Question re weaning and BFing

[BoeBarlow]

DD is 5.5 months so we're starting to think about starting solids in the next couple of weeks. She has been EBF until now and is a bottle refuser, although I've had some success with expressed BM in a sippy cup with her recently so not too worried about being able to give her water.
My question is, do you BF before or after the solid feed? Do you leave a gap between a BF and solid feeds i.e. wait an hour between them or follow straight away? And also do you only offer water when eating solids or throughout the day?

Ok, that was actually three questions... TIA from a clueless first time mum

Bumping. Anyone?

I used to offer a bf about an hour before food, and give water in a sippy when she was eating food. Kept the same number of bfs at the start but as she started to eat more I spread the feeds out a bit more.

I think when you first start weaning it really doesn't matter about the timing of the solids - they don't associate food with hunger (or lack of), it's just something different to put in the mouth, and you'll only be giving them a couple of teaspoons (or if you're doing BLW they'll only be sucking on things to start with and v little will go in). I just tried feeding DS from 6 months whenever he was in a reasonably good mood, starting off with once a day and gradually progressing to twice and then 3x per day. I only offered water with solids.

It's probably easiest to start by still thinking of your baby as EBF, just with a teeny bit of food added! By the time things change significantly and you want more structure about it (8 months ish in our case) you'll have worked out what you're doing anyway!

Exactly the same as Justins. Milk is the more calorific, so that stays a priority, and then food offered about an hour later. It does feel a bit like you're constantly feeding in one way or another, but it doesn't last long.

Great, thanks for the advice everyone. I knew I'd still be BFing the same amount to start with, I was just wondering about the timing of things. Do you start off feeding solids at the same time every day or do you wait until it's more established before introducing set mealtimes? I'm hoping that DD will start to self-wean herself off the breast when she's ready rather than me actively reducing the number of feeds although I will be going back to work when she's 10 months so I need her not to be BFing during the day at least by then given she won't take a bottle

My DD is a bottle refuser, by 10 months she drank plenty of milk and water from a sippy cup and ate enough solid food to do her when I was at work. She was 8.5m when I went back. She's still keen on breastfeeding when I'm around (just turned 1). We did BLW, I put something in front of her when I ate and didn't worry about timings.

I just offered dd food with us at meal times and carried on bf as usual until she was actually eating a substantial amount of solid food (instead of feeding the dog)

Thanks Winkly. That was the one thing I was most worried about going back to work. She definitely seems to like the sippy cup more than the bottle (by that I mean she doesn't scream bloody murder whenever she sees the sippy cup! )