Talk to me about early weaning

[poppygolucky]

DD is just over 18 weeks old and lots of people asking me when I intend to wean. On my understanding, it should be 6 months. I've read BLW book and really keen to go down that route. DD is EBF and seems to be thriving: putting on weight, sleeping well etc.

However, SIL has an 21 month old she weaned at 16 weeks, one friend weaned her 3 year old at 17 weeks and another friend weaned her 2 DCs aged 8 and 5 at roughly 4 months too. So where has this conflicting advice come from? My friends aren't the types to ignore guidelines can't say the same about SIL so why have they done this? Has advice changed that recently?

I weaned dd at 4.5 months. No amount of milk was satisfying her. My paediatric doc friend said totally fine to wean around then, if done slowly and respecting no gluten etc rules. I guess some people will have done it when the guidelines were to wean at 4 months, which was a long while ago I think. and some find the waking fifteen times a night because the baby is hungry a good enough reason to jump start weaning. Crucially, do what feels right for your baby and seek medical advice of you go early.

Advice changed in 2003 to 6 months. Before that (from 1994) it was 4-6 months.

There's some NHS advice on when to wean here - www.nhs.uk/start4life/pages/no-rush-to-mush.aspx

You should do what you think is best but having read up on blw i wouldn't wean early. If you wean early you give them mushed up fruit which hasn't got as many calories as milk. I have a big baby who guzzles milk- i give him hungry milk 240 ml x 4 a day and hes 5 mths old and im no hurry to wean and will follow the nhs guidelines. But your baby, your decision, you do what your comfortable with and don't be swayed what others say or do.

I have 2 close friends, both health professionals (not hvs ) who both weaned around 16 - 17 weeks. Tbh I think a lot of the reason was...they were bored! I waited until 26 weeks, and I'm glad I did. Did the BLW with dc and it went really well. Just wait if that's what you want to do, I did not comment on my friends' decision, and they didn't comment on mine. No-one should be pressurising you either way.

Thanks for the replies.

I feel as though I want to wait til 6 months: besides it being the guidelines, DD has shown no signs of being ready for solids and it seems to fit in well with the principles of BLW.

To be fair, my friends haven't passed any comment on my decision to wait, and nor have I said anything about their decisions to wean earlier. We are all aware that we might make different parenting decisions and are totally non-judgey with one another, thankfully.

SIL is another kettle of fish. She has asked me a few times if i've given DD any baby rice yet, and if not, when I intend to. She also passes comments that my DD is looking enviously at her DD's food. But she is slightly unhinged, so I shall just ignore and be confident in my decision. :)

I read (somewhere can't remember where) that the guidelines used to be 4-6 months because people were weaning waaay before which is dangerous, so they set that to encourage later weaning. But especially with your first you want them to be doing new things so lots of people took it as you should be doing it at 4 months. And I think that mentally sticks with people - why are you waiting so long etc.

And lots of people think they will sleep better which I believe has been proven to be rubbish but when you are desperate for sleep...

This may be controvertial but I also think if you have had a bad experience not breastfeeding you may want them to get on to the next stage asap to forget about it.