Evidence against early weaning

[floozles]

Just wondering if anyone can point me to the evidence for not weaning until 6 months (am looking into it as planning to start solids for DD at 22 weeks). I've read through the Optimal Duration for Exclusive Breastfeeding:A Systematic Review published by the WHO and am left scratching my head. As far as I can ascertain, the review was carried out predominantly to see if there was any evidence of harm in recommending exclusive breastfeeding until 6 months in developing countries, in terms of reduced weight gain & poor iron status.

There is evidence of reduced GI infections in babies exclusively breastfed for 3 months vs 6 months in a study from Belarusse, and reduced eczema in the Belarusse study and a study from Finland which looked at children of atopic parents only.

The summary states that 'Besides their reduced morbidity due to gastrointestinal infection, infants breastfed exclusively for 6 or more months had no observable deficits in growth, and their mothers were more likely to remain amenorrheic for 6 months postpartum. No benefits of introducing complementary foods between 4 and 6 months have been demonstrated, with the exception
of improved iron status in one developing country setting (Honduras).'

I can see how exclusive breastfeeding till 6 months is ideal in developing countries where you don't really want your baby getting d&v, and prolonged amenorrhoea is useful in terms of birth control. I can't see from this any real evidence that giving my daughter a daily spoonful of apple puree from 22 weeks will harm her.

Just wondering if there's more up-to-date evidence that I've yet to come across.

[Ducks head below parapet...]

Hi. I don't know much about the current evidence, but just wondering why you want to wean your baby earlier?
I've waited til 6 months with my three and it hasn't been a problem (the older two were sleeping through from around 10pm to 7am from being 1 or 2 months, and didn't become unsettled without solids even at six months). DS was a big baby too - 9lbs 4oz at birth.
I found there was a lot of pressure of people to wean them earlier because that was what the old guidelines said, but there was never any need for it.

If all she needs is a daily spoonful of fruit then she can prob wait.

I don't particularly feel under any pressure to wean early, but I can't see the evidence at the moment for waiting until 6 months (she does sit with us at the table sometimes licking her lips and watching the food very closely!).

It does seem from other posts on MN and from friends that there are people out there who do want to introduce solids earlier and I just wonder, as there seems to be such strength of feeling in some quarters, where the evidence that introducing solids a bit earlier than 6 months is harmful in the long-term.

Honestly am wanting to learn, not start an argument !

Floozles - I don't think it really matters THAT much in the great scheme of things whether you wean at 4 months or 6 months. But generally, stuff I've read seems to indicate that it is safer to wean too late than too early - it seems that babies are less prone to allergies, asthma etc... if weaned later.
It could all be a load of rubbish of course! But I think that if it's not a problem to wait until 6 months then wait, just to be safe.

Also Floozles - although giving a baby solids is exciting at first, believe me, after a few weeks you will long for the old days when you didn't have everything stained with pureed carrot and weetabix plastered all over your walls

It is unlikely to harm her, but is equally unlikely to benefit her-what is a spoonful of apple puree going to achieve?
Is there any particular reason why you've decided on 22 weeks?
I did BLW which meant that the decision was in my son's hands (literally). When he was ready to eat he picked up food and ate it. Took a lot of the angst out of the process

weaned all 4 of mine before 6 months. 3 months for dd1. none of them have had any allergies, asthma so far (youngest is now 7) apart from ds1 who gets hayfever and is allergic to tidyness!
Dh had eczema and still has asthma.

Decided on 22 weeks coz it's half-term, and we've finished the course of swimming lessons - just in case it causes nappy havoc!

Spoonful of puree - well, you've got to start somewhere.

Not totally against the idea of BLW, will see how we go. Unless I discover any published evidence that persuades me that it would be harmful not to wait until 6 months, that is.

BTW: 6 months or 26 weeks?

DD will be 26 months on Monday and we will be starting weaning then.

She will be exactly 6 months next Wednesday, but as she was 2 days late it makes no difference to us whether it's months or 26 weeks.

HTH.

26 months

I started solids with my DD "early", somewhere around 5 months. She was just following every spoonful anyone ate from hand to mouth with a longing look in her eyes! She's 10mo now and a brilliant eater, eats far more than my 3 year old.

PS would def recommend Ella's kitchen sachets

6 months is 26 weeks - a year is 52 weeks after all.
Even if you don't do BLW I suppose it could still be helpful to use your baby's ability to handle foods as a useful pointer to the time to start. Seems so arbitrary otherwise.

Weaning age is a little odd because in some ways it is a developmental stage like sitting, crawling etc but it is usually in the hands (or spoons) of the parents. I mean, my son is 15 months and not yet walking but there is nothing I can do to make him walk, he'll do it when he's ready. I took the same attitude to weaning, and he started eating at about 25 weeks.

Sorry for rambling on! Hope this makes some sense.

In developed countries such as the UK, exclusive breastfeeding is still strongly protective against respiratory infections as well as D&V. This study showed this benefit persisting between 4 and 6 months in infants who were exclusively breastfed at that point. Note that they looked at babies who were hospitalised with these infections too.

Watching you eat with interest is not a sign of readiness for weaning. Everything you do is of interest to babies, and if they watch you driving eagerly, you don't let them drive do you ?

I think welliemum posted a really useful thing about this. Let me see if I can find it.

Ah, bugger, I can't. I was thinking of one specific post. However, if you search for welliemum and weaning, she's done a lot of reading around the research.

Welliemum on relative risks

I posted on that welliemum thread and very interesting it was too, but all it said was that there is a risk to weaning early and the risk is greater the earlier you start.

I weaned my twins at 22 weeks cos they were cluster feeding and that carried on for more than 5 days (ie not a growth spurt). I was exclusiely BFing two babies so I think the amount of milk one person can produce does have limit at some point (unless you want to feed every hour which I didn't).

I would lay off wheat, meat, gluten and oats until at least 6mths, but fruit, veg, baby rice... I did it and it did stop the cluster feeding.

Yes it is only a few spoons at first but I think by 6mth you want your baby to be eating well (and it might take a few weeks for him to get used to it) so he can take in the amount he needs.

You will read on MN that food is not linked to sleep but it has been for my two. When they don't eat well we get a 6am waking the next day rather than 8am.

I think the best thing to do is to wait until they are ready rather than set an arbitrary date of say 22 weeks. And by ready I mean able to chew and swallow, not just watching the food or waking up in the night or any of that.

We did wait until 26 weeks because I wanted to follow the guidelines and it was obvious that we could have done it a few weeks before - we went straight onto mashed food and finger foods and dd was immediately able to chew everything with no problems - but this made the whole process easier, less stressful and much more fun.

I could have just said that I agree with FaintlyMacabre ahem.

Kramer MS, Kakuma R. Optimal duration of exclusive breastfeeding. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2002;(1):CD003517

(reviewed literature and noted a decrease in rate of gastrointestinal infections in both developed and developing countries)

I've not read the full text of that myself.

---

Chantry CJ, Howard CR, Auinger P. Full breastfeeding duration and associated decrease in respiratory tract infection in US children. Pediatrics. 2006 Feb;117(2):425-32.

(documents increased risk of respiratory tract infection including pneumonia and recurrent otis media in children who were fully breastfed for 4 vs 6 months)

The full text is available here.

I was advised to wean at 3.5 months by a top Paed doctor. Not becasue of sleeping or weight gain, but becasue of wind/reflux and he advised it may be helpful to have something more solid in his stomach.
I have not as yet, taken his advice.
But then I am not exclusively bf. So I don't see that the research applies to me. I wish I was. But I bf and give approx one bottle of formula per day.
I will try and wait till 6 months. But seeing as ds2 is almost 4 months already, I will start anytime soon, when I think he wants to.
Nothing I have sen , as YET, has convinced me that there is solid evidence.

reasons to wait a month:

1. there's no harm in waiting til 6 months - whereas there may be in weaning early.
2. weaning is messy, extra expense and time-consuming - put it off as long as you can!
3. it's not in your baby's hands if you are spoon-feeding - if they can feed themselves at that age then fair enough, it seems they are ready.

The research into optimal exclusive breastfeeding...does it assume that once weaning starts that breastmilk is decreased?

Just asking as genuinely interested (will not be so lazy later today and read those papers myself if I get a chance)!

I ask because I wonder if it is breastfeeding that offers protection or food that does harm. So if still same amount of breastfeeding continues as well as offering small amounts of carefully selected foods to a baby that is ready could potentially maintain the same benefits.

Sorry, might not be very clear question as brain not in gear yet!

Also, just wanted to say on a positive note about offering spoons (and not against BLW at all) that biologically/prehistorically we would have done that in terms of mothers masticating food in their mouths and then offering it to their babies.

There is some evidence that continuing breastfeeding through the introduction of gluten may be the most important factor in the development of coeliac disease. But otherwise the research isn't differentiated enough to tell.

I suppose, again the point is that there is no harm in waiting till 6 months, but possible harm in not iyswim

dundee study on gastro/resp infections was on scottish babies, not developing country

bmilk has more calories/nutrients in it than apple

It's probably my background but I've always thought that it's nice to give babies proper grub. My two were weaned at 4 months, they both seemed more content, slept better and had less reflux. I was given baby rice at 6 weeks however that's probably a bit excessive.

Proper grub for babies = breastmilk or formula