very curious...

in my conversations with friends with kids of similar ages, the topic of solids comes up a lot. I've found that my friends who FF tend to start solids earlier than babies who are BF.

Obviously we don't fight here but I'm curious as to why this is and if it's the same for our DDC so I made an anonymous poll. Hope it doesn't offend anyone

thanks!


(Elisa- I know you BF, and now have to FF and give solids for Cookie's caloric needs so you would qualify as other )

other:

im ff and i was told by the nutrisionist that we cant start solids until 6mo althought cookie gets a spoonful of applesauce before every feed since 1mo old (to help her take her meds) so technically shes been getting solids since 1mo old. but her pedi said we can start solids now if we want so cookie gets a couple spoons of solids (shes doing a week of sweet potatoes now) every day.

i think cookie is really the exception here. the sooner she gets on solids the sooner we can get her weight up real well. formula can only be thickened so much before cookie starts to get dehydrated, but solids we can get high calorie solids and still give her a bottle

haaaa, i was editing my post as your were posting!

just to let you all know: when you start solids your jaw/mouth is going to be so sore! XD

everytime i feed cookie i mimic the open mouth that i want her to do and im sure i look dumb but i dont notice im doing it and my mouth hurts after because i do it so much LOL

hehe yes i am..... an.. other

We're waiting til 6 months, although I may test the waters beforehand just to see his reaction

Lurking as usual, LOL

I'm waiting but it's strictly a personal choice... I don't think Carter is ready, yet and everything I read seems to say that 4 months may be okay but that 6 is best. I think Formula moms (me) are eager to do anything to offset the cost of formula!

Carter hasn't doubled his birthweight yet and I tried giving him formula in a spoon just for fun and if he could talk he looked like he would have said "WTH is this BS???" hee hee

There's some LO's on the Feb boards on solids already and they seemed super ready... eating with no problem, etc.

I might start Carter on Organic Oatmeal at 5.5 months just to get him used to a spoon, but no foods til 6 months for us! I think this is one of those things where there's no right or wrong, though!

am i the only other

We are waiting until at least 6 months but if I don't think he's ready or he doesn't seem interested I'm going to hold him off for as long as possible. We are not doing any type of cereal because it's really just empty calories which our pedi said our monster baby doesn't need.

We're having the solids discussion at Jacob's 6 month well-baby, but I believe the rule of thumb at the practice we go to is starting with green veggies. I plan on enjoying my all-boobie all-the-time monster for as long as I possibly can.

Elisa, i tried to change my vote to "other" so you wouldn't be alone but i dont know how.

lol idk either!

Waiting til 6 months because I am waiting for Alex to be ready..ie sitting unsupported, losing tongue thrust reflex and having pincher grasp, also when he looks interested in food. I am also exploring "baby led weaning" in which you skip purees and go to soft foods (real food). I like the concepts.

Babyjinks wrote:I am also exploring "baby led weaning" in which you skip purees and go to soft foods (real food). I like the concepts.

Oooooh, i'm intrigued although DH would be mad we wouldn't get to use our Beaba Baby Cook we got as a gift

I put other. I am FF and I was going to wait until 6 months, but my pedi recommended started at 5 months so we will start then. A little nervous about doing it as I wanted to put it off for awhile if I could, but DH is really excited about it now and I guess if the pedi says it is okay then it should be. We will see how it goes. We were told not to start too late after 6 months as it can cause some poor eating habits in babies and children later in life and not too early as it can cause some allergies so hoping that 5 months is okay.

I am waiting to talk to my pedi this week...I want to start Brett just b/c I feel like he's hungry ALL the time!! As soon as I get the green light, I'll be giving Brett some rice cereal. I know there isn't a lot of nutritional value in it, but if it helps his tummy stay full a little longer it might be good for him. It's all so confusing! I never thought I'd worry about when I was going to give my baby food. I just don't want to screw anything up!

We are EFF and waiting till Layla is around 6 months to start solids

I don't know........... she seems pretty interested in food but I'm just not ready to give her solids yet. I'm going to talk to my doc at the end of the month first before I do anything. I also want to solidify my pumping routine at work before I start compromising it by solids.

I think a lot of BF moms wait because they worry about their supply or don't want to take away from their BF time.

Wanted to share what I just went through with Lauren in case some of you are on the fence about when to start solids.

(Backstory)-----We had major issues with Lauren when we switched from BM to formula at 2 months and I never want to go down that road again. Nevermind the guilt I felt, but her stomach was hurting her so much. She screamed all the time pulling her legs up and grunting with pain. So we had to put her on Alimentum and that has been our saving grace ever since.

I got the green light from our Pedi to start solids last week (4 mos.). I thought it would be a good idea because Lauren is barely making it 3 hours in between bottles now. She seems so hungry all the time.

Well, I tried organic oatmeal (I was told oatmeal is less binding) and my happy go lucky baby turned into a miserable little thing. I felt so bad for her. Something about it completely tore her stomach apart. I called the Dr and asked if I had to do cereal and could she just get fruits and veggies because the oatmeal is clearly not working. He said that she eventually will have to get oatmeal (cereal) for the iron, but in the mean time wait a few weeks and try it again. Ugh, I am SO scared. I hate seeing her like that.

So with all that being said, if I had to do it over again, I would wait until closer to 6 months. But, every baby is different so who knows

kell wrote:I am waiting to talk to my pedi this week...I want to start Brett just b/c I feel like he's hungry ALL the time!!

This is why I started Rhett on solids at 3.5 months. And OMG it made life sooo much easier- for both of us!


Right now I want to start her on cereal- bought the spoons and the rice stuff already... but I don't want to do it when our house is in demo mode. BFing is just easier. And she really isn't that demanding of the boob like Rhett was so I think we should be fine. I put 6 months but it's not like I'm sticking to that like glue. Could go next month. Its' like a novelty that I want to do but I know I really don't need to because she's fine. The thought of her possibly STTN is appealing however! lol

BFing and waiting until 6 months

We are FF and we just started. We started because Eli was eating more than the max allowed formula and still not happy! The ped said he was just stretching his stomach with all the formula and not getting the calories he needs.

He has also tripled his birth weight!

I'm not sure when I would've started solids if this issue hadn't come up. I wonder if FF babies don't get solids faster because it is such a big expense to pay for formula. Not that it is a great reason to do anything, but at 40+ ounces a day and a zillion dollars a can, it really adds up. It doesn't happen immediately but they do eventually cut back a little (not a lot though) on the milk, so it will help with that expense somewhat, and that is a perk for me, since we had to start anyway.

At 2 months we asked the pedi because MIL kept wanting to know when she could feed him. (When we were kids our parents started some kids at 1 week old with cereal.) The pedi told us to tell Grandparents we can TRY at 4 months if he seems interested but if he doesn't like it to wait until 6 months.

Well, by 3 months Quin was mimicking us while we ate. He would open his mouth when we put food to our mouths and would close his and chew while we did the same. So, the pedi told us to try at 4 months. We tried Earth's Best Organic Rice Cereal that day. He loved eating. I only made 1 tablespoon of rice cereal with 3-4 tablespoons of BM. After 2 meals (dinner on 2 days in a row) he PUKED on DH the 3rd day before dinner. We don't know if it was from his vaccines on Thursday or the dinner on Thursday and Friday. So, we decided to wait and try again later.

Per my MIL we now give foods at lunch. They learned the hard way that if you feed a baby new foods at dinner and they react badly you are up all night with the baby. Where as if you feed them at breakfast or lunch you deal with the reaction while you're awake. So, last Thursday I started Earth's Best Organic First Apples at lunch. He loved it. Then we did Bananas and now we are on Pears.

As for a sore mouth, we don't have to open ours to get Quin to open his. I think that's part of the readiness. He is pretty clean while eating too. He just loves eating.

Maybe I'm not feeding him enough of the solids, but it doesn't fill him up. He will eat a full BM meal within an hour of eating the solids. I only give 1-2 tablespoons because I don't want a reaction to the foods and it is just him testing the foods to make sure he likes them. How much should he be getting?

Every day I'm surprised at how different individual pediatricians are. When we briefly discussed solids with our pedi at Jacob's 3 month appt we were told to start with veggies (with the reasoning that starting with fruit first will make it difficult to get baby to accept non-sweet foods, don't know how much I believe that) and we were told to give one new food per week.

When we saw the pedi yesterday he said we wouldn't talk about starting solids until his 6 month appt since he's doing so well with BM and seems content.