a good proportion of those children would have been killed or mained in the wholesome healthy war that you mention. The life expectancy of 80 accounts for all this.

The life expectancy is higher now not because people didn't used to live until their 70s and 80s a century ago but because many did not make it to the age of ten. If you managed to make it out of childhood at all, you had a good chance of living to a reasonable age.

Interwar children had a great diet? They ate seasonally what was available and in Britain for much of the year that wasn't much - lots of dairy, lots of sugar, lots of unappetising cuts of meat (tripe, liver) accompanied by overcooked sprouts, carrots, swede, turnip etc. It is thanks to preservatives and improvements in processing, food transport etc that we in the West can enjoy this wide and varied diet - the idea of two pieces of fresh colourful fruit a day would have been laughable. Look at the parties that were thrown when bananas made it to our shores!

Crappy lifestyle? You mean vast improvements in workplace health and safety, in reducing road accidents, reductions in the number of people smoking, improvements in the drugs and surgery available to deal with disease, the Clean Air Act, maximum working hours directive etc etc?

I agree with later weaning (never used to before mn -- mine were 16 weeks) but still don't understand why people who can get so hot under the collar about a bit of pureed carrot at four months are simply so uninterested in formaldehyde, artificial sweetener, 2-phenoxyethanol (preservative), aluminium phosphate and aluminium hydroxide at eight weeks.

"So if WHO recomends babies aren't weaned untill 6 months, are all babies are breast fed for two years, are all the posters who are strongly for waiting untill past 6 months feeding thier babies for 2 years?"

Whether bf or ff, what's the harm in waiting until 6 months or thereabouts? I see the point you're making but it's a bit of a non-argument.

My post was to MoonlightMcKenzie btw.

I'm not disagreeing with you totally either or saying there are NO problems with lifestyle. The main issue is not the type of food we eat but the AMOUNT. I also think climate change will impact on life expectancy as well (though sadly mostly in the developing world).

I think what gets me about these early weaning threads is the refusal to accept that research and understanding about health and nutrition moves on and we can benefit from it. It's not even that radical a change in advice FFS - from 4-6 months to 6 months.

YANBU. I started weaning DD at 4 months too, because that was the advice at the time, with no problems.

DS is a bit over 4 months and I have started giving him a taste of the soups and purees we eat. Sky didn't fall and I didn't get struck by the wrath of God yet.

These guidelines are not set in stone, and NOBODY knows exactly how and why allergies are caused. In fact, recent evidence suggests that avoiding possible allergens in pregnancy & breastfeeding could increase chance of allergies in baby rather than decrease it. Also, that "if there is someone with allergies in family" caveat is complete RUBBISH since most allergies don't run in the family at all - I am the only person with allergies in our entire family tree and this is true for pretty much everyone I know who has severe allergies.

see, i don;t understand offering tastes of food at a young age .. a baby does not know that there is anything otehr than milk , and a taste of something is a bit pointless....it is not needed , the baby does not want it...so why?

Lulu I weaned dd earlier than four months onto beans because she was severely constipated.

really? why ??
why not offer water/ diluted milk/ or lactulose , if it is suitable for infants?

I did offer water and she was on breastmilk all the time.

why not?

all the things you say about food you can say about lactulose, it makes the gut behave differently and maybe the gut wouldn't learn how to behave properly if it's constantly got this support

plus you know, the possible nausea, cramps and so on, plus it's contraindicated for various things you might not know about a three month old baby, like impaired kidney function and all that kind of thing

beans and carrots seemed like a good option to me and beans helped a lot to keep her steady

we saw a cranial osteopath too, it all helped

I mean, how can lactulose be better than beans?

that;s why i said re lacutlose, if suitable for infants

well, it is not something that sits well with me, i thikn giving a new digestive system hard to digest fibrous foods before 17 weeks is not something i would do or recommend, but there you go

i just find it baffling, it takes a baby 9 months or so to develop in the womb, why do we think it takes just a few weeks for them to be ready for anything other than milk?

but it really helped

sometimes mothers have more sense than "world health experts" give them credit for

I've read up on weaning since mn and found out how late it always used to be, so I'm much more sympathetic to the "late" view now

but horses for courses, mothers know their children

there are things I find baffling about this debate too, utterly baffling

obviously she needed more fibrous foods lulu

not all babies are the same, but you know this

fair enough

no point going round in circles

i know all babies are different, i said on this thread and many others weaning should be aroudn 26 weeks, not bang on, and what the signs are, if a baby is showing them before 26 weeks, but i just feel that befor 17 weeks is too early regardless of all babies being different. but that's my POV

you are so helpful to many on here, i know you are well versed

ps she is alive, well, allergy free and regular

My DS is 23 weeks old. I'm more than happy to wait until he is at least 26 weeks before introducing solids. It is so much easy to carry on breastfeeding him and not have to lug food around with us when we go out.

In all seriousness, DS can only sit up unaided momentarily. His hands are constantly in his mouth because he is teething, not because he is hungry. I've no idea why spooning a bit of carrot puree into his mouth will make him any more satisfied than milk, but hey ho.

I'm quite happy to follow the guidelines and introduce solids after 6 months. I know if I did earlier he'd get all manner of allergies and I'd feel guilty. Far better to wait I think.

It's not the 'essence of evil'.

When I had DC1 and 2 (12 and 10) years ago, babies were normally weaned at 4 months.

When the WHO introduced their guidelines it was widely stated that the intention was to ensure that babies in poorer/developing nations received maximum possible benefit from breast feeding so their immunity was as good as it could be.

When I had DC3 and 4 (4 and 2 years ago) I was quite surprised by the amount of vitriol from baby-care fascists who had latched on to the relatively new guidelines.

I weaned mine when they were sitting in my lap at meals, making those urgent 'uh..uh' noises or reaching for food. If you give them very pure fruit and veg. and introduce just one thing at a time I can't see that it's the end of the world.
Going to make supper now - feel free to flame in my absence.

glad to hear it stuffit!!

Surely the answer is to be aware of the guidelines and why they are there, assess your own child (who you know best) and make the best decision for your child.

I weaned DD when I felt she was ready.

I couldn't give a monkeys when the rest of you weaned your DC's. Does it really matter?

Lulu - re your questions "Why?"

Personally, because DS vomits my breastmilk out like the possessed child in The Exorcist and I'm desperate to put a little solid food into his stomach to thicken the mix.

Others probably have different reasons.

but cote, I know several mums who weaned refluxy babies early on the advice from HVs that it would help.

Did it? Nope, it just meant that the projectile vomit was orange and stained all it came into contact with

Obviously if it is being advised by a paediatrician due to weight gain issues or FTT that's another story.

lllama, are you saying that ""world health experts"" (why the inverted commas? it implies they aren't actually experts) know less than, eg, a mum with 2 GCSEs and a city and guilds in food hygiene? . I'll take my chances with the experts ta

I was in a well known fast food chain the other day, shame on me, and there was a table of young mums next to me. One was spoon feeding not one but two jars of food into a baby that was 18 weeks old (I heard her tell her friend the babies age). They were discussing food and one remarked that he was eating a lot, and she replied that she had to give him another jar after the first one or else he would only be looking for milk in 10 minutes . I held my tongue as it was really none of my business, but I wanted to tell her that maybe he wanted milk because he was thirsty? or because the jar wasn't as nutricious as his milk and he still needed feeding...

...but, I was feeding a Happy Meal to my 2.5 year old DD, so I was in no position to judge

my nephew had reflux, the solids did not help , after a few days, he was back on milk only and no further food until 6 months

i think that weaning early under health proffesional advice is difference to the example of the baby being fed 2 jars of food to stop him wanting milk , whihc is a shame.

why do people care abnout when people wean? because when you see unsuitable food being given to babies who are physically not ready for food, i think it does make you worry. giving a baby rice in the bottle or rusk, for example or solids at 8 weeks, does make me judge as it carries health impliations and risks

weaning early just to offer a taste of food seems a bit pointless to me when tehy have their whole childhoodd and life to taste whatver they want

Belle The NHS benefitted the people who were born during the wars. It was a better service than it is now.

The deathrates associated with childbirth increased when it moved into hospitals.

The restricted diet between the wars was exactly why it was better than now. People had to eat locally sourced, locally produced food. They weren't coated in sauces. The preservatives didn't make food appear to last longer than the nutrients it contained. Now, good food is available now it is true, but crap food is available cheaply and in abundance. It wasn't then.

Sugar was very limted, and those unappetising cuts of meat that you speak of are not unhealthy. In fact, it is those parts that contain most of the nutrients, including extremely good fats that help to digest the food. There is nothing wrong with tripe, liver, meat etc. especially if not eaten to excess. The transporting and processing of our foods that are widely available in supermarkets reduces the nutrition. If you want to eat healthy, you would hunt for in-season, local, organic food or grow some of your own.