Who has tried Baby Led Weaning? I'd like some feed back from people in the know!

[vino4me]

Hi all, DD is 15 weeks, and bfing well. Not to bothered about weaning until 6 months but thinking that BLW seems a good way to go.

Have you tried and tested? How did you find it - I'd like some responses from real people testing it. I keep getting oh my friend Jen's brother's girlfriend's swim teacher reckons..........

Thanks all!

yeah, i'd be inclined to think that stealing food and eating it is a sign of readiness.

ds3 did it.

hes the third baby in 2.5 years, so tbh, he was never gonna get much time or attention paid to his mealtimes anyway, so to chop stuff into handsized pieces and lob them his way was a fab way to feed him. he loved it. made a right old mess, but hey, like thats avoidable?? i think not.

anyways, he was confidently eating cereal and soup and stuff with a spoon etc by about 13 months, and doing a pretty darn good job of it too (eating with a spoon is really quite complicated when you think about the dexterity required to scoop from the bowl and hold it level up to the mouth and get it in there, and thus, is my Unofficial Measure of Eating Skill)

and he seemed to learn all that (and more ) all by himself and without much input from others, which, imo, makes him happier as hes achieved it for himself. whereas all the jars and puree and spoons of mush hoo-haa we faffed about with the first time took up much more time and (pointless) energy.

i wasnt religious about it; if i felt he was hungry and frustrated and just wanted to get a bit in, id help him out with a spoon now and then, but he didnt want it much. [i just held a spoon of food near him, so he could grab and pull my arm towards him when and if he wanted it, rather than trying to sneak gobfulls in him when he wasnt looking, as one finds oneself doing when feeding a jar]

apols for waffling on... hth

I did draw the line when MIL offered him a piece of garlic bread - the salt don't you know I told her (tescos own brand eeeks) never turn your back on a MIL...
But he was into it...
Have yet for him refuse anything actually
so he not only looks like his father it seems

GARLIC bread??!! (pace Peter Kay)

dd2 is 27 weeks and we've been blw for about 4 weeks (she initiated it by swiping her sister's rice cake) I've been stunned at how quickly her manual dexterity has progressed, she's now chomping manfully through baked potatoes, fishcakes, brocolli, infact everything I put infront of her. Well, except this morning's oatmeal experiment and to be fair, it did look rancid.

Initially I found the mess hard to cope with but I'm in the groove now and have my strategies in place - mainly lots of newspaper and facecloths.

Dd1 was weaned the normal way and this is sooooo much easier, even my mil hasn't complained!

Did good old spoon and puree with DD and spent the first year of solids trying to prise open her chops to put in delicious, nutricious organic puree/solids and then spent ages wiping most of what went in off the floor after she'd seen how far she could spit it, so was pretty motivated to do BLW when DS got to 6 months. Primed DP, who thought I was bonkers and went along with it so he could play the 'I told you so card' when I sucombed to the spoon. Anyway, DS (now 7 months) loves it, fills his boots almost every mealtime. I cannot tell you how much less hassle than mush I find it, and DP is such a convert he's busy preaching the good word to all our friends for all the world like he'd invented the idea - so we're all happy

I posted a reply and it disappeared, now I've got to write it all out again, grrr.

I think the "Breastfeeding Police" comment was aimed at me, Aitch! lol

I didn't even exclusively breastfeed my daughter, we couldn't. She was very prem and was nose fed for about three weeks, my milk took most of that time to come in and she had to have formula. At around two months old she got to 6lb 2oz and stopped growing for four weeks. So we had to put her back on the formula.

It took until she was nearly ready for solids to get her off of the formula and then it was like solids replaced the supplementation.

I mentioned breastfeeding in passing because it is related to the origins of puree.

In the 1950s commercial formula was new and they needed to convince parents it was the best thing for their child, before then the only thing available was breastmilk. So they drummed up scientists to tell mothers that breastmilk was bad for them and their child - of course this was before the EU interefered in things or we had a trades description act.

Before then mothers were weaning anything between 6 months and a year, depending on the era. 1950s formula couldn't sustain a baby for that long and along came purees.

Advice has varied since then as scientists have tried to recover. They are now studying the development of the infant body and finding out more about it, they understand it better and now know why waiting till six months is better.

I'm really sorry to be so lazy and not research loads of websites but could someone please tell me in a nutshell what BLW is? A friend mentioned it in passing and I said whaaat? I am not giving ds a carrot!!!!! He is 23 wks and is exclusively bf (and i'm not apologising for that!) not even a hint of rice has crossed his lips - do you really just give them whole normal food?
Thanks - SS

Firstly, save your fingers from the research and call into babyledweaning.com!

Secondly, BLW is dropping the purees stage and allowing baby to feed themself. Studies have found that babies development is linked all the way from the hand to the nappy (to be polite) and if they can't put it in their own mouth then their whole digestive system isn't ready for it (for example grapes can't be digested until a child has the pincer grip, if you put a grape in their mouth chances are it would be pushed back out, if it goes down it will be in the nappy next day undigested)

It is a lot less stressful (the only BLW rule!) and fosters healthier attitudes towards food. It is also great to eat out and order your baby anything (especially when the waiter looks blankly at you and says "for the baby?" lol) or eat at someone's house and not have to worry about what LO eats or just eat a hot meal.

Sorry, missed a question.

Do we give whole normal food?

Sort of. Start with "Chips and Trees" Chips are vegetables that can be cut into "chip" shape and lightly boiled (root veg is good for this) you can also add in things like toast soliders if you are happy with bread. "Trees" are brocolli and cauliflower, perfect BLW foods because they come with a "handle".

As your LO learns to open their hand you can add in other things that are fist shaped and when they have pincer grip the gloves are off!

This is how weaning has historically taken place and still happens around the world, the NHS weaning guide is now starting to lean towards it too.

hobnob I think you could change to blw even with the intolerances, as long as you are happy to carry on breastfeeding before and after you leave her, and possibly at night too if you haven't already stopped. You'd probably also have to explain more to the carers, who might not be used to this approach.

But I left ds2 in nursery from about 6 months old, he had severe reflux and was breastfed, and because of ds1's intolerances I was avoiding a lot of food. Initially I expressed for him but soon realised he just wasn't drinking much from a bottle during the day, so I cut down greatly on how much I expressed, and provided the nursery with food I'd made myself until I was happy he could eat the stuff they made for everyone else. (This was partly because the nursery hadn't been very good at dealing with ds1's intolerances. If you have a childcarer who's okay with the food intolerances you probably wouldn't have to supply your own food.)

I did find that ds2 preferred small amounts of everything initially, but after a while it was great to go and visit and see him sitting in a high chair and eating his food with gusto - and no purees in sight!

Regarding the spicy food, if you are preparing it yourself you can probably make the basic stuff and then add more flavourings to your own portions, but I wouldn't worry too much about the spices. Both of my sons happily ate spicy food from quite an early age. I would worry more about the salt/additives if you are buying ready made stuff, but if you are dairy/gluten free you probably have to read labels all the time anyway.

DD1 purees etc, which were very unpopular, been fussy eater since.
DD2 Blw, eats loads, varied diet, enjoys food. Even DD1 starting to try more things as a result

Thank you for that Tinkerbellesmum - really helpful and definately makes alot of sense (cant see our old ancestors with a blender somehow!) I think i'm going to find the whole BLW really interesting so will definately check out the website during 'nap time'!
Thanks Again x

can i ask a question to all you blwers.

one of the great things about blw and an important part is that the family eats together and you GIVE the baby something off your plate. dh doesn't get home until late so we eat together after the children have gone to bed, therefore dd2 cannot have anything from our plates. i feed dd1 around 5pm and so give dd2 something then with her, BUT it means cooking her extra (which defeats the object) because if i gave her stuff from dd1's plate it would be a really limited diet - dd1 is the world's most fussy eater. any ideas?!

I don't do it this way, in the early days I gave DD2 something to try whenever anyone else was eating, e.g. croissant, rice cakes etc. I tend to eat the same as dc for lunch, but like you have a seperate evening meal later. I just cook seperately for them.

You don't need to literally be feeding them from your plate, just the same as what you eat.

One option that a lot of people seem to be going for is to cook for for the baby with your meal and put it up for the next day.

Another option is to cook for the family and your DH have his when he comes home. If you wanted to eat with him you could either split your meal so you are still giving your children a family meal time and eating with him; just eat with the children for awhile to help your youngest; or put the adults meals up.

Hi - great thread! My ds2 followed BLW only because he absolutely refused to be spoon fed and still does. I did not know what this feeding regime was called until 3 months into it, would have loved to have had some help/advice from mumsnetters (I had not been introduced yet). Now that ds3 is 6 months and ready to start experimenting with food I am going to follow the blw (mixed with some spoon feeding). Ds1 followed Annabel Karmels book and started at 4mnths. Lots went in but it all seemed to come out the other end totally un-digested...

My biggest problem with BLW initally was lack of ideas just what to feed ds2 so he got a lot of dried bananas (not the chips, but the blackened soft ones), buttered bread, baked beans, flapjacks (soft ones...) - we actually were referred to a dietician that recommended those items i've listed. So can someone please send me their top ten ideas for feeding 6-9 month olds or a link to their fav website. Thank you - [email protected]

have a look here and here, plenty of recipes to choose from. but the best thign is to start with what you eat... they can manage just about anything ime. especially now that winter's coming in you've got lovely soups (dip bread in) and casseroles to look forward to.

You don't really need to worry about ideas because they should eat the same as you do, sans salt. The best site is Aitch's site there are lots of recipies on there, but personally I've never gone to as much effort.

Aitch beat me to it!

thank you very much tinkerbellsmom and aitch - the ideas are fantastic and very inspiring! If only I had seen them 2 years ago... ok got to run, got 2 years worth of steamed veg to catch up on! Ds3 is going to love this, I just know

God that site is great! bows down to aitch I've spent the best part of ds's hour long nap cutting and pasting recipes! and in stiches at the gorgeous pics of all the weaning babies lol. Can see its going to be a bit addictive!
Oops, he's just waking up - I'm off to find a pitta bread to fill with carrot and cheese

Well, me and ds3 have been BLW for a week now (he is 6 months) and we didn't know it!! Felt slightly freaky as he will not have anything from a spoon, and so tried him on finger foods from the go, much to the shock of my friends.

Ds1 and 2 were great with food weaning, but Squeak will not have anything from a spoon. He rather likes digestives (thanks to his big brother of 3 sharing his with him!) and have also tried veg and fruit softened by cooking, and given in strips.

SO, what next?? Do we just do more of the same for a couple of weeks. When do we start with these lovely recipes that you have been posting on the other sites?

I am sooooo glad that we are not the only ones, as it seems that everyone I know thinks I am mad!

Watch your son and follow his cues.

That sounds horrible on it's own doesn't it? I can imagine being told that and thinking "well how am I supposed to know what cues are?" I made it up as I went along so I didn't have anyone say that.

Anyway, copy and paste of what I posted earlier:

Start with "Chips and Trees"

"Chips" are vegetables that can be cut into "chip" shape and lightly boiled (root veg is good for this) you can also add in things like toast soliders if you are happy with bread.

"Trees" are brocolli and cauliflower, perfect BLW foods because they come with a "handle".

As your LO learns to open their hand you can add in other things that are fist shaped and when they have pincer grip the gloves are off!

If you follow their development (what they can and can't do) you shouldn't go far wrong.