Weaning at 5 months?

[imstickladyyousees]

I'm posting in the hope that someone can offer some advice on this as I can't ever seem to get hold of my health visitor.

DS has just turned 5 months and is mainly breastfed with a bottle or two of formula added in. He's now going back to waiting a feed every hour and a half to two hours and not sleeping well through the night. It's been going on for a couple of weeks now. He cries whenever I eat near him or licks his mouth when we eat. He's also an absolute giant, DH is 6 ft 6 and very stocky so clearly takes after him.

Is it really that bad to start introducing the odd bit of puréed banana, sweet potato, butternut squash etc. I know it's 6 months for a reason but I feel like he's showing a lot of interest...either that or I'm going completely mad because of the sleep deprivation

I think 6 months is recommended because before then the gut isn't mature enough to handle food. It's really common for babies to show lots of interest in food before they are ready.

Having said that you know your DS best and lots of mums introduce food a bit early. Could you introduce formula in a different way, like freezing it in a popsicle (not the weather for it I know!) mushing frozen formula so he feels like he has something new to try and feels like he's "eating"?

The thing is, the people with small babies think they should wean early for that reason too! Maybe hang on another couple of weeks then give stuff from 5 and a half months? They don't eat much to begin with anyway, mainly smear it around!

For the sake of a few weeks and letting his hit strengthen a little longer I'd just wait.

Start weaning if you think he’s ready, 5 months isn’t completely unreasonable. I don’t think it will help the feeding though. Babies are most full on milk and food you can give them at 5 months will all be lower calories than milk and much smaller quantities. You may find he starts filling up on fibrous foods, drinking less milk in daytime and starts waking more hungry at night. You often see babies slimming down when they start weaning as they are actually getting less calories. Wean if you want too and think he’s ready but it’s unlikely to solve your problem!