weaning

[mummy2t]

Hi all My little one is 20 weeks old and i have just begun to offer a very small portion of baby rice mid morning, he is doing really well with it and really enjoying it. Today i offered the baby poridge and he loved that too, how long should i wait before a offer more tastes and eventually start the proper veg and fruit purees? i dont want to go to fast with it all
all advice welcomed
steph x

hello, you'll get ore advice in the wean ing section, but try to wait till 6 months which is the reccomended time to wean onto solids.

i didnt wean my ds properly until 8 mths more for fear of upsetting his belly but i did give things such as baby rice and porridge anything milk based he needed extra due to extreme hunger but he was only just before 6 mths i did this

there bellys are unable to cope with too much until 6 mths then you can introduce other things

You should stick to the 3 day rule. You don't offer a new taste for 3 days so if there is a delayed allergic reaction, you'll know what it's from.
Anything else, you'll lo will tell you.
Maybe try give a spoon at another meal time as well.
I weaned at about the same time, there's no hurry to get going though. I did it all very quick and within the week ds was on 3 solid meals a day and had dropped a bottle. I will be doing it different next time as feel I rushed it a bit but I did what I thought ds was telling me to.
They are all different and you're lo will find a way of telling you what s/he wants

if she's ready for solids go for it.

anything you make with milk. use formula milk till 6 months.

after 6 months pretty much anything goes

some books such as gina ford will say no fish or meat till late on,

but after watching the mess some of my friends got into with these "3 day rule" i wouldn't advice them.4 freidns used this..

none of there children will eat fish,meat or eggs as they banned them till they were nearing the end of their first year.

just make sure the meat or fish is cooked slowly for a long time, for emaple, casserole.

give them a wee bit of your to try before you put salt in.

and if your child can handle eating it that way, avoid pureeing. some children then refuse to eat mashed or lumpy once used to pureed. however, some kids are can't. and gagg on everything. so you have no choice but to puree

good luck
!!

it will be messy.

your baby does not need food at this age. but if you are going to offer food, ensure there is no gluten in it. and check the salt content. recommended weaning age is around 26 weeks. have a look at this for no fuss weaning BLW

Please stop feeding your baby.
The research behind weaning shows that when born baby's stomachs are permeable, to allow them to absorb the milk easier to digest. Only milk should be entering the stomach when it is permeable to avoid possible allergies or stomach/digestion problems in later life.

The permeability allows antibodies from breastmilk to go through to your baby's bloodstream, but by feedng them now parts of food can also go through which can cause allergies and stomach complaints.

Somewhere between 17-26 weeks the stomach becomes unpermeable, and 'seals' which is when the baby is physically internally ready for solids. Unfortunately we can't tell which baby is ready at 17 weeks, and which is ready at 26! That's why they say to wait.

It has been suggested that once your baby can sit unaided, grab food, put it in their mouth, chew and swallow that they are likely to be ready internally, until then nature wouldn't allow us to be developmentally ready and we would fail at some point in the process.

thanks for all advice,
as for the last post,
my little one decided of his own accord that he would start sleeping through from his last bottle at 10pm to 7.30ish of a morning,he then fed every 4 hours give or take, since then gradually he has started to have bigger bottles feeding very frequent and waking again through the night, i feel that if i dont offer the milk based baby rice and porridge ( the power type i add his milk too ) that i am starving him. I have waited for as long as possible in terms of what i feel is right for my baby, since offer 1 to 2 teaspoons of the rice he has been alot happier and relaxed.
I was only asking for advice, not to be told to " stop feeding my baby "

you go girl!

it's your baby

mother knows best!

our parents never waited 6 months with us. did us no harm

mummy2t, you're actually giving him less calories by giving him baby rice instead of extra milk.
At this age they need milk.
You may not have liked my post but I'm sure your son did not decide for himself he needed weaning!
He decided he was hungry, that doesn't mean for solids.
When he grabs food of your plate, puts it in his mouth, chews and swallows that is when he is telling you he is ready.
But it's your choice, I only hope he never comes to you to tell you he has IBS or something, because personally, I couldn't handle the guilt.

yvonnek, maybe not with you personally but the increase of allergies and stomach problems goes to show that it did do harm to many people.

Mother knows best my arse.

The foods you're talking about have less calories and nutritional value than milk, but they're harder for a baby to digest than milk, so they don't feel hungry as quickly.

It's rather like an adult who's dieting using that powdered fibre stuff- it fills you up so you don't feel as hungry and don't eat as much proper food.

It's totally up to you what you do with your child, and if it makes it easier for you when he sleeps through the night, then go ahead.

he still has the bottle, the rice is extra so i am not giving him less calories,
what wo you do in my position, he was feeding very regular and was very unhappy. the amount of milk he was having was at times making him sick and the volume he was consuming, on the advice of my g.p and h.v i dedided to offer baby rice, not a full blown sunday dinner. i gave this much consideration.
with ds1, if i had waited for him to take the food from my plate, bite it, chew it and then swallow it i think i may have been charged with child neglect.
i am all for waiting untill later to start weaning if you can, it just wasnt the case for us, i wish it could have been.
if the evidence is so strong to suggest that babiesshould have any solids before 6months plus then cow and gate etc etc shouldnt be allowed to make and sell the stuff.

there's many many factors thatlead to allergies and IBS.

they include the rise in use of pre packed "convience food"

additives
colourants

and many other factors.

as long as your making sure the food is cooked from natures own ingredients and you cook from scratch, no salt, sugar, additives there is no harm in it.

as long as your sensible and advise your health visitor that your planning on starting they will give you advice.

my paed gave me a whole range of leaflets and even recipes to use from 4 months.

they don't make baby foods that say "from4 months" if it was wrong!

it's illegal to make baby food with salt and other products, and to label them inappropriately aged!!!!

I did baby led weaning (where you just give finger foods and no puree) from 6 months and as we have severe eczema and asthma in our family I didn't introduce wheat gluten and eggs and milk until after 12 months. My dd who is now 25 months will eat absolutely anything including all kinds of meat, fish veg and fruit. Leaving the weaning late definitely did not make her fussy.
I would wait until 26 weeks before you offer any more. If he seems hungry offer more milk as that does have more calories than baby rice and any veg or fruit purees.

its not about me wanting him to sleep through the night, if my baby needs me in the night or day then i am there, I AM NOT doing this to have a child who sleeps through, i am doing this as i have a child who is hungry

you think baby food manafacturers are going to say from 6 months, if they know from 4 months mean they get another 2 months of sales!?!?

the DoH and NHS weaning information says categorically no solid food before 17 weeks.

it might take manafacturers a while to relabel things. but that does not mean they necessarily have the consumers' best interests at heart.

i wrote to a well known maker of baby foods re their labelling and got a lot of bolleaux back.

weaning is something that if done too early can contribute to issues later in life. why not wait> why hurry?

nothing bad will happen if you wait until baby seems physically and physiologically ready

also as has been said a milk feed is far more calorific and satisfying and filling in terms of volume alone than some food /puree if a baby seems more hungry

yvonek - i think it's a bit dangerous to blindly trust that a food manufacturer, there to make a profit from selling their baby food is giving the most up to date and correct information about when to wean.
I know you also had advice from your paed but since 2003 the NHS have been recommending weaning from 26 weeks and not before. The reasons for this are valid and scientifically researched.

Yvonnek, you do know that the baby food manufacturer's have to change the labels that say 4months+ but that they recently went to court to get a extention on the deadline to give them more time to change the packaging.

mummy2t - you're absolutely right, they shouldn't be allowed to make and sell it!
I hope i haven't offended you in any way with my posts, your OP asked for advice and mine would be to wait until 26 weeks before weaning.

ok, forget food labels,

what about my doctors saying it was fine,

you all saying from 17 weeks.

mumm2t little on is already 20 weeks.

she's mid way from the 17-26 week mark,

don't think it's fair to tell her to stop weaning.

we're not talking about a full jar of food.

a couple of spoons of baby food

17 weeks is the earliest time possible.
There is no way to tell if your child is one that is ready early or not, especially if they are being spoonfed mush rather than trying to feed themselves.

i think that 17 weeks confuses the issue tbh.

the current advice is 26 weeks or so.

with 17 weeks being hte absolute minimum, and before that time babies should not have any food at all.

but i thikn that using 17 weeks makes people think it is ok anytime after that

victoriansqualor's post sums it up perfectly about why waiting is best

and logically, what is more filling for a hungry baby.. more breast or formula milk or a few spoons of food?

yvonek - she asked for advice, i'm not really bothered if you think i'm being fair or not. I'm giving my advice based on my experience and research i did before weaning my own child.

yes, if your baby can sit, hold head well, lost the tongue thrust reflex and can pick up, get food to their mouth, chew and swallow you can bet their insides are ready to cope with food.

yvonnek