solids and breast feeding

[jinna]

my son is 6 months and i am breast feeding him. I started weaning him at 4 months and he took to it well although he ate very little amounts. He is 6 months now and i feel confused about when to give him solids and then when to brest feed . I 've read that he should still be getting 600ml of milk each day aswell as 3 meals - at the moment he is having a little at breakfast and then some food at tea time. I have also read that it is best to give milk separate from the times he is fed solids inorder to help absorption of iron - i just feel very overwhelmed - i feel even more silly for getting in a fluster because he is my second baby - my older son is 4 - but i honestly cannot remember what i did with him - although i do remember that he wasn't such a handful as my baby at the moment.
the 6 month old has also learnt that when he doesn't like something he will close him lips firmly - i can't believe they start doing this so young .
any advise would be greatfully recieved

My second son does this mouth closing thing too, and he also seems harder in many ways than the first, si I sympathise. I didn't start solids until 5 months and he's now 6 months. I must admit, I don't take much notice of when I should be breastfeeding - I just do it on demand, as always. I give hime solids first, then a feed, as he's more likely to take the solids if he's hungry and I think it's nice to have a drink after a meal. He's on 2-3 solid meals a day, but is still a copious breastfeeder whenever he gets the chance. He is one of those babies who would be on the boob all day and all night if he could, but I still feel that breast is his main source of nutrition.

Don't know if I did it right either - I used to breastfeed as far before meals as possible to make sure she was hungry as she didn't really eat much until she was 8 months. At about 6 months (if I can remember back that far) she used to have one early morning bf, breakfast, one bf at about 11, lunch, bf after lunch to get her in the mood to sleep, sometimes a bf in the afternoon if she wanted it and then dinner and last bf before bed. I reckon don't worry too much about the amounts of milk he's getting - if they're hungry they'll drink / eat what they need.

DS2 is now almost 6 months and this is his routine. First thing in morning one boob followed by baby cereal mixed with boiled water followed by another boob. A couple of hours later he has a sleep until about 12 noon when he has veg or fruit followed by both boobs (or sometimes half of his solids followed by one boob, followed by the other half of his solids then the other boob). About 2.30 - 3.00pm he has another b/f followed by a sleep until about 6pm when he has solids, veg or fruit again, followed by both boobs. Then 8pm both boobs and bed. This works for us but then they are all different and I didn't know about the advice to give b/f separate from solids, it is more or less the same routine as DS1 fell into about the same age although he was bottlefed at this stage. We have just recently changed things so he gets his solids first except at breakfast when I assume he is thirsty after his night's sleep. I know what you mean about forgetting I am starting to panic about the next few weeks, do we drop a feed, do we introduce some cooled boiled water, my memory from DS1 was that the back of the formula tin was my guide for the number of feeds he should have. DS2 does the lips shut thing, he usually blows raspberries at the same time, splattering everyone with the food he does not fancy.

My ds is 7.5 months and started solids at 6 months. We were out all day today which is proving to be a problem with him. He had a bf on waking at 6, three cubes worth of porridge made with fruit, lunch was half a 4month organix jar of mediterranean chicken and half a 4 months jar or apple and apricot and dinner was some veggies. I could NOT get him to feed during the day cos we were out and he was too interested in everything else so I was quite uncomfortable and overfull. He's already woken up once tonight since bedtime and obviously wanted to catch up on what he's missed. His nappy was very dry late this afternoon so clearly he isn't taking in enough fluid but I'm sure if I give him water he'll just get even more tricky about feeding. Jinna, I wonder if being a handful comes with being a second baby?!

It certainly seems to, Skara. Makes you wonder why.

thanks for the advise so far. I think the reason i have been so worried about his feeding is because he weighs less and looks smaller than my first . he is only 16lbs at the moment whereas my first was 19lbs at 6 months. as a result i feel i am more obsessed about his eating and drinking whereas with my first son i wasn't.

Droile, I guess it's their way of ensuring they get some of that much-needed attention that child no.1 is used to having 24 hours a day! Ooh, I feel a nice helping of maternal guilt at the the thought of poor little ds having car seat strops just to make sure we remember he's still there...!

Scrap my previous message, I was obviously feeing like we had cracked it last night! DS2 been up since 4.30am this morning and I very stubbornly refused to feed him as he has been sleeping through and decided it was something else that was bothering him, teething or something. Wish I had fed him now we are all shattered.

Demented, I think sometimes they wake themselves up for other reasons, then become hungry if a certain period of time has passed. This can happen to me if I wake in the night and become active for more than 10 minutes. Suddenly, a bowl of cornflakes beckons.
For what it's worth, I always feed mine when he wakes in the night, and pronto. I find he will then settle down to sleep again faster. Sometimes he sleeps through and sometimes he doesn't. There seems to be no pattern to it.

I had been doing that Droile, but it seemed to knock us out for the rest of the day. DS2 would go back to sleep and would want to sleep until about 9.30/10am which is no use for getting DS1 out to the playgroup, the last time it happened I said next time he does this I am not going to feed him, I'm sure he will just settle back but obviously this was not the case. I don't mind 6am but 4.30am is a bit much and next time he will get fed. The thing is he wasn't really crying, just sort of singing for a while, bashing his feet against the cot then eventually crying and DH brought him into bed with us and DS1 who had by that time woke up. Lesson learnt!

I see what you mean. However, I let DS2 sleep in for as long as he likes. This morning I had to get DS1 out by 9:30 and DS2 wasn't even awake at 9. I just got him up at 9:15, shoved him in the car and fed him when we got back. I've learned to just b/feed him wherever we go, when we get there.
But then, I can't bear night wakings going on for any period of time and will just feed and feed to induce sleep. I use the boob like a drug.

i do the same droile - i can't operate without my night sleep so i have baby in bed with me and then give milk whenever he needs it and so he sleeps through and i get minor disturbances when he wakes for a feed- i have told this to friends and they think i am spoiling him - but at the moment it keeps me sane so i'll carry on

demented - I fed solids at 6 months and it took a couple of weeks for her to really take to it. I just carried on b/feeding as normal, ie just anytime really. Even now 4 and a bit weeks later (with 2 meals) I don't really fuss .. she seems to take the solids even just after a b/feed ... don't worry too much about water, just offer it but if he is getting enough b/milk he will be getting enough liquid. They do settle into a routine eventually.

I don't like imposing routine, see my many comments on GF on other threads. I just seem to have children who start to fall into this sort of routine. Even before the introduction of solids he was beginning to form more or less this routine with an extra one maybe two night feeds. TBH looking back I'm not really sure why I started solids, I think some of it was stress about our house move and a lack of confidence in my b/feeding (after problems with DS1 it doesn't take much to knock it) and I was on the verge of stopping the solids about three days or so after we started when he really started to enjoy his food and get really excited about it so figured best just to keep going however it seems to have the effect of making him more rigid in his routine which I don't think is bad as it's his own doing and obviously how he likes things, ie don't have to wake him for feeds, he doesn't put up much of a fight when I put him down for naps and during his waking times seems happy for a couple of hours or so.

Oh how I would love a car of my own Droile and I would probably just lift DS2 out of his bed and into the car seat, unfortunately I have to get him wrapped up against the elements and do the 20 min walk to the playgroup, there is nowhere to feed there so either have to walk back home or walk into the town, pay for a coffee or hope that the one and only mother's room is available (in the better weather of course I was whopping them out in the park but it's getting a bit chilly for that now ), as much as it goes against the grain if DS2 is still sleeping at about 8am I find it best just to wake him and get on with breakfast etc. Athough I am definately with you on the night wakings I won't be trying that again!

Sorry about the ramblings sometimes it's all just going round my head and it's good to put it down in type.

Thanks for the advice about the water Eulalia, I think I'll wait until he is taking a bit more solids at lunch and give the water a go, he certainly takes a good b/feed even when he has had solids so I am not worried about his fluid intake, probably just thinking too far in advance, thinking about what happens when they drop the lunchtime feed, but presume that this won't happen until nearer 7 months or more.

I thought it was supposed to be simpler second time round!

jinna, just going back to your original post, the point about b/feeding and giving solids at separate times of the day, I just wondered, do you do this? I was thinking about this and would imagine that in trying to do this the day would just become one big feeding time (my DS2 is a slow b/feeder mind you).

It doesn't seem to be simpler, does it? Just goes faster. Sorry about the car assumption. I live in the middle of nowhere so wouldn't get out without it, but I forget there are other worlds out there.

Don't worry Droile it's a sore point, I know we can't afford one and I don't technically need one as we live in a fairly civilised town, but it doesn't stop me wanting one.

Too true about it going quicker second time round, I can't believe DS2 is almost six months already.

Funny thread. How different we all are.

We are car-free, and very happily so.

I am always worried DD can't possibly be getting enough milk, and definitely eats too much solids. Try/Tried to breastfeed as close as possible before solid meals (about 3/day at 6 months), so that she would still get as much of her nutrition as possible from milk & all its fatty/anti-bacterial/pro-biotic goodness. Easily find somewhere to feed her (bus bench as good as anywhere). Thought milk should be the main source of nutrition for them still, until 1yo.

Result? One greedy baby who gobbles down everything, including water, but breastfeeds little in the day and weighs less than 19 lbs at 13 months old. Jinna's baby sounds big to me!

someone told me the growth charts are for formula fed babes and can't be applied to b/fed ones. so not to worry about weight.

Droile, the weight charts have their limitation, but that's not one of them. The data sets from which the charts in most use take their info were based on a range of babies, some bf, some bottle fed, some mixed, some on early solids - not that they were selected on these lines, but they weren't selected at all, so there is bound to have been a mix. There are new, consultative breastfed from birth charts, but they are hardly different. There is no good evidence that healthy breastfed babies grow any more slowly than other babies - some do, some don't. There is an oft-repeated dictum that 'breastfed babies gain weight slowly' but it is not based on anything other than tradition.

Charts are not based on the growth of individual babies - they are based on many babies weighed at different ages and then the reserchers joined the dots. They help us have a rough snapshot of the growth of populations, but they are of limited use in assessing the health of one indivdual baby, which depends on many factors....one of which is weight and the rate of weight gain, it's true.

Back to the point about not giving B/F after solids and iron absorption. There was a study carried out on volunteer men who were given pears and breastmilk, with subsequent iron absorption analysed. It was suggested that iron absorption was poor when solids and breastmilk were given together. It was a very small study. Can't remember all that it entailed but it was not taken very seriously!
I always gave my babies solids followed by breastfeed, with breastfeeds inbetween when they wanted them.

thanks mears & tiktok, very informative.

I suppose thinking about it though, the fact that they weren't selected, so there's bound to have been a mix, is where the idea that they may relate to ff babies comes from. Without selection, wouldn't there be bound to be more ff babies in any mix? It is the predominant feeding method.

Droile, yes, if the data sets came from info collected on babies in the last 30 years, they will have been predominantly formula fed...probably. But if they came from babies born in the 50s and 60s, then they are likely to have been breastfed in the first weeks, anyway.

Point is, they differ hardly at all from the breastfed from birth charts.

Charts give a rough and ready view of how an individual baby compares in one aspect only (growth) to a cross-sectional view of the population of babies collected at the time the data sets were compiled. It's not lognitudinal - that is, the same babies were not followed and weighed every week. That would not necessarily be any more accurate a way of comparing, anyway.

Any chart applied to one individual baby is going to be limited.

But my point was really that breastfed babies can grow poorly, too, and this might mean the bf should be fixed to make it more effective.

Droile i am trying to give solids and breastmilk at separate mainly because if my son breastfeeds first he doesn't want to eat the solids but if i give solids first then he doesn't want the milk - you are right it does take a lot of time!!!