Baby Led Weaning.com and the constant bad advice that it gives.

[MissClareBear1]

I follow this group on Facebook. I sit there and read dumbfounded as mothers advice other mothers to do idiotic and unhealthy things, such as wean a 16 week old baby.
How can someone who has never met your child inform you that your child is ready to wean at all, let alone early?

I have posted on the page about the numerous health guides from the NHS, WHO and other organizations -ran by qualified health professionals with years of experience-that weaning a child before they are six months can cause all manner of health issues. The website even states that it is not qualified to issue medical advice.

It frustrates me because the women that are posting comments are informing people to ignore the health advice of professionals. They are putting children's health at risk.

Is it just me or is this ridiculous?

I will puree and spoon feed myself my hat if you are a consultant.

I recently saw an NHS pediatrician who said they're currently doing studies on weaning babies as early as 3 months and suggested I start weaning my baby now who was 5 1/2 months at the time.

We laughed at how the advice changes all the time.

The advice doesn't change all the time. It changed about 10 years ago to be "around 6 months". The study you were talking about is called the EAT study, and that doesn't conclude until 2015. So it's possible that advice may change after that, but it depends what that study finds! And that study is primarily looking at allergies, and it is quite likely that any change in advice may only apply to those with a family history of allergies.

With any fbook group you're always going to get a range of people from the devoted to the mildly interested, with a great slab of the not - understanding in there as well.

When it comes to weaning some people use baby rice at 17 weeks, others BLW not a day before 26 weeks. Then there's a huge range of people who are doing what they called "blw mixed with purees" or "starting on purees and transitioning onto blw". Neither of these are BLW in the strictest sense but it also seems unnecessarily arsey to stop those people from asking questions on a blw page. As it happens, most of the questions come from those grey-area folk because the strict BLWers who have read the book tend to be fairly confident on what they're doing. So the admins help out where they can and expect the community to help out too (cause yknow that's how social media works. ..) So it might be a case of redirecting them to other sites but most of the time there will be someone on the page who'll be able to help. Even if someone has started out on purees, a little guidance and kindness from blwers means they might start out with blw next time.

To draw a parallel, I used a baby bjorn with dc1 but got to know some baby wearers and they told me about wraps etc so that dc2 was in a moby from birth and then a woven till well into toddlerhood. If those babywearer had sneered at my baby bjorn and said I wasn't really babywearing I never would have got into it. So I try and apply the "don't be an arse" maxim to all aspects of online parenting.

Tbh I'm baffled now. I've just had a perfectly lovely and reasonable response from the person who messaged us asking for a pinned post the other night. No mention of MN or this thread and they just don't sound like the same writer...
Thanks for all the mails etc of support, chaps, much appreciated.

I would love to know what type of consultant you are missclairebear that could have qualified when 23, please? (as your profile states you're 33 now)

Okay, so the other person has mailed back in to say that she's never heard of MN. In that case, MissClareBear, I'm sorry but it does look like your message to us has gone astray somehow. I hope that my posts here and on the FB thread in question have gone some way to allaying your concerns.

fram, while I'm equally a bit sceptical that missclairebear is a consultant as well, I am a doctor who graduated from medical school at 22. If I hadn't have been on maternity leave for the best part of the last 4 years, I would have become a medical consultant at the age of 31 (almost 32), so it technically is possible.

My dd sees a dietitian because of possible allergies (and my older son has multiple severe allergies). Her dietitian (at a leading nhs hospital for allergies, according to my uncle (who really is a consultant)), told me to start weaning her on to purees as soon as possible after 17 weeks

In the end I only started at 22 weeks as dd got chickenpox so I waited till her skin recovered
But it is clear that even within the nhs people are not sticking strictly to the 26 weeks approach

The NHS advice is around 6 months, and definitely not before 17 weeks, and between 17 weeks and 26 weeks is acceptable under the advice of a health care professional. So there isn't really a hard and fast 26 weeks "rule" anyway.

I have a 5 month old whom is 72 cm and 8.5kg (the size of an average 7 month old) and slowly dropping his weight percentiles. I am exclusively bf and worked hard to do and maintain this. I cannot now keep up with my sons requirements, he is emptying me and I have nothing left everyday. He is really struggling after 2pm and is waking in the night genuinely hungry. OP what do you think I should do? Reading the latest research I cannot see why weaning him onto first tastes and purees is an issue at 5 months but I could be misinformed.
I have read a lot as I am a physio and very health conscious/want to do the best I can for my son.
I trialled a small amount of baby porridge mixed with breast milk and my son opened his mouth, swallowed and whined for more. No tongue thrust, no coughing, no reaction.
I wondered if given your profession you could pass on the latest research suggesting health risks in weaning before 6 months?
This pdf has some good research and useful advice is the research poor quality? www.child-nutrition.co.uk/Weaning.pdf
I am finding myself like many others in a difficult situation and feel like some of the advice not to wean a day before 6 months quite intimidating and often unsubstantiated. WHO advises bf up to 6 months but many people cannot do that and have to use formula from day one. It is also advice that considers that many countries do not have sanitised water and hence bf for 6 months is much safer for the child.
Some unemotional sensible advice based on good quality research is needed by a lot of mums who just want to do the best for their children if you have access to the latest research please can you pass it on.
Many thanks

Latest weaning advice to best avoid allergies is to begin weaning between 5 and 6 months. Personally, my dd had strong tongue reflex at 6 months so only really started eating solids enthusiastically and consistently at around 8 months.