What's wrong with weaning with purees?

[whatsthetimemrwolf]

I weaned dd (now 6) and ds (now 5yo) following Annabel Karmel's book, starting with purees then progressing to lumpier foods. It was relatively stressfree, easy and happy experience.

I now have a 5mo dd and planned to wean the same way when shes 6mo. However I don't really understand why there seems to be a negative attitude to 'pureed' weaning in comparison to blw (which I'd never heard of until reading on mn!). Are there any issues with introducing foods the AK way?

Hee hee, I have to say, no offence intended to anyone on here, I'm sure you're all lovely ladies with lovely babies - but I find this the worst thing about being a parent - EVERYONE has an opinion on something, and gets very very angry if someone else doesn't share it!
I personally am of the opinion that, as long as you're not hurting your child in any way, you should just go with what works. With regards to the 'bullshit' BLW; for us personally, we tried purees to begin with, my baby hated them and refused to eat - so I gave it a go and found it worked better for us. Equally, a mate of mine tried BLW first and didn't get on with it at all!!

So lets all play nice ladies...

zeb - i didn't say trad weaning causes anything - i said that i suffered with eating disorders and am therefore hoping that the blw approach may help safeguard dd against similar.

but goodness me you have your judgey pants pulled up to your armpits today so theres probably no reasoning with you

I did BLW and didn't post a single thing on it. Just got on with it. Much like most mothers, there is no such thing as a BLW 'type'

nothing OP, whatever works for you.

amused by fight...looks like an 'are you looking at me?' stylee one!

I think there is very little wrong with feeding puree, as long as you continue to give as much milk as a baby wants and don't get too obsessed with how much a child eats (I fed my DS like he was a Christmas turkeu ). DS also didn't really get to learn what the food he enjoyed looked like. He loved greeny orange mush, but wouldn't eat carrots and broccoli in a cheese sauce for AGES.

It is also a big faff, tbh. BLW was much easier.

With DD, I wanted to try BLW, but ended up doing a bit of both. Certainly didn't make the endless pots of stuff again, but I did help her eat her porridge.

I don't think spoons or mush are bad ... I do think it's less than ideal to obsess about reducing milk intake when a child can barely hold their head up.

heartily agree Druzhok

actually now you mention it - dd will eat sticks of cheese and steamed cauliflower with gusto but i made her cauliflower cheese thinking she'd love it and she gave me such a look of disgust!

i love blw - even if its just for the pleasure of giving dd cherry tomatoes stright off the plant and her getting really excited aobut them!

nothing wrong at all

all up to you

i suppose make sure they can manage lumps as i understand that can be a problem later on

zebedee - chiilllll oouuuuuuttttt incidentally, how is purees traditional weaning - the victorians gave their little ones dried bread and chicken bones as first food, or a flour and water pap (lots of those poor little things died though - the pap, not the bones ones)

we are doing blw and loving it but i could not be ARSED to puree lots of veggies and i think it nurtures their drive for independence if they are given opportunities to self feed, but then that is common sense

also ds wouldn't let me spoon feed if i tried

zebedeethezebra Wed 14-Jul-10 10:25:06
There's nothing like a controversial comment to spice up a thread a bit grin !

The thing with BLW types and the way they carry on on this website is that they all think that what they are doing is far superior to traditional weaning and you all seem to think that therefore you are far superior than everyone else.

I don't think I'm superior / inferior to anybody else. Don't make assumptions about people just because of the way they choose to wean Zeb!

And you say 'traditional' ... I say pretty recent trend, in the whole scheme of things. Probably on the same part of timeline as food processors!

"I too don't understand the hostility to BLW (except perhaps the slightly ridiculous name)"

I think the name is entirely to blame. It implies superiority and, if you do something other than finger foods, that you are forcing your baby in some way.

It's not like breast v bottle since the product is the same, just the delivery method is differen - I guess comparing the two is Iike comparing breast v expressed milk. Whichever suits your baby the best is what works, neither is superior to the other no matter what the name implies.

There is often an element of superiority accompanying finger food posts, especially when they compare their child directly with a spoon fed one. This, combined with the implied superiority of the stupid name is what puts people's backs up.

DD was having none of the whole finger food lark, with hindsight I think she disliked the feel of it. She was better (but still a PITA to wean!) with spoon feeding ordinary food. She eats pretty much anything now.

One of the theories around BLW is that if you offer babies a range of food types, they will select what they need and therefore eat what they need. I think the idea is that they control their diet from the outset - as opposed to having to learn calorie and portion control later in life.

Surely though, as long as you offer finger food with the purees, feed them slowly (something to do with taking 20 minutes for the brain to register that the stomach is full perhaps?), and don't worry about them 'finishing' a meal (or even about them starting, if they're not in the mood), then you could achieve the same outcome?

As a self-confessed BLWer, I found it easier to go for the 'pre-historic' [sorry, couldn't resist ] route of letting DS start out by helping himself from my plate before moving on to proper mealtimes - that way I wasn't stressing about how much he ate or about wasting food when he wasn't hungry.

But each to their own.

Mind you, any suggestion of superiority is purely on here - in RL pretty much everyone is openly or quietly sceptical of the whole thing. I think it is mainly the question mark over how much, if any, food is actually going in. I worry about this too so reading people's posts on here just helps me hold my nerve.

I dod alot of finger food with all three but DD1 and DD3 seemed to appreciate my help with spoon as they lacked the dexterity to get certain foods into their mouths.

I think the combination of spoon feeding and finger food works best as at least you know some is going in.

I don't buy the independent food selection = calorie and portion control, theory. The baby does not select the food - you do! For example, mashed potato is easier for a baby to eat than a hunk of meat, so it will eat more potato. mashed up and spoon fed, the baby will consume more meat and less potato - surely that is more nutritionally sound - iron and protein - for a baby?

Why claim that BLW is the traditional way of weaning? My mother remembers her mother mushing up vegetables with a fork and chewing meat before feeding it to her baby sister back in the 50s. I don't imagine my grandmother was unique, and I am sure that in the past mothers just fed their babies in whichever way they thought was best, whether giving them a bit of bread to munch on, or some mashed up vegetables. They just didn't stick a label on what they were doing and try to claim that their way is best. Which is, as zeb says, what many proponents of BLW do.

And I referred in a previous post to the propaganda around BLW is because I've experienced it. Being anxious to wean DS1 properly I paid £80 to attend a BLW course, where for two hours I was shown videos on it, and told how babies are scared of spoons and will only take to solids if they feed themselves food that hasn't been pureed. I tried it, and it didn't work for me. And given that both my boys started with purees and don't have any of the issues that my course told me they would have, it's clear that those who promote BLW do give out misleading information about purees.

I don't care how anybody weans their baby - everyone does what they think best, and what works with their baby. It's an individual thing. But I do care that the suggestion is made (extremely strongly by some) that BLW is the only way to wean a baby. It isn't.

Feeding methods in themeselves are innocuous but they do become a 'political' issue to so extent. Journalists these days raid Mumsnet for their articles. There may even be Mnetter journalist pro- blwers. You might then get a gov't working party who recommend BLW, for example then it becomes standard for health visitors to recommend it (not saying this does or will happen just imagining the possibility).

If it did, those babies who are all getting what nutrition they do from jars only, might start to get their nutrition from Pop Tarts and fag butts.

Don't knock poptarts puffling - for some people it's the closest they get to having one of their five a day!

I am almost certain that prehistoric women were chewing bit of roots or meats to feed their babies. That would come to me quite naturally (I did it too when nothing else was available and noone was looking).
Do a mixture of both, or what ever works if you have a fussy eater.

Oh god, this is like bf v ff. We all do it our own ways and for whatever reasons. All that matters is that we're doing it with love! Well, that and some stickyness whichever way you choose!

"And I referred in a previous post to the propaganda around BLW is because I've experienced it. Being anxious to wean DS1 properly I paid £80 to attend a BLW course"

... some mugs will pay for anything!

paid £80 for a blw course? are you kidding?