Doubting myself about how much DS feeds

[hazchem]

DS is one. He is breastfeed on demand (between 8-10 a day) and has a few feeds in the night. I am happy with this.

So today I went to the HV clinic and had him weighed and at the same time asked for some advice about him throwing food.

The HV said that between 6-8 months babies should only being having 50-70% of their calories from breastmilk and said I was feeding him a lot. That he was throwing fod because he was too full from the milk.

Is she right? Should I be cutting down his milk?

I post this everywhere as it really does cut through the confusion about solids vs. BM

6-8m need 130 kcals of complementary foods and 485 kcals from milk (approx 650ml of bm at 75kcals per 100ml) total 615 kcals a day

9-11m need 310 kcals of complementary foods and 376 kcals from milk (approx 500ml of bm at 75kcals per 100ml) total 686 kcals a day.

12-23m need 580 kcals of complementary foods and 314 kcals from milk (approx 420ml of bm at 75kcals per 100ml) total 894 kcals a day.

Full details here on page 18. Pleae note that there is different values for industrialised/developed countries and developing countries. I have listed the industrialised/developed countries figures.

6-8m need about 80% of their calories from bm if they are living in a developed country (I am assuming you are in the UK) but if you were in a developed country then 200kcals would come from complementary foods and 415kcals from BM and even then that would still only be a 32:68 split (food:bm) so where does your HV think you are living??

Now that he is over 12m though you can switch to offering food before BFing as he would be expected to eat a bit more complementary food (it's still called complementary food as BM is still very important) but don't worry if he is throwing his food - he can so he does (like most things toddlers do).

Perhaps limiting the items of food on his plate/tray at any one time will help (not limiting how much he has to eat just what is there to throw) or if he throws a piece of potato replace it with a carrot stick instead of another piece of potato (IYSWIM). If he keeps throwing you could just end the meal then and try again a little bit later to see if he is interested then.

Thanks Truth I feel much better.

We are in South East London it's a bit rough but reasonably developed!

I'm attempting much of your last paragraph. Maybe it is just a case of him finding out about gravity and he did eat lots of toast at Lunch today with some mandarin.

Maybe you just have the next Isaac Newton on your hands

Truthsweet has given the proper technical answer, but I'll give my one too!

She's talking bollocks. Babies throw food:
-because they can;
-because they want to see what happens when it hits the floor;
-because it makes their big sister laugh;
-because they didn't fancy carrot;
-because they're bored;
-because they've eaten enough;
-because, because, because....

Is he having mainly finger food? DD1 was never a big thrower. But DD2 (9.5 months) is quite fond. Does he do it at the beginning or end of the meal? At the beginning, i have noticed that DD2 sometimes gets overwhelmed if there are too many different things on the tray. She will 'clear the decks' with her arms until just one or two things are left and then focus on them. If I just give her a couple of pieces, she tends to focus more.

Also, if she's too hungry, weirdly she often doesn't have enough concentration for the food. I try to time milk feeds between (not immediately before) meals now (she's fed on demand, but I have a rough idea when she's likely to ask and will offer pre-emptively if she hasn't and a meal is reasonably imminent), but even if she feeds straight before, she eats better than if she's really hungry.

Thanks Second.

The hungry thing is interesting. yesterday lunch time he had a feed but I unlatched him put the toast on and then feed him lunch. He ate more calmly then he has in a while. I might try to feed him a bit closer to meal times too.

Oh yes, for a lot of BLW babies there is a stage where their hunger outstrips either their concentration or the speed at which their fine motor skills will let them eat!

If he's calmer with milk closer before meals, that could easily be it. He could be getting frustrated because he's hungry and can't eat fast enough! So, your health visitor's advice could be the exact opposite of the actual solution!

Mine was a thrower too! Turned out she only liked having one piece of food in front of her at a time. Literally. Even if there were just 3 carrots or whatever, she would very carefully throw everything on the floor til there was exactly one thing left. She would eat this with great relish and then look at me as if to say "Well, where's the rest then?"

Personally I think it is possible to worry too much about what and how much they're eating at this age. Babies are very good at knowing what they need, and if you're offering a wide variety of foods he will unfailingly choose what meets his current needs, whether that's milk or solids.

Also worth considering that many of us tend to offer solid foods that aren't very nutritious - ie fruit and veg - so some babies carry on having loads of milk for ages because they can't get enough calories otherwise!