First food -aptamil porridge vs baby rice

[Michronrub]

Morning, a couple of questions ....1- I was looking for advice around first food. Lo is 17 weeks and I'm looking to try him with a porridge or baby rice which is best to start with ?
2- He is not sleeping long between feeds and has regressed from 2 night feeds to 3 and unsettled Inbetween that . I think it may be hunger ???

could you not just give more feeds or bigger feeds. It isnt recommended to start food until closer to 6 months. Are both foods gluten free? If so, it wouldnt really matter which you started with. Or you could use simple fruits and veg pureed instead.

p.s. food never made a difference to sleeping for my 2

also google 4 month sleep regression

Thanks for responding , lots of people advising to start food and others not. Will google it . Thanks

Also have a look at the amount of calories in baby rice compared to formula or breast milk, I think the milk is more calorie dense, definitely more calories in milk than purees. Maybe it's worth going to see your health visitor, they can give you proper advice about weaning and what you should expect a 16 week old baby to be doing. I hope the sleep gets better soon.

Sounds like 4month sleep regression to me. Happened with both of mine and MIL in particular was constantly telling me to get them on solids. I ignored, mainly because I wanted to wait until the recommended 6 months, and just fed more often. In fact I found weaning made sod all difference to sleep. In fact DS2 wakes more because he's quite windy after having fruit and spends all night pumping!
Also, I don't think baby rice has that many calories so probably won't fill him up that much. I never bothered with it and went for porridge. Fruit puréed also aren't hugely calorific either.

Definitely baby rice is safer, made with water.

Lol . Just googled sleep regression at 4 months and seems to be famous ! So that's that! Re the food I would prefer to wait a little longer too , will see what the next few nights bring ! Thanks all

Blog post explaining why baby rice isn't such a good choice

I started mine on carrot at 6 months. Baby rice isn't very nice stuff. Its a lot simpler to wean at 6 months because you don't have the list of things to avoid.

It sounds like the 4 month sleep regression, so it should hopefully pass soon. My hv told me it was preferable to put a baby under 6 months on to a hungry baby milk rather than wean early but the best thing to do is just feed them more often.

Thank you . He is feeding less and more often , seems to be going backwards with that too . Will see how he goes over the next few days and nights