weaning early

[gfenton999]

Hi, please bare with me as I'm new to this whole mums-net stuff.
Basically the whole weaning situation has got me s stressed out!
My L.O is 4 months old and everyone is telling me I should start weaning and ignore the 6 month guidelines but I have decided to ignore there advice. L.O is breastfed with the very occasional formula feed if i have to work and my partner has him alone. He feeds on demand and is a pretty good feeder.
He is however a terrible sleeper, still waking every 2 hours for a feed, and people have told me that by introducing solids he will sleep better. The other issue is, that even though he is a good feedr, his weight gain has slowed down quite a lot and I now have him weighed every 2 weeks. he was 7.4 at birth and was 12.13 a week ago, so would weaning benefit him?
I would prefer to wean at 6 months but I don't want to do him any hard if his weight gain has sowed down too much?!sorry about the long post

Well first of all, welcome.
Secondly the link between feeding and sleeping is a myth. It used to be that bad sleep was a sign to wean but it's not considered to be these days. in fact starting solids can often cause more broken sleep with irregular poor and trouble settling stomach. Weaning earlier is likely to make it worse too as the gut is less mature.
The signs for weaning are being able to sit up and having lost the tongue thrust.
Also breastmilk is higher in calories than any solids you can give.
When you say your dc weight gain has slowed, have they fallen down centiles? Babies often slow down a bit from the first few months and will go through spurts. Again regular breast feeds should give more calories than solids spent you're better off with that. Remember, milk should be the main source of food until 1.

sorry for typos - on phone. But needless to say official advice is 26 weeks for a reason