Weaning advice - true or false?

[BellaBear]

(preferably with some back up other than just 'instinct'!)

Things I have been told recently (DS is 24 weeks and we'll start weaning in a couple of weeks - in my whole circle of friends with babies which is quite large I know of ONE other baby who is waiting until 6 months to wean)

A 'I had to wean my DS at 17 weeks as he is such a big baby'

B 'It's better to start on purees as it is more natural this way'

C 'If you wait until 6 months to wean, you have to introduce new tastes (eg meat) faster than you would have done had you weaned earlier'

D 'The first time I gave DD baby rice, she slept through the night' (Honestly, this must have been coincidence, right????)

E 'I couldn't have waited, DS was so interested in food'

I am genuinely interested in what others think, I am not trying to trash these views at all, this is the only place where there seems to be support for delaying solids and I am interested in proper reasons why these views MAY not be correct. Or are correct.

He's not even a gp and I know that he has nothing to do with babies and weaning at work.

He's just a dr who thinks he knows everything

what sort of doctor is he??

One that puts people to sleep

A 'I had to wean my DS at 17 weeks as he is such a big baby'
bollocks DS2 is now 15lb at 13 weeks, size does not make one iota of difference on gut maturity, it is age, not size.

B 'It's better to start on purées as it is more natural this way'
bollocks What is natural (i.e. in nature) is mother's milk then solid food, proper solid food, once they are able to chew and swallow.

C 'If you wait until 6 months to wean, you have to introduce new tastes (eg meat) faster than you would have done had you weaned earlier'
rubbish you have 2 months less of baby rice, that's it.

D 'The first time I gave DD baby rice, she slept through the night' (Honestly, this must have been coincidence, right????)
coincidence Babies sleep through when they are ready, it's more likely baby was making more noise, waking up in the night because of a growth spurt and that ended at the same time the rice was given.

E 'I couldn't have waited, DS was so interested in food'
again utter tosh babies are interested in everything, everything because it's new and interesting!

Have to go do the school run so I'll read the rest of the thread later, though I see lulu and tiktok are here so know some sense is being spoken..

Download this leaflet and shove it upthe arses of those who try to make you feel like a retard for not spooning mush past your babies tongue thrust reflex!

Monkies

I think my key observation is this - all of those reasons are pure conjecture on the mother's part.

the only scientifically supported evidence is for weaning at six months.

end of story, as far as I'm concerned.

But it is interesting how few people follow the guidelines. I am one of only two people I know who waited. I can honestly say that in rl I have never brought up the subject of early weaning with people, but have several times been forced to defend my decision to wait. Once by my hv.

I just don't understand why people don't wait as feeding food is such a bloody faff. My ds was a terrible sleeper who got even worse when I introduced solids too.

I know, it's weird. My HV was deeply distrustful of BLW and said if I was feeding DS purees he'd be sleeping through the night by now.

Conveniently ignoring the fact that if you put a spoon of mush anywhere near DS' lips, he pursed them up so tight you'd be hard pressed to poke a cocktail stick in there.

Independent little so and so refused point blank to eat anything whatsoever unless he was in charge of the spoon/carrot stick/piece of mushy broccoli.

People get seriously vitriolic on here when you point out the rules, and start accusing you of all sorts of nasties too. I really admire those who keep on posting (VS, Lulumama, tiktok, sabire - well done!)

rules SHOULD say GUIDELINES!!

Agree with C, but it's you can, not you have to. The rest are total rubbish. We have very early weaning age in the west even at six months, so anything less is total rubbish.

lol constancereader, it is quite hard to stay nice sometimes!
You just have to remember that someone who has no idea might read the thread and needs to know the truth, not 'instinct'.

Have seen 2 babies recently, 1 was drinking a can of coca cola and the other was drinking a bottle of lucozade sport.
Eldest was 10 months old .

Have looked after a baby who was admitted at 6 weeks old because of vomiting after every feed. Parents had been melting white chocolate buttons into baby's bottle

Realise that this is not exactly weaning but just shows what parents can think is acceptable.

are these parents then advised of appropriate infant feeding?

Oh Gosh, I hope so lulu.
Wouldn't surprise me if not though.

i presume parents who do this sort of thing are doing so from some misguided notion of giving their baby a treat, rather than knowing it is harmful and doing it anyway.

The babies drinking coke/lucozade were in a toddler group but the white buttons in a bottle happened 13 years ago and we got the HV involved whilst the baby was in hospital as well as our dietician.

i see. lucozade is foul. i had it once when i was really ill before my a levels, i can still taste it . it coats your entire mouth in gunk.

Lulumama, the parents did think they were giving their baby a treat and could not understand what was so wrong about it.
The sad thing is no matter what advice you give people, you can always tell those who will ignore it and carry on as before.

There seems to be an idea that there's an ulterior motive to changing the guidelines that I really don't understand. The previous guidelines have been based on what people were doing rather than any evidence. If you look back 100 years you find the age was higher than now and the further back you go the higher it was. It was the introduction of formula in the 1950s that had the age coming down and we've spent the last 60 years trying to fix things.