Does BLW mean you need to breastfeed more often?

[Falcon1]

I was wondering if anyone can help me. I'd like to do baby led weaning but am slightly concerned that if my daughter doesn't really eat much for months, I'm going to have to breastfeed more as she gets bigger. I already find it a bit draining and not sure I can face more night feeds!

Am I worrying unnecessarily, or does BLW mean she'llbe feeding more on the breast than she would with spoon feeding?

[MadMonkeys]

I started blw dd2 at 24 weeks when she tried to help herself to my lunch. She got it straight away, 2 weeks later she is now eating quite a lot, much to my amazement. We did blw with dd1 and it took her a couple of months to actually swallow much, but during that couple of months she didn't seem that bothered with milk either. depends on the child I think, you won't know til you try...

[LimeFlower]

If she wants to eat she will eat,regardless to whether she's being spoon fed or BLW.If she doesn't want to eat she won't.
9mo DS was fine with food for a while and bf was reduced to night feeds and one feed during a day.Now he went off the food (bloody teething) and bf more.
I still try to feed him,he just keeps his mouth shut,pushes the spoon away or plays with food chucking it onto the floor.

[marzipananimal]

DS took to BLW very quickly and was soon eating a decent quantity of food, so I don't think doing purees would have made him cut down bf quicker

[flipflopson5thavenue]

I've not noticed an increase in bfing (DS is 8 mo, been doing BLW for a couple of months) although I don't really keep track of how often he feeds a day, and its certainly differs from day to day. However, the last few days he has woken 3/4 times a night and I just feed him as its the quickest way for us both to get back to sleep. I don't really know if he's woken for hunger or something else. If he was getting hungrier I'd expect him to feed more during the day too, so I don't know if that's why he's waking. Maybe he's teething, or I did wonder if he's a bit chilly.

With BLW I think the advice is that if they start getting hungrier before they 'get' the whole feeding themselves, you should just increase their milk feeds. However, all babies are different and your daughter might learn to feed and associate hunger with the food she's playing with really quickly, and so you may not notice such an increase in bfing as her appetite gets bigger. Likewise, she may just become more efficient at feeding at each feed and not increase the frequency. Finally, you can always change your mind once you start. You don't have to do one single method of weaning exclusively.

People I know who are doing traditional spoon-feeding weaning seem to be very systematically increasing the solid food intake, with a view to reducing the milk intake - bottle of bf. I don't know if this is what spoon-feeding tends to do, or if its more their own personal choice, but I think that with both trad and BLW milk should still make up more than half of nutrition up to 12 months.

Just give it a go and see what happens. You;re not tied into any one way of feeding your baby. I've found BLW a bit stressful til now but its finally getting more fun as DS has started chewing and swallowing more and now flaps with excitement when I put him in his high chair and start getting his food together :-)

[Pyrrah]

We did BLW as well.

I think it depends a lot on the individual child. DD was boob obsessed and only gave up in October last year at 3.5 years! I was SO done by then I can tell you.

Until she was 2, breast milk was definitely the major part of her diet, she just wasn't interested in food at all. I did try purees a couple of times just to see if it made a difference and she spat them out in disgust. The only food she really liked was curry and rice to be honest.

However, my sister's son, who did not do BLW is very similar and at 2.3 is definitely still more interested in breast-milk than food.

I'd wondered if my being a SAHM made a difference to her reluctance to give up milk, but even when she went to full-time nursery at 2 it showed no signs of reducing. My nephew went to daycare at 10 months and is the same.

It also depends on your parenting philosophy. I very much did full-on attachment parenting - we co-sleep, baby wearing, feeding on demand, DD was never left to cry or any kind of sleep training. I'm also very much a go with the flow type parent, so we didn't have any kind of schedule or routine. My sister does the same.

It is great for lazy people (ditto breastfeeding) and much less emotionally harrowing (having witnessed SIL in tears when DN wouldn't eat the super-duper organic puree that she'd spent all morning lovingly producing). I loved not having to go out armed with jars or having to actually feed my child, just took a bib and utensils.

[SwivelHips]

I can only comment re what happened here with my DS, we did BLW and at nearly 10 months its hit and miss what he eats in a day. Somedays he eats 3 meals a day, with 2x pudding and others (like bloody yesterday) he only ate his porridge. He's teething so is fussy what goes in his mouth. He dropped a day milk feed at approx 8 months so is now on 3 bottles a day.
In the beginning they don't eat very much, probably 9 or 10 months before they get it. I dont worry about what goes in as milk is his main source of food until 1 - or he lets me know otherwise .
I have to say I've loved BLW, NYE we took him out for a meal and it was great to sit and watch him eat pizza and chips on his own (erm no salt added I should add). Meant I could sit and have a glass or 2, too lazy for traditional weaning here :)