Cereal with breastfeeding

PayneJ09

So my baby is now 4 months old and the doctor said go ahead and start the rice cereal. My question is, is anyone out there breastfeeding and giving cereal to their baby? If so, how much cereal do you give and how do you do it with breastfeeding? I end up pumping a bottle which I only get 3 or 4 ounces from one breast and use a little of it to mix with the rice and then feed him the rest of the bottle during and after eating cereal. My only thing is he still isn't sleeping for a long time after the cereal like I thought he would. His last feeding at 10:30 or 11:00 pm is usually breastfeeding and sleeps till about 2 or 3 am. But when I feed him cereal it is usually at a 6:00 or 7:00 pm feeding. He isn't really on a schedule but close. I would love to get him on a schedule since I'm a stay-at-home mom and would like to get things done around the house without him waking up. If anyone has information or knows where to find some please let me know. I am going to do more research myself also. Thank you in advance.

taraleanne

Agreed that cereal won't affect sleep. 

I also started my son at 4 months with doctor's approval for certain reasons on cereal but after few days of rice with no bad reaction we went to oatmeal which I would prefer.  He is 5 months now. 

I started out small, just an oz with a tsp or so of cereal - kept it very liquid and then started increasing from there. Now he probably gets about 2 tbsp or so an it's thicker, it depends on how much I had time to pump for. We give it to him at dinner time when we are eating with a cup of breastmilk (1-2oz or so). He thinks this is great, he eats "dinner" with mom and dad. He gets excited to be put in his highchair and he drinks from the cup well and loves to hold the spoon himself. We feel this is more about a good bonding experience - making eating solids fun family time in addition to an easy/safe way to introduce solids. I also breastfeed first - the cereal is a treat, I don't want him to fill up on cereal and not take breast milk from me. But quite frankly my baby is a pig in the evening and could breastfeed, eat cereal and then breastfeed again an hour later, he's always cluster fed before bed!  

 If your doc gives you thumbs up and YOU feel baby is ready, go for it. 6 months is a guideline but every baby is different. Some are ready sooner but don't do it simply to try to get him to sleep longer. As for a schedule....I personally wouldn't force anything and wait for his schedule to emerge on it's own. Meet his needs and you will have a happy thriving baby. We just sorta figured out HIS schedule now (at 5 months) so if you say it's almost there then why not just wait a bit longer and it will work out. At least this is my experience. Besides, I think it's closer to 6 months that it starts to make more sense, at least that's why friends have told me.  (Aaaaand, then they'll go change it up again, ah well! ) 

PayneJ09

I guess I should of said it a different. I am not really caring much about the sleeping part. I was just wondering if anyone else had their 4 month old not sleeping long naps. I know some babies sleep more when they have cereal because its usually a thicker and fills their belly more. I am just trying to figure out how much cereal to give a day (Once a day or twice a day, etc) and then when I should start the other puree foods. Or if I should do oatmeal next. It's been a while since I had a baby ( I have a 13 year old now) so I don't remember going through all this plus I didn't breastfeed my first one so the breastfeeding and cereal are a little different for me. I have been following what my doctor says is ok and won't see her till 6 months old but I could always call or message her with any questions but sometimes it's nice to get answers from moms out there.

taraleanne

I think everyone on here has 4-6 month olds who don't take long naps! Scroll on the board to find the "nap question" thread and you will see  

re: solids, there is no right or wrong answer I don't think. I switched to oatmeal and do it once or twice a day, depends on how I feel!   My pedi suggested we wait to start purees to 6 months but I'm going to start this week- at 5 months 2 weeks since 6 months is just a guideline and I think mama knows best. Every baby is different. My DS is totally ready. He's practically begging for the food off of our plates and has been for weeks. He sits in his chair great, drinks milk from a cup and eats the cereal from a spoon great, he loves it. I'm trying lentils first. This was my choice, they wanted us to start a meat first but i think pureed chicken is gross! I recently went to a "introducing solids class" held by my public health office which was awesome in telling us how and what to do.  I think baby centre.com or .ca has some good guidelines for introducing solids which almost mimicked what we were instructed in class. 

taraleanne

Nicb13 said:

taraleanne said:

I think everyone on here has 4-6 month olds who don't take long naps! Scroll on the board to find the "nap question" thread and you will see  

re: solids, there is no right or wrong answer I don't think. I switched to oatmeal and do it once or twice a day, depends on how I feel!   My pedi suggested we wait to start purees to 6 months but I'm going to start this week- at 5 months 2 weeks since 6 months is just a guideline and I think mama knows best. Every baby is different. My DS is totally ready. He's practically begging for the food off of our plates and has been for weeks. He sits in his chair great, drinks milk from a cup and eats the cereal from a spoon great, he loves it. I'm trying lentils first. This was my choice, they wanted us to start a meat first but i think pureed chicken is gross! I recently went to a "introducing solids class" held by my public health office which was awesome in telling us how and what to do.  I think baby centre.com or .ca has some good guidelines for introducing solids which almost mimicked what we were instructed in class. 

Oy. This is sort of true. It's a guideline for a reason. Babies just aren't ready to be overloaded with foods because WE, as parents, think it's fun to watch our kids eat baby food. They aren't in a rush, the parents are. They don't need these food for the nutritional aspect so why the rush?

Yes, a mother's intuition goes a long way with most things but there are guidelines out there for a reason. Just saying.

I agree to some extent. But lets be clear, I'm not starting solids 2 weeks prior to his 6 month birthday because I want to see him eat solids. LOL. I think that's funny actually, why the heck would I want to do that? It's more work for me to make this stuff than to just pull out the boob!!  IMO, 2 weeks is negligible in the grand scheme. Every baby develops at a different rate. I'm tired of denying him food at the dinner table when he's been grabbing at our plates and practically begging for food for weeks now. I feel like I'm denying him. He's had no problems with cereal for the last 1.5 months (ok'd by pedi at 4 months) He's ready. I'm with him every day, he's ready!  I'm not saying every baby is ready sooner, but surely to goodness it's not like overnight on the eve of their 6th month birthday they are instantly ready. Baby's don't work that way, nothing does. I'm tired of this whole "wait till 6 months" preaching quite frankly (not that that's what you are doing, I'm just saying for example). Babies roll, crawl, walk, talk, potty train, etc.. at different rates so IMO it's the same for solids. 95% of the people I know have started their babies on solids sometime before 6m and everyone is just fine! I'm not saying start baby on solids at 2 months old but give or take a few weeks from this "guideline" of 6 months, sure. I even know some parents who chose to wait longer than 6 months for other reasons.  I still feel like the parents, if they are informed can make this call if they so choose. Even my doctor had said to me once "you know baby best after all" 

taraleanne

@nicb13 two is better than one for sure!! I think it's good that mama's (and dads) take as much info as they can and then make a decision that seems to work best for them. 

taraleanne

taraleanne said:

Nicb13 said:

taraleanne said:

I think everyone on here has 4-6 month olds who don't take long naps! Scroll on the board to find the "nap question" thread and you will see  

re: solids, there is no right or wrong answer I don't think. I switched to oatmeal and do it once or twice a day, depends on how I feel!   My pedi suggested we wait to start purees to 6 months but I'm going to start this week- at 5 months 2 weeks since 6 months is just a guideline and I think mama knows best. Every baby is different. My DS is totally ready. He's practically begging for the food off of our plates and has been for weeks. He sits in his chair great, drinks milk from a cup and eats the cereal from a spoon great, he loves it. I'm trying lentils first. This was my choice, they wanted us to start a meat first but i think pureed chicken is gross! I recently went to a "introducing solids class" held by my public health office which was awesome in telling us how and what to do.  I think baby centre.com or .ca has some good guidelines for introducing solids which almost mimicked what we were instructed in class. 

Oy. This is sort of true. It's a guideline for a reason. Babies just aren't ready to be overloaded with foods because WE, as parents, think it's fun to watch our kids eat baby food. They aren't in a rush, the parents are. They don't need these food for the nutritional aspect so why the rush?

Yes, a mother's intuition goes a long way with most things but there are guidelines out there for a reason. Just saying.

I agree to some extent. But lets be clear, I'm not starting solids 2 weeks prior to his 6 month birthday because I want to see him eat solids. LOL. I think that's funny actually, why the heck would I want to do that? It's more work for me to make this stuff than to just pull out the boob!!  IMO, 2 weeks is negligible in the grand scheme. Every baby develops at a different rate. I'm tired of denying him food at the dinner table when he's been grabbing at our plates and practically begging for food for weeks now. I feel like I'm denying him. He's had no problems with cereal for the last 1.5 months (ok'd by pedi at 4 months) He's ready. I'm with him every day, he's ready!  I'm not saying every baby is ready sooner, but surely to goodness it's not like overnight on the eve of their 6th month birthday they are instantly ready. Baby's don't work that way, nothing does. I'm tired of this whole "wait till 6 months" preaching quite frankly (not that that's what you are doing, I'm just saying for example). Babies roll, crawl, walk, talk, potty train, etc.. at different rates so IMO it's the same for solids. 95% of the people I know have started their babies on solids sometime before 6m and everyone is just fine! I'm not saying start baby on solids at 2 months old but give or take a few weeks from this "guideline" of 6 months, sure. I even know some parents who chose to wait longer than 6 months for other reasons.  I still feel like the parents, if they are informed can make this call if they so choose. Even my doctor had said to me once "you know baby best after all" 

I agree that there's not a clock that ticks over that suddenly means baby is ready for solids. You have to take your baby into account. But it is old school to suggest cereal at 4 months and assume that every baby who is 4 months is ready for cereal or even needs cereal, esp when they have no real need for it at that age, for nutrition. We've been led to believe that babies have to start with cereal and work their way up to real food, when that isn't necessarily the case. If you'd skipped the cereal and just waited until your baby showed you the cues he's showing now that he's ready for solids, nothing would be any different. The cereal didn't really do anything. He's just ready for it now, whereas he wasn't a month or two ago. That was my point. I'm tired of people automatically assuming that 4 month olds need cereal, and a lot of people don't know that that rec is no longer current. Just like you don't have to wait til 6 months to start solids, you don't have to start cereal at 4 months.

Good argument. I never really thought of it that way but you're right, a lot of people just want to go start cereal at 4 months. (I think that used to be the recommendation years ago... actually I think it was 3 months when I was born) Some people think it helps baby sleep better at night.  In my case, I never thought of starting cereal at 4 months until we came into some issues (too long to explain here) and so we started when he was 4.5 months (plus he was showing signs of being ready too, so that helped!). I did some research, talked to several other mom's who encountered the same issues and various other med. professionals (I work in healthcare) so we didn't just make a decision uneducated. But you are right, I think alot of people don't do their homework. 

taraleanne

Nicb13 said:

taraleanne said:

  Good argument. I never really thought of it that way but you're right, a lot of people just want to go start cereal at 4 months. (I think that used to be the recommendation years ago... actually I think it was 3 months when I was born) Some people think it helps baby sleep better at night.  In my case, I never thought of starting cereal at 4 months until we came into some issues (too long to explain here) and so we started when he was 4.5 months (plus he was showing signs of being ready too, so that helped!). I did some research, talked to several other mom's who encountered the same issues and various other med. professionals (I work in healthcare) so we didn't just make a decision uneducated. But you are right, I think alot of people don't do their homework. 

Not that long ago! Our pedi suggested that DS start on either rice cereal or oatmeal at 4 months old (he's 20 months now) because he had doubled his birth weight and was otherwise "ready". It's actually quite common to recommend it, although not all babies are ready like you said.

yeah I hear it all the time. Both hubby and I started at 3 months, I guess that was the recommendation back in the early 80's. 

Edkitten

My LO just had her 4 month check up and the dr did recommend trying cereal because she has over double in size and is a very good sitter with little support. He recommended cereal because it tastes like formula (since that is what you mix it with) and will get her used to texture. He recommended trying small amounts once or twice a day ( if she didn't seem interested i was to wait a week or two and try again). Once she is eating cereal with ease , I can feed her some puréed fruit/vegs. I did my research, talked to her doctor, worked with my baby and found that she is ready to eat a little cereal.