is 15 weeks too early to start weaning??

[needsomesleepplease]

Ds showing all the signs he is ready but we are going on holiday next week and was hoping to wait till we came home but now not sure what to do!!!

I find the strength of opinion exprssed on this thread odd. If she had said 'i want to fedd forumla from birth' would you have been that strong? yet there is vastly more evidence of that being harmful than weaning at 15 weekS!!

last time this came to be discussed i got to reading studies into weaning: i found that there were really good really strng reasons for third world mums to ebf as long as possible. In the first world however the evidence is much less strong -someone mentioned allergies - a study in Kent found no link between weaning and allergies, only that it was best to BF as foods were introduced. (the american study suggesting the opposite only covers babies with a predisposition to allergies, and essentially only shows that babies introduced to foods earlier, dvelop the allergies earlier - did they really need a study to tel them that, i wonder.)

furthermore I do not know of what time in history women have ever weaned as late as 26 weeks as a matter of course.

flatly quoting recommendations as though they are gospel is not a helpful approach. Let's not forget those same recommendations used to favour formula!

I do however agree that if you're on holiday it will probably be much less hassle to EBF.

i might add that her HV's advice is standard - they recommend 26 weeks as a guide, 17 weeks as an absolute (though, when i was born my mum was old she must wean at 12 weeks otherwise we'd suffer...but hey-ho, there you go.)

my personal opinion on this: it does BFers no good at all to be told they have to carry on giving nthing but BM when their DC is spending half the day and night feeding. IME a spoon or two of 'solids' does solve this issue. I think giving no other option only encourages towards the bottle despite this riskng latching issues.

also, i have seen no study at all to suggest any difference whatsoever in the health fortunes of FF babies weaned late or early. but then, it's in no-ones interest to do such a study.

There is no logic to this argument at all. How on earth would a few spoons of nutritionally deficient (in comparison to BF or FF) milk help with hunger? It can't and doesn't. Its nonsense. Compare the calorofic value of a few spoons of mashed pear to a small amount of milk and you will see what I mean.

You can do what you want with your own child. What I object to is advising others on your own limited experience to go against vast amounts of published, peer reviewed, scientific verified research. Its irrespoonsible and arrogant. If you think you know better than people who spend their careers studying such things, then you practice your own opinions on your own children. But don't advise others to endanger their own children, because essentially, that is exactly what you are doing.

sparklycheerymummy, the guidelines are aimed at the average babies and include advice that any early weaning done for medical reasons (such as in your case) should be done under the supervision of a medical professional. Obviously a baby with severe reflux who is losing weight and unable to take milk is in need of slightly different measures to the average baby. We cannot extrapolate out from your individual case, just as we cannot use anecdotal evidence to dispute proper research. So you did the right thing, you followed guidelines in fact and hurrah your child is well.

how is baby rice nutrionally deficient?

from the nutritional values on the side of the box, it is a very concentrated carbohydrate (85.7%), whereas mature breastmilk is 89.5% water. if you mix BM with rice, what you get is only slightly greater volume with much higher calorific value (as the &age carbs is upped, and the%age water is lowered).

whoever uses pear for a first food anyway?

although i also read somewhere that 'food' is less calorific than BM, i really think that depends which 'food' is meant.

I'm sure the OP is perfectly capable of making up her own mind, but taking the view that the 'men in white coats' know best is i think a bit patronising, not least beause they've been wrong so often in the past.

here is a link to an interesting article showing how much conflict can be shown by different studies on the Beeb website

To lambast me for questioning said guidelines when the professionals in that area are also doing precisely that is unfair.

out of interest, what would you advise a woman who is BF successfully but finding their baby is feeding too often, and waking often in the night? i take it that is the problem from the name 'needmoresleepplease'

I'd be very interested to know what women in the most pro-breastfeeding countries do. Anyone from Denmark/ Sweden/ Norway able to say what they do about weaning?

And if you lack the capability to digest a dense carbohydrate, as your system is specifically designed to absorb the substance that is 85% water?
And many many people use fruits and veg as fist foods, not nasty gloopy baby rice.

Taking the view that experts in the field might know more than an untrained parent is patronising? Ridiculous. The days when we are not allowed to question the men in white coats are long gone, but some people go way too far, thinking they automatically know better cos they read some stuff on the internet. Insanity.

'out of interest, what would you advise a woman who is BF successfully but finding their baby is feeding too often, and waking often in the night?'

Odd question.

How can a baby feed too often? They are fast growing beings, they feed as often as they need to.

I would prefer to give formula than early solids if there was a choice (and if it was as early as 15 weeks)

"'out of interest, what would you advise a woman who is BF successfully but finding their baby is feeding too often, and waking often in the night?'"

I would advise her that that is what BF babies do, are meant to do, and to get used to it. Babies can be kinda hard y'know. But if you are trying to circumvent nature and make a baby feed less and sleep too much, by all means fill up their tiny stomachs with baby rice that they can't digest properly.

It used to be advised that you put rusks and sugar into a bottle of milk at 6 weeks to make a baby sleep, why don't you advise that as well?

i am beginning to wonder if this site is actually here for mums who want to support each other or just have a go and put people down.

sparkly - I can tell you sure that the purpose of this site is NOT to encourage mums to risk harming their babies!

sparklycheerymummy, the thing with weaning is that it's doesn't stop at support and hunny hugs. We can't just say bravo to you, you are woman, hear you roar, wean your baby whenever you feel like it. It's a health issue and there are answers to the questions and research that informs them. It would be doing an absolute disservice to Mums and babies if MN discouraged a healthy engagement with the facts when there may be a right or wrong answer. It's MN and it embraces debate and challenge while offering support. And it's fantastic. It is not about putting people down, it's about offering information and yes it gets heated, but precisely because people care.

Sparkly - I can see that you feel got at by some of the posts. However it is important that others reading this thread who might be thinking about early weaning are aware of the possible risks. If everyone said "aww hun, it's fine to wean at 15 weeks" just to tell the OP what they wanted to hear, it's not really fair on people who might want more information. If I had weaned early not being aware of the risks I'd have been most annoyed that I wasn't made aware.
If people who know the facts then want to wean early, that's fine - I'm all for (informed) choice! But no-one's going to tell you (or anyone) it's definitely going to be ok just to keep everything fluffy and nice. There has been some debate anyway, so different opinions have been aired - but I understand it can feel like everyone's getting at you. They're really not, though.

crossed posts showofhands!

"I'd be very interested to know what women in the most pro-breastfeeding countries do. Anyone from Denmark/ Sweden/ Norway able to say what they do about weaning?"

I'm in New Zealand, which (IME) is very pro-BF. Weaning at 6 months is pretty standard here.

Stereophonic.

u wean when u want, no 1 knows ur child better than u, im a nursery nurse n av weaned god knows how many babies at 3-4mths old n guess what....they r fine, healthy lovely babies. My boy is 4 months ive just introduced him to a spoon n a little baby rice n he loves it, i dont care what hv or any 1 else says to b honest they dont know him or me 4 that matter n my experience goes against what they say!! my boy is 3mths n 3weeks he weighs 17lb6 this means nothing when it comes to whether or not its time 4 solids, the fact that he feeds every hour for 12hrs of a 24hr period, regardless of how much i try to amuse him is a clear indication to me. All these ppl on ere saying u shudnt wean r just as bad as those saying u shud listen to ur baby n WHAT U THINK

Are you a troll or for real, luluxx75?

my eyes are bleeding

She be trollin', yes?

First post 'n' all....

Is that art? I can't figure it out. I think I saw a face somewhere but I lost it!

Oh it's beautifully impressionistic, aping the modern day convention of syntax, spelling and grammar. It's like when you throw paint at a board for effect isn't it? Only letters and access to the Interweb. I wonder what it all means though.

Dunno. Have you seen any other of her works? Perhaps there's a theme?

She has no other works.

oneopinionatedmummy is right. there is very little evidence of harm caused by early weaning, nothing to support the "prevents allergy" hypothesis and actually "food is fun until they're one" is incorrect and a far more dangerous piece of advice than "from 17 weeks"