It's not rocket science - "it may cause harm to wean early, it does no harm to leave it till 6m" - WHY do people still want to shovel baby rice in at 12 weeks (or earlier)?

[hunkermunker]

I have come up with some ideas as to why people wean early:

they have competitive baby syndrome and are annoyed someone else's baby rolled first, so they want to get theirs onto steak and chips via baby rice and one fruit or veg a week for months

Well, an idea. Any more?

Message withdrawn

did anyone say anything about a single cause?

Decades ago it was actually the norm to leave weaning MUCH later - my great aunt was really shocked I was giving DS1 anything before he was 12mo. So all this "there are more allergies now than ever" kinda supports the "early weaning is risky" theory better than anything, IMO.

And ZK, I didn't mean for you to take that as badly as you did - I really thought I was making the same point as Harpsi (albeit in a more personal way, because you'd ignored her).

are we all going to bed now?

Zookeeper, quit the persecution act, I have politely advised folk look at the other thread several times, before and after being called patronising and aggressive.

Admittedly, I childishly played on being called that and behaved as such, but, up until then, I was being as helpful as I could before you were rude to me.

So, I think you'll find, your rudeness instigated how people are dealing with you now.

actually. it wasn't that normal to wean early years ago. my mother certainly didn't. when food was scarce, it was usual to keep babies on milk as long as possible.
and when babies were weaned, they weren't weaned onto processed gloop and jars with additives &c.
because Heinz and Cow and Gate didn't have so many units to shift.
I certainly wasn't weaned until after four months, and I am 37

agreed vvv

There you go again hunker

singersgirl, completely agree. i think the point that people are making is that given this is such an easy score then why are people not doing it, iykwim? and mrsa, both hunker and i were acknoledgine earlier the BLW thinking that if they can pick it up and eat it by themselves then their gut is in all likelihood ready. the gut closes as 4-6 months, so that does seem to me to be a good indication of maturity. but you'll never know if you feed them yourself, so i think that's the thing.

No, but several posters have implied that it is the greatest risk. Food intolerances are probably increasing because of the greater range of allergenic substances ingested. Historically, much food was eaten seasonally and in limited quantities, whereas today it's available all year round.

Oh, I was off to bed, wasn't I?

am I 37? I might be 38 come to think of it.
anyway. my point stands

By people you mean your usual ignorant cronies? I've notice you cannot contemplate a point of view different to that of your own.
Feel free to have the last word.

In fact, I think that early weaning has probably got more common as baby food manufacturers realised they could make a FORTUNE out of misleading mothers by putting 4m+ on labels.

Think I was weaned by 3 months, and I'm also 37.

I have a feeling my mum has mentioned baby rice at 6 weeks (maybe talking about my older brother?)

Was official advice not handed down in the olden days?

btw Aitch

DD2 despite not having a pincer grip yet loves sweetcorn and peas and does a complicated manouvere to get them out of her hand and onto the top side of her first finger (with a closed fist)before snuffling them up. Quite amazing to watch.

I feel I have to say, that the current thinking on Crohn's and ulcerative colitis is it could caused by MAP, a bacteria that could come from meat, milk and water and the other is it's a genetic problem, much research is taking place

I can find no correllation between early weaning and either disease

The WHO does not say it is dangerous to wean early, it says waiting til 6 months and exclusively breast feeding cannot and will not hurt the baby. But again, this advice is more for BF and not enough research has been done to see what is better for FF babies

The argument that new research can't be done as no one will subject a baby to the early weaning group is not needed, they have the research already, virtually everyone was weaned pre 6 months as little as 12 years ago, so the statistics are already there

If I was a parent of a young baby now, I honestly do not know what I would do. I had a baby that was satisfied by bf til 6 months naturally and one that swiped, chewed and swallowed food at 4 months (developmentally very advanced in everything) I also know that solids did make sleep better in all 4. So far, we have no problems, if we do later....do we blame early weaning or genes or genetics or environment. If I had a baby, I'd probably try to hold on for as long as possible, not follow any timeline and read the signs from the infant

Oh fgs dont bring Fruit Shoots into the mix singers

Aitch, can I be one of your ignorant cronies?

Is there an application form?

i don't think that is the case, singersgirl, i know i posted about other environmental factors.

and come on... no-one laughed at my 'anecdotal evidence never did me any harm'??!

Well, maybe it's just the people I know who were weaned early then . Food wasn't that scarce in the 1960s.

Anecdotally, as well, my cousins were all fed on Carnation milk (!) from birth and have lived to tell the tale. No, no, no, I'm not suggesting we should do that....

Well, I promise everyone if I have another baby (unlikely in my perimenopausal state) I shall not let anything other than breastmilk and Calpol (in extremis) pass its chubby lips. Unless they forcefeed it formula as they did with DS2 when he was hospitalised at 9 weeks.

oh and i was weaned at 4.5 months.

But not exclusively bf until then and neither was any baby who was born in Edinburgh in the early 70's thanks to the freaky way hospitals dealt with bfing.

If other hospitals did this too it wipes out loads of the anecdotal oh i was bf and I have xyz stuff because the bf was not exclusive.

yes, no doubt the official advice was to wean early 37 years ago. just like it was advised to feed formula.
my dm is v good of ignoring official advice and listened instead to her own mother and her friends

There you go again vvv

There you go again Cam