Baby-Led Weaning Support Thread #1

[Corinne's Mommy]

Hello All!  It's been a while since I posted, but I've loved reading the adventures of all of your little ones!

Pauline- we've been doing BLW for almost two months, but I think it took at least a month before I felt Corinne was REALLY eating.  She played with and licked her food for a while, and then one day she just started chewing.  Alice will figure it out when she's ready (and hungry!), as everyone has said. And I agree, it's so much more fun to go against convention!

I think all of the comments many of you are getting from your HVs (I don't know what that stand for, but I assume it's the equivalent of a Dr.?) are interesting.  Our pediatrician hasn't even had a conversation with me about feeding solids except to ask if we've started them.  I told her that we are doing BLW, she said she has never heard of it and left it at that.  Not sure if I should be happy about that, or look for a new pediatrician!

Corinne has been eating like a champ, but gave me quite a scare yesterday.  I've relaxed a bit about choking because she seems to chew really well, but not yesterday when eating a plum.  I looked down for a second (of course at the computer!) and when I looked back at her she was turning purple and choking.  After a few slaps to the back, the plum flew out and hit the floor.  So scary...but a reminder to watch her closely.  Since that meal, she seems to be gagging a lot more.  Has anyone else experienced a regressions in chewing abilities?  Seems like a silly question, but maybe she's getting a little too confindent and eating too quickly?

[evanskimberley]

PLums can be quite stringy, could it just be that?

[Bryony]

Corinne's mummy - sorry to hear about the scare that you had, that must have been quite scary at the time.

HV is a health visitor  (a strange name as they don't "visit", or at least, not these days) - they have a nursing background and in the UK most people take our LOs once a month or so to thier clinic to be weighed and to ask for any advice etc needed. In the UK we don't take LOs to a paediatrician unless they are ill and need specialist medical care... it's such a different set up in each country isn't it!

Bryony

[grahamsmama]

Corinne has been eating like a champ, but gave me quite a scare yesterday.  I've relaxed a bit about choking because she seems to chew really well, but not yesterday when eating a plum.  I looked down for a second (of course at the computer!) and when I looked back at her she was turning purple and choking.  After a few slaps to the back, the plum flew out and hit the floor.  So scary...but a reminder to watch her closely.  Since that meal, she seems to be gagging a lot more.  Has anyone else experienced a regressions in chewing abilities?  Seems like a silly question, but maybe she's getting a little too confindent and eating too quickly?

I don't want to alarm you unnecessarily, but you might want to give a call to your pedi.  I've read that babies should be checked out after a choking incident because they could still have a remnant of the food stuck. That could explain why she's still gagging a bit at times.

[Lippy Chick]

No we haven't had the 6 month growth spurt yet.  I guess when she gets there, she'll become a bit more hungry.

To re-iterate what Bryony said about health visitors.  I think a paediatrician in the US is the equivalent of our GPs but for babies.  So we would go to the GP (general practitioner) for all our every day ailments or if we suspect something is serious.  Then if the GP suspects the problem is serious then he/she would refer us to a consultant and that's when we would see a paediatrician in this country.  You would then wait for an appointment to come through (depending on how serious they thought the problem was) and it could be anywhere from 4 weeks to 18 months.  Some people wait years to see a consultant for various problems.  It is something the government is trying to sort out.  HVs are not only for babies and young children, but the elderly or anyone who needs a home visit for whatever reason.  There are some really progressive HVs and some who are stuck in the stone age.  Like anyone really, some people want to move with the times and some people are afraid of progress.  I hope that helps.  I hope Corinne stops gagging soon.  It could just be a reaction to choking and now she's instinctively protecting herself.  I don't know, just a suggestion.

Pauline

[lotteloulou]

Sorry I forgot to include her lunchtime bottle she does have 5 a day honest, she had last bottle about 5-6ish then off to bed at 7, I've tried dropping and reducing the dreamfeed but it just messes her up so I thought I'd wait until she is eating more then I'll try reducing then stopping it but it's a vicious circle plus she's got 4 teeth coming through at the top, I suppose it all comes down to the fact that she only eats when she wants i just worry that she'll still be on a bottle when she's 18!! However my mum says I was bf until 13 months and only ate solids every now and then so I guess I'll just go with whatever Charlie feels like on the day.

[Freya'sMum]

Ok ladies...

...as part of the ongoing efforts to make the bw site as accessible as possible, all mods have been advised to refresh long support threads.

It seems that new posters can be put-off by the volume of posts to read through before being able to join in with these long threads, or feel unable to join in with what they perceive to be an established community of posters. So, in order to make new posters feel able to access the support offered by a support thread without feeling intimidated or like there's loads of reading to do, those that have reached 30 pages will be locked and unstickied, and a new one started.

But we don't want to lose all of the valuable discussion that has happened in these threads, so each one will be numbered, and cross-referenced so you can find them again in the future if needed.

So this first BLW support thread has reached a whopping 40 pages ... so in a minute I shall lock it, then start a new one, then put the cross-references in... I shall leave it stickied for a week then let it gradually move away as the new thread gets established!

See you in #2! Here's the link:

https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?topic=104281.0

Ax