8 month check - how things have changed!

[mumnosGOLDisbest]

I've just had DD2s 8 month check and was surprised at how much advice has changed in 4 years. The HV was lovely but untill today I felt I knew enough about babies being a mum of 3 but apparently not. DD is 33wks and i'd just like to compare against some similar aged babies.

1)Does your DC sit unaided yet?
2)Do you give DC vitamin drops to prevent rickets?(BF babies)
3)If you BF, when and how often? DD seems to BF more and eat less than HV would like.She eats 3 small meals and BFs about 4-5 times a day (no night feeds usually).
5)I didn't dare say we cosleep as she wasn't impressed that DD usually doesn't fall asleep on her own in her cot.

DD is happy and healthy and developmentally fine. She sleeps and eats well so I'm not concerned just a bit surprised and curious :)

I only heard at baby clinic today that the 8 month check exists... my son is 36 weeks.

1. Yes, but topples sometimes reaching for things
2. No, no-one ever mentioned them to me, but I know all my antenatal class people were given them. I didn't bother asking for them as I take vitamins myself and my son is BF'd.
3. Probably BF the same amount as you, but also a couple of nightfeeds (gah!). Am trying to fill him up in the day now. In the last week something has clicked on the solids front and he's eating more.
4. Moved him into a big cot this week (next to our bed) after he outgrew the sidecar cot/ I got fed up being kicked in the night. He was sleeping all night in the sidecar cot, but has been coming in with us at 5am for a cuddle back to sleep.

I wouldn't worry about any of it if I were you. Your daughter is fine, so who cares what other people do? I am of course massively jealous that she sleeps through...

Had ds last week, she weighed him and checked centiles and measured head and length. Asked what he was eating and how much milk he has and if he slept ok. All very informal. She then watched him playing and asked how I was feeling. Maybe it varies in different areas. I think if his centiles hadn't matched up she might have asked about his food habits a bit more.

Ds does sit up unaided and have vitamin drops but that's because he is mixed race, I didn't know they gave them to bf babies. I told the hv if ds wakes before 6 I put him in our bed and she said 'oh I don't blame you!'

coo.

we've not had an 8month check.
we do 1 year's here, i think, which can be anything from 8 months onwards! DD is 9 months.

I can't imagine that a baby who is 8 months old in september would need vitamin D drops! (sunshine is the biggest supplier)

my answers to your questions would be:

1. yes since 5.5 months ish
2. no
3. every two hours, including through the night. she is BLWd and doesn't care that much about solids - preferrng BF even when offered solids. we offer solids whenever we eat.
4. (you've not given a 4!)
5. she co-sleeps. I'm not getting up several times a night to feed her, and she's got eczema too, so i'd have to stay up holding her hands (to stop scratching) until she fell asleep! she never ever ever falls asleep by herself. sometimes she will in the car/pram and usually with a feed. self-soothing= scratching herself raw.

This is the sort of thing that makes me happy I completely opted out of the HV system. I never saw anyone past the morning after midwife (and she only stayed for 20 minutes).
Seriously, you don't need to sit and listen to this crap - you've had 3 kids, they'll change their minds next week and make another 'list of things all good parents should do'.
I mean - vitamin D drops, are they serious? Have they considered that advice is a result of their first piece of advice to keep kids out of the sun and plastered with suncream. Maybe if they'd butt out and concentrate on the parents that really need a bit of extra help we could all get on being parents in peace.
Gah!

Sorry - that was a bit of a rant :/

i think that's why the vitamin D problem came about - the fact we as a whole overdo the suncream!

I don't blame your rant.

Indeed it was (wink)! Just out of interest how did you opt out? Did you fill a form or just not go to appts etc and did they try and stop you? I'm not thinking of doing this as mine are nice and laid back and tend to just tell you 'you know best trust your instincts' I'm sure of course they don't say that to the ones they are concerned about iyswim! I'm just being nosey.

Thanks for all your replies. It sounds like DD is perfectly normal as i suspected :) weldone nickel you spotted my deliberate mistake

my dd isBLWd too and whilst enjoying her food I'd still say milk is her main source of nutrition. HV says by 8 months she should be having 2 feeds and gets most vitamins, iron etc from food. I thought BF did that and food suplemented it not vice versa.

That's interesting because I asked my hv how much milk ds should have and mine said ds should still have about 20 oz of milk a day which I'm presuming would be more than two feeds?! Just shows you how advice varies doesn't it!

@ conors
I don't know if its vitamin D she was suggesting but that would make sense for rickets. I told her our diet is healthy and DD will get all she needs through her food.
To be fair HV is lovely but I certainly don't agree with all she said.

Sure does sugar (sounds like a line from a western). All 3 have/had more than 2 feeds a day at this age.

DD turned 8 months a couple of weeks ago:

1. Yes, since approx 6 months old
2. Yes, on the advice of her ped.
3. A little BF in the morning, then pump for the day (I work f/t), BF a little when I get home, pump again (for back up) and BF before bed. She eats breakfast (fruit puree/yoghurt/Cheerios), lunch (pasta/veg puree/crackers/cheese) and dinner (what we eat/baby spag pol/purees/fruit/corn on the cob the other night)
4. She BF's in bed with me and falls asleep - I immediately transfer her to the cot and she, usually, sleeps til morning (8pm-6/6:30am)

But as they say - all babies are different. I keep getting asked why DD isn't walking yet. She'll do that when she is ready.

We have 9 month checks here . They are calling me back in 4 weeks because DD is not crawling or pulling herself up yet ! Didn't realise they developed to a strict timescale.

Also told to do CC and not give any bf during the night as she doesn't need them ! Oh, and to bf after food rather than an hour before so that she eats more .

Sugar - my youngest is now 5 so things have probably changed a bit. I'm not one for doing as I'm told anyway (!) but I found the first midwife appointment incredibly patronising so I booked my own scans privately and told the midwife when I had time to make an appointment I would and refused any tests. When the baby was born (and no, I didn't write a bloody 'birth plan'!) I excused myself from the hospital and a midwife came to see me the next morning, she was very nice and told me she would sign me off and pass my papers to the HV - I told her it was not necessary and it was a waste of resources, and anyway, I was going back to work the next week so wouldn't have time - she asked if I'd mind a phone call, which I didn't and I think I spoke to them twice over the course of three children.
They can't force you to do these things - they just want to tick their boxes. It's funny how vulnerable we feel at this stage in our lives and how readily we take (at best - dodgy) advice from someone that (often) doesn't even have children. You wouldn't take instruction from a driving instructor that couldn't drive themselves...
God gave us a 'mothers instinct' for a reason, and (for the most part) I was quite happy that mine was in full working order. Luckily, I was right, but I probably did it all 'wrong' according to them .... co-sleeping on their front, feeding on demand, cuddles when they cried, weaned at 4 months - they would gave had a fit .

Good God Iceberg, what are they going to check in 4 weeks - her handwriting?

IME it really varies according to the HV in question.

At DS's 9 month check (I think it was), the family next to me was being berated for allowing their daughter to bf as often as she liked, and told to withold bf even if it led to her spending half the day screaming, and that she 'should' only have one feed per day.

OTOH the HV I was talking to was completely unfazed when I said that DS had 7 or 8 feeds a day (I didn't mention the night ones!)

I had a similar experience at his 2.5 year check - one HV was giving a family a really hard time with detailed questions about something which clearly wasn't an issue - while the one I talked to barely asked me anything about it.

We have a 12 month check which is apparently just a questionnaire that we fill in at home.

My DTs are now 10 months old and

1. yes can both sit unaided and have done since 8 months
2. yes I give drops as they are partially bf and don't have much formula, no baby can get enough vitamin D just from sunlight alone in this country
3. I bf first thing in the morning then they have 2 small cups of formula 1 hr before each meal and a large bottle at night. They have 2 big meals (breakfast and a 'proper' tea) and a small lunch usually sandwiches:finger foods

yes, that's why they coined the phrase "food is for fun until you're one"

milk is still the staple.
if DD is hungry, she asks for milk, not a sandwich!

Iceberg - i can imagine trying that with DD.
she had a milk feed at 11, and since then, i've given her an apple to chew on, a plum and some water.
each time i handed her some food, she did one chomp, then put her arms out for me.
then when i held her, she clawed at my top and started trying to latch on to my boob through my teeshirt. i finally gave in at 12 o'clock.
if they think i can make DD eat more by not giving her milk, then they obv don't know a lot about babies!

Just on the flipside, it was our hv who was our first port of call, when we were worried about ds's development.

I think if you have no concerns then the developmental checks can seem like a box ticking exercise, but they can be huge red flags that something is wrong. So for example, at 8 months, ds wasn't sitting, couldn't hold his head up when on his front, couldn't roll, still had head lag, wasn't babbling, had no interest in toys, couldn't bear weight on his legs. Our hv assessed him and referred us to a paediatrician, and developmentally they said he was at the level 1-3 months.

Surely it is a good thing that someone flags these things up early, because if there is something wrong, then the earlier you can access help the better.

hazey - yes, that is important.
I think that these days, most mums know what the rough milestones are, and one or two not-quite-theres are okay, but more than one or two, then it's important for the HV to see it.
otoh, there might be women who don't know what the milestones are, maybe they just don't know anyone with babies or haven't got mums to talk to. they're the ones the system needs to flag up most, i think.

I think as well that with babies it is sometimes hard to see that the milestones aren't being hit. Ds is my 3rd, and I am around babies and children all the time. but he had horrendous silent reflux, so spent a lot of time being carried, and screaming, and although dh and I both had an awful niggling feeling that something was wrong, we just couldn't see just how wrong they were. I remember the weird combination of relief and misery when the paed pointed out all the things that had been niggling us over the months. It is very easy to have these concerns dismissed by lots and lots of well meaning people telling you that their dc didn't walk/talk/sit etc until they were xx years old, and there was nothing wrong with them, or boys are lazy, or 'oh, he's your 3rd, well they have their older sisters to do it all for them' etc etc!

ah, yes, other problems were masking the developmental ones.

I do like our HV, very approachable and friendly. I just didn't agree with some of her advice and think she was simply ticking boxes against an average. No space for differentiation in development. Reading her notes later she's written 'baby clean, awake and appropriately dressed' good job she didn't come 20 mins earlier which i found a bit patronising. Fair enough if she was caked in poo and sweltering in winter woolys advise me but this seemed a bit pointless.