Link between obesity and ff

[spongebrainbigpants]

Have just been reading this link that was included on another thread:

bf and obesity

and I'm getting confused.

It would seem that this research actually shows a link between demand feeding and reduced risk of obesity not breast feeding, i.e. that those babies who are demand fed rather than fed to a routine are better at regulating their appetite and therefore less likely to be obese.

Am I reading it right?

It then makes the huge and sweeping generalistion that ff mums feed their babies to a routine and are obsessed with what they eat (i.e. the ozs consumed).

Geuninely want to clarify this so would be interested in how others read it. Sleep deprivation does funny things to the brain and I may be getting the wrong end of the stick!

spongebrain - think of it another way round. As a BF mum I don't know how much my DS is drinking really.

However, a bottle feeding (Formula or EBM) mum can see that her DC drank Xoz less than normal - which I can certainly see might be worrying, and as they'd had that much before, they might well try to convince baby to drink a little more - or offer more regularly to get them to have what they normally have. Completely understandable.

"It can also help prevent against obesity later in life, but the reason for this still isn?t known"

Well what about the fact that more poor people bottle feed, more poor people are fat, more poor people have bad diets?
Surely that is the main reason.

(clearly generalisation but true I believe from reading previous reports on breastfeeding and diet demographics)

sponge, it doesn't make a 'huge and sweeping' generalisation! The researcher is making a suggestion based on her observation of many mothers in her study - the word 'obsessed' is not used anywhere, and nor is 'demand' feeding used.

The researcher talks about 'infant focussed' feeding and merely reports that breastfeeding women do this more often than bottle feeding women, including the women who used ebm.She suggests this behavioural explanation of the link between obesity and formula feeding. She says women who use bottles might be encouraged to adopt this strategy.

So yes - the wrong end of the stick has been got

Chairman, I take your point but my DS is ff and he has been demand fed from birth (bf for 2 weeks - but only ebm as he would never feed from me ). Sometimes he has 5 bottles, sometimes 8, sometimes he drains the whole lot, sometimes (more often than not now!) he only takes 4 or 5 ozs at a time.

That's his prerogative and I don't try and make him feed more (even if I wanted to it's impossible believe me - he just pushes the bottle away and firmly closes his mouth!).

Countess, I agree, in which case I think it would be fairer on ff mums if this so-called 'fact' wasn't constantly trotted out as gospel!

Countess - there are plenty of studies which control for the socio-economic status of parents, their own weight and their own diets and still find the obesity-formula link.

tiktok, so there isn't any link between bf and reduced risk of bf - the link is between demand feeding and reduced risk. I think that is the point?

oops, I meant bf and reduced risk of obesity!

I would also suggest that 120 mothers is a very small research study!

I'm not trying to pick a fight btw, I'm genuinely interested in this and how stats are reported to support/undermine an argument depending on what you are trying to prove.

And I am a strong supporter of bf also and hope to bf future DCs if I can. Just genuinely concerned that this info is not being presented accurately.

No - you've got it a bit wrong again!

Don't use the word 'demand' feeding for a start. It's not used in the study and is not a fair representaion of the research.

The researcher suggests a behavioural factor in the "formula feeding = increased risk of obesity" research, which might help explain some of the results.

To do this she observed the way the pre-school children of bottle feeding mothers (regardless of what was in the bottle) and breastfeeding mothers demonstrated eating habits and linked 'knowing when they felt full' to having been breastfed or bottle fed.

This is preliminary research, hardly earth-shattering, and would need to be peer reviewed in a journal and replicated elsewhere to be more 'solid'. However, it has plenty of validity, and is in line with what has already been observed (many times) as maternal feeding behaviours.

No one study has the last word on anything. There are dozens and dozens of studies that show less bf = more risk of obesity, and many of them control for social and other dietary factors. This study contributes a suggestion that it might be more than the actual milk at play here, and that there is a behavioural factor as well as a nutritional one.

120 mothers is a large sample for a behavioral study.

tiktok, what's wrong with the word demand? That's what I do with my son, I don't know what's wrong with it? What should I say? It's not meant in a pejorative way .

You can use the word 'demand' as much as you like - but that is not what the word was in the study...so it's not fair to paraphrase like that. The study uses 'infant focussed' feeding, and if you are looking to extrapolate advice from the study for whatever reason, or to pass it on to others, then you need to use the same words. 'Infant focussed' is precise and means rather more than what we understand to be 'demand' feeding.

'Demand' is a very outdated term anyway! It is inaccurate and makes it sound as if the tiny weeny baby is acting like a diva

what is the diff between infant-focussed feeding and demand feedign then@?

I ff too spongebrain.

I have read posts on here where mums say they're worried their dc isn't drinking as much formula as they had been so the principal in the paper does ring true with me. (I try really hard to not care how much goes in - but it can be difficult to).

The other idea I had (based on no evidence) is that AFAIK for the equivalent nutrition formula takes up more volume than breastmilk. I assume that if you learn that adequate calories equals large volume early on then that may well have an effect later in life.

I was a chubby child and have fluctuated between slim and chubby as an adult (I was breastfed though) so I don't like hearing that my dcs are at more risk because I have given them formula. But I think that probably is the case.

CountessDracula, I was just about to ask the same question?! I don't think of my little boy as being a diva at all, and I don't see 'demand' as being a bad thing in a baby. He has only one way of communicating his hunger to me and I respond to him not to my timetable.

I 'infant-focus' feed my son is a bit clumsy!!

demand feeding to me means as and when they appear to be hungry.

Mine is presently on a routine - but the amount he eats is up to him - infant led feeding.

OK, countess, I'll have a go at answering that

Firstly, difference in 'tone' - 'demand' suggests 'diva baby' (don't you think?).

Secondly, waiting for the baby to 'demand' a feed means (usually) waiting rather longer than the first, subtle but rather more important feeding cues, which are not 'demanding' at all, but which will need you to be 'infant focussed' to spot. Some babies never actually 'demand' and are laid-back and then eventually too lacking in energy to demand...so the 'infant focussed' parent will feed anyway, according to how she perceives his needs.

Thirdly, some bottle fed babies will appear to 'demand' rather more than they need because they love sucking (this is why some breastfed babies will chug back 150 mls of formula after breastfeeding - they didn't actually need that much). An 'infant focussed' carer will be aware of that.

That's it off the top of my head - but mainly for me, it's the 'tone' of the word I am uncomfortable with

Gosh
it must be tiring thinking that much

I kind of understand but I do feel that it is semantics...

ohidolike, thank you for the post. Interesting that you say you were a chubby child and yet bf, but we can always find examples that prove/disprove our argument so I'm not suggesting that you one example is proof of anything before anyone jumps down my throat!

My three siblings and I were all ff (much more common in the 70s) and my brothers and sisters have never had a weight problem. I was always a slim child but started having a problem with my weight in my mid-20s due to complex mental health reasons. I think probably sod all to do with being ff!

My son, against my hopes and plans, is ff, but I expect I can help him combat obesity by helping him to eat healthily and keep active which both my dh and I do.

Obesity is such a complex issue - I have a friend with two teenage sons, one exclusively bf and one exclusively ff. One is a semi-pro athlete, fit as a fiddle and very slim, the other is morbidly obese with a BMI of 37 at the age of 13. Yes, you've guessed it the latter is the bf one!

Anyway, I'm rambling now and not really adding to the discussion!

tiktok, thanks for the clarification. That does make sense but think it's not a phrase that will become commonly used! But I could be wrong - maybe I should start using it with my friends and see what reactions I get!

Ooh yes Tiktok, the point about some babies being too laid-back to demand.

That's what I was like apparently, after successfully b/f my older brother who made no secret of the fact that he was hungry my Mum ended up 'underfeeding' me because I was so laid-back.

I ended up losing weight and she was advised to top-up then I became ff exclusively. So her knowing what to look for, rather than to expect a demand would have really helped her I think (my Mum is still a bit gutted about it now ).

I'm sure you don't think of your baby as a 'diva' sponge

Countess - semantics are important.

That's why the researcher who ran this study did not use the words 'demand feeding', I expect.

Of course individuals do not always fit the profile suggested in research. That's why studies use more than one person to look at when conducting their observations.

From a public health point of view, we need to know what might make some difference to the quite scary obesity stats. You could prob predict that if we had a fully-breastfed society, we would have lower rates of obesity - but this would not mean every person in that society would be slim.

Oh ramble away.

I have 3 now. All of whom have had formula from a young age. My eldest and youngest have both been very clear about when they have had enough from the beginning and I think they'll be fine.

My dd2 though is just like me. Was heaviest of 3 at birth and has grown loads since. She's 18mo now and in proportion but very tall for her age. She was always rubbish and pushing the bottle away. She would sometimes but she would also often over eat and then vomit. She still does that now occasionally. I have also never been any good at knowing when I was full. Or rather I have an abnormally high threshold for feeling full which my brother and sister don't have.

As I said I try to be relaxed about it and not make big issues about food but it's hard to know what impact how an what you feed your children will have. We do try and make sure they are very active (which they are) and always offer loads of fruit which they love. (But I do feed them a lot of not so healthy stuff too )

chequers - it's not that uncommon. If your mum had been 'infant focussed' rather than 'feeding on demand' things might have been different

tiktok - that was a very interesting and helpful explanation of the difference between 'demand' and 'infant focussed' feeding - especially as my dd doesnt 'demand' to be fed at all which could have led to problems with maintaining supply.