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Hawaii Babies
Starting to wean already?
What was the transition like when your baby started relying more on solids than on nursing or bottles?
A has been showing less and less interest in nursing. He does well first thing in the morning and before bed, but over the past month, the in-between feeds have become fewer and more like snacks. Yesterday I also realized that it no longer felt like I was producing much milk anymore, probably in reaction to the feeding changes.
He is a monster eater and does awesome with solids. In addition to the baby food I make for him, since he's started to wean, I've been giving him oatmeal cereal 3 times a day with about 5 oz of formula each time. If I'm not around to nurse, we'll offer him a bottle in between meals, but he'll only drink a few ounces.
He's still gaining weight, growing and developing right on target, but I really was not prepared for this so early. Any other suggestions for making sure he's still getting all the nutrients he would've been getting from BM?
ETA: I don't pump anymore and have used up my frozen stash, so he gets formula - either by bottle, or more successfully, with his solids - if he's not nursing.
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Re: Starting to wean already?
So funny you posted this because I came here to write something similar! I don't have answers, but I'll tell you my situation...
Will and Dash have had four 7.5oz bottles per day for a while now. But lately we've notice that they're not drinking all of it; in fact, they only drink about 2/3 of the bottle.
So yesterday we started a new trial, cutting them each down to only three bottles a day. They drink the whole thing each time and aren't showing signs of hunger or unusual fussiness between meals. They're mega eaters at each meal, and they get sippy cups with water a couple of times per day in between solid meals and bottles.
They have plenty of wet and poo-y diapers, tons of energy, and they weren't drinking all of the milk anyway so it's not like we've reduced the amount they're actually taking (just the amount we're offering since the rest was being thrown out).
But it still seems so early for them to want to rely on solids as much as they do? The formula tin does say "3 - 4" bottles per day, but I still feel so weird and nervous I'm going to malnourish them or something.
I've read conflicting things about babies nursing...most pro-nursing resources say that babies rarely self-wean before 18 months...
Anyway, it could be more of a nursing strike OR he's just gotten super-efficient and your supply is evening out. Around 7-8 months Libby would nurse maybe 5-7 for most feeds except for the one before bed which was a "power session" of 15-20 minutes. She still has plenty of wet and dirty diapers and when I pump between 9-11 a.m. I still can get 6-8 oz. in about 7-8 minutes. So I figured that even with a 5 minute feed she was getting 3-4 oz. at least.
I would keep offering the breast at regular intervals throughout the day and before all solids if you don't want him to wean just yet. With BLW, they recommend nursing before every meal and also only offering one meal a day for the first couple of months, then increasing to two and then finally three meals a day by 12 months or so. Kellymom.com recommends that baby get no more than 25% of their daily calories from solids at 12 months and says that too many solids too soon can lead to early weaning.
If you want A to increase nursing, I'd back off the solids a bit and have a "nursing holiday" this weekend where you nurse him as much as possible...offering it often. Snuggle in bed, and stay close to each other and home and see if that helps increase his sessions. Sometimes, they're just SO distracted by all that's going on that I think they "forget" to ask to nurse. Here is some more information about early self-weaning...the causes and how you can fix it.
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Lisa -- thanks for chiming in. I'm glad I'm not alone in this!
Lori -- Thanks, Kelly Mom was helpful. I think I need to be more persistent in encouraging him to nurse and not just accept his refusals so quickly. The site mentioned distractability, especially during milestones -- he just started walking this week and is an incredibly active boy, so that's certainly something we've been dealing with all along.
We did wait till 6 months to introduce solids, but I think we're now on solids-overload b/c our pedi told us to do 3 solid meals a day right away since A had not gained much weight at his 6 month visit. I wasn't worried about that, however, since the visit coincided with him beginning to crawl, and I figured he was burning everything he took in. Nonetheless, I started feeding him lots of solids to try to bring his weight back up... and now he's probably hooked!
I like the idea of the "nursing holiday." I'll try that over the next few days since I won't be away from him very much. Back to the fenugreek too, I guess...
yep, I was thinking of that exact page that Lori posted from kellymom.
I was kind of confused by your original post because food plus 3 helpings of cereal with 5oz. of formula is a LOT, I can't imagine Jack eating that much even now. The calories in the formula combined with the cereal is probably equivalent to more than one feed so I was just logically trying to figure out your timing - do you offer a nursing session/BM bottle BEFORE the meal and he eats that as well?
Our ped recommended doing that or if he's at school to offer the milk with the meal. I was under the impression she was suggesting that until J is 1 (next scheduled appt) and it works well for us, especially from everything I have read re: solids being the supplement to BM/formula instead of the other way around until sometime after age 1. He still eats a large variety of food (100% finger foods - he's in control of what and how much he eats w/in whatever he's offered).
It could be weaning, you never know - there is no one set "normal" for babies but it wouldn't hurt to see what happens if you change things up a little. Jack is easily distracted in a couple ways - when nursing he wants to look around and also unless we are already cuddling or laying down he never "asks" for milk in any way (signing (even though he does know it and will do it when I ask or get set up), reaching, or crying) so even now it's really up to me to offer.
Yeah, it's a lot.
Initially I did 2 oz. of milk and some cereal, plus two 2 oz. cubes of food.
However, since I got concerned about him not getting enough milk between the morning and night feeds, I gradually started to up the cereal (i.e., milk) intake. I'll cut up a little soft fruit, tofu or avocado and he'll feed himself, plus I'll mix a small amount of healthy solids into the cereal.
Gah. I probably shouldn't have done that, but it was the only way I was sure he was getting a decent amount of milk during the day. I was trying to nurse before each meal, but he would just suck and then pull off and run away... over and over. I think that made me just rely on the solids more than I should've. Boo me!
Anyway, we'll shoot for a small breakfast tomorrow and hopefully he nurses better before lunch.
This is exactly Libby too. The only time she really indicates that she wants to nurse is right before bed and then she just buries her face in my cleavage! Thrughout the day I just ask her is she wants mama milk and use the sign too. If she does, she'll crawl over to me and then get really excited. It's kind of cute, actually.
With all of her activity, I think she gets so busy it's like she forgets to eat! I have to "remind" her. That said, if I try to nurse her and she's really not hungry/thirsty, she won't latch on. We also offer her cups of water throughout the day, at least two meals (sometimes three) and a couple of snacks (which are basically a bite or two of fruit or 2-3 crackers, etc.). She's been holding at the 25 lbs. for a few months now so the pedi's not worried about her growth/weight. But sometimes, she'll wake between 1-3 a.m. with a growling tummy...so I've been trying to get more food into her closer to bedtime and nurse her as much as possible between the time I get home (4 p.m.) the time she goes down (7 p.m. ish).
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nah, don't feel bad! Especially if your ped was concerned I can see why pre-set amounts that you can actually see would make you feel better.
I guess I wasn't clear, my confusion is - if you are worried about his intake, calories, and vitamins, isn't the formula and milk that you add to his food taking care of that? Or are you worried that he isn't getting enough actual BM?
See I always make sure J gets so much BM because his solids were a crap shoot for so long since he has always just fed himself and he would just pick at some stuff and then chow down on others - I couldn't really pre-plan (still can't actually because 1 day he likes something and the next day he will completely avoid it). But in your case it doesn't seem that he isn't getting enough nutrition (rather than distinguishing the various types of food/solid/milk/formula) so if you are happy with the way things are going then that is ok too! If you want to try to change things up a bit that is ok too! good luck
I'd read that babies should get most of their nutrition from formula or BM at least through the first year, so I was starting to worry that the amount of milk was insufficient and combination of solids might not be cutting it nutrition-wise. I try to give him lots of variety in his foods, and thankfully he eats all the crazy concoctions I whip up for him, but it's still hard to compare that to the stuff in milk.
Anyhow, I'm not worried about his weight or height and he's making great progress developmentally... just second guessing myself, I guess.
I gave him a smaller breakfast this morning, so we'll see how that goes. He does approach to nurse throughout the day, but like I said, it usually ends up in super quick sessions. But I'll try to encourage him to "focus" more today!
after reading through all your posts I would think that he is not weaning at all. I think that between his development of walking and being easily distracted, combined with the fact that he is getting 15oz of formula per day, I can totally see why he isn't nursing! although I think some of this may be him getting easily distracted, I think it's more a matter of him being so filled up on formula than anything else. I don't think he doesn't want to nurse, it's more that he does not need to nurse b/c he is full! 15 oz is a LOT of formula - I think if you want to be more sure of how much he is getting then I would start pumping again and give him that instead of giving him formula. or, like the others suggested, nurse him more often and esp before all meals - you can nurse and then immediately do solids, you don't have to wait.
i agree that you can be more assured of a well balanced "diet" if they are getting enough BM/formula vs relying on solids..b/c like Robbi said, it is so hit or miss with what they eat sometimes... I really thought of the first 6 months of solids as a time of experimentation and tasting different things and less of a time for getting nutrition in her since, like you said, I could always know she was getting enough through the BM.
FWIW I will tell you what we did and what my experience was like...there were several times from about 10 months on where i would think that she might be weaning. she'd completely refuse to latch on and skip a session or she'd nurse for like 30 seconds and then stop. knowing that it's rare for babies to self wean that early, i simply continued to offer it to her and eventually after a few days she'd start nursing as usual again. there'd be like 3 days in a row where she'd not nurse before bed and i got really sad b/c i was thinking she was dropping that session but i kept offering and then all of a sudden she started nursing again. i think sometimes distractions, teething, etc can all affect their nursing.
we did not introduce "breakfast" to her until she was almost a year old. i also always nursed her right before feeding her a "meal." this didn't really seem to affect her appetite b/c she's always a little piggy regardless! :P up until about 12 months of age she was nursing about 6-8x/day and between 12-14 months she dropped down to 6-7x/day and it wasn't until she was 14.5 months old that she dropped down to 4x/day and that was partly b/c i stopped offering it to her and when we dropped a nap she naturally dropped 2 nursing sessions. she was a little bit over 13 months old before we started introducing cow's milk.... simply b/c i had enough in my freezer stash to continue feeding her expressed BM. and truthfully we had enough until she was about 14 months old but i just wanted to transition her a little bit to cow's milk before we ran out of frozen BM just in case she didn't take to the cow's milk well. we just ran out of frozen BM yesterday *sniff* and i'm not pumping anymore so as of today she is exclusively on cow's milk when drinking milk from a cup. when i am at home i basically nurse her whenever she wakes up and before nap/bed now, i no longer nurse right before a meal and she takes cow's milk during her meals. when i am at work she nurses in the morning and before bed and during the day she's drinking cow's milk.
i think it's been a nice, natural progression for us... but like i said before, there were many many times up until now where i thought she was ready to wean but i was glad i didn't just stop nursing b/c it was clearly just "a phase" that we had to ride out...
Jaime & Brent
Oahu, Hawaii | Sept. 9, 2005
My Food Blog - Good Eats 'n Sweet Treats
yep, me too. which is why I always BF before a meal if I'm with him or tell them to give him his milk before and with meals at daycare.
I didn't mean that the other food he's eating is replacing the milk intake, I just meant if you add it up the milk and formula he is getting throughout the day (in various form) it is probably quite a lot! And it doesn't have to be separate to count in terms of the nutritional value.
Thanks, ladies. All great advice!
Actually, he's already nursed twice since his smaller-than-normal breakfast, and both were pretty decent sessions. I had to let him get up a couple times, but he'd quickly come back with some encouragement.
I think I overreacted with the formula/cereal because it brought back memories of the pedi gently lecturing me on the importance of 3 meals a day to boost his weight at 6 months. He's in the 40th percentile for weight and 70th for height now though, so I should probably feel a little more confident and patient with his distractability!
Hoping this keeps up!
glad you are already noticing some differences!
remember - percentile figures are just a personal number. A child can be totally healthy and stay in the very bottom of the curve - what is more important is that he stays in tune his personal growth pattern. J has always been about 95% for height and 50% for weight - which means he's quite skinny for those that are as tall as him, but no one has every questioned so it doesn't bother me. I wouldn't mind if he gained some weight but don't have a goal to get him any higher on that percentage since 50% is his norm.
Good point. I only mentioned it since he was in the 8th percentile for weight when the doctor was concerned.... he has typically been around 40th since birth.
I don't think much about the specific numbers since the chart was based on formula fed Caucasian babies, anyhow. At least that's what I read once after my scolding!