Surprised to hear my HV tell our my post natal class it is fine to wean at 17 weeks........

[McDreamy]

........and then give out literature from unicef that says 6 months

Nope, no proper response!

I only made a verbal complaint, but it was to the surestart manager. She said, "Oh yes, most mothers here(!) like to wean early so we tell them the safe way to do it"??
Erm, no! The woman in question was asking about weaning and didn't have a clue about ages! All she knew was that jars said 4 months. It would have been a perfect opportunity to explain the risks of early weaning to the whole group (babies were all under 16 weeks) and to just keep breastfeeding!!

I thought she may have had a word with her but no, my friend went for her weaning 'chat' at 12 weeks there recently and she was still spouting the same sort of crap and like Dreamy siad, giving out literature which clearly states the DoH guidelines!

Is it too late to complain again? Properly this time? I am pregnant again and will run in to her no doubt and don't think I could remain so calm and polite this time.

I'd make a complaint to someone higher up the tree. I'm not quite sure who the right person is, though.

I talked it over with DH when I got home and he feels I should write a constructive letter to the head HV listing my concerns.

Would totally agree McDreamy - it's dreadful advice and many of the other mothers in the group will now wean at 17 weeks safe in the knowledge that "it must be okay because the HV said so".

This sort of crap advice is what makes me so angry with HVs (and am speaking as a HV myself). I have worked with some right idiots who are just bone idol about keeping up to date.

i would make another complaint stretch,

part of the problem is, that 17 weeks is mentioned in the literature, which means that it is presumed it is fine to wean then. but it is the absolute minimum age and if your baby is not showing the physical signs of maturity, then it is still too early, regardless of what the leaflet says

And another thing that I disagreed with was when we were talking about signs of your baby telling you he needs weaning

Waking in the night - surely you just give more milk?

Not satisfied after a feed - again give more milk?

Puts everything in their mouth - I thought all babies did this and is not a sign of hunger - but correct me if I'm wrong!

I'm not surprised by it but fucking raging angry

really gets my goat

I ended up arguing with a hv about this as they were saying 'lean the baby back and then you can pour thin baby rice into them from 16 weeks'

her reasoning was there was no point telling mothers the guidlelines as they wouldn't wait that long anyway

fucking stupid cow

you are right , mcdreamy, and the NHS weaning leaflet says that those are not signs of readiness !

My HV advised weaning at 20 weeks.

The iron thing. This study showed that far from running out of iron at 6 months, exclusively breastfed babies had actually replenished their ferritin levels in some cases at that point. So they are absorbing plenty of iron from breastmilk during this period