Spoon feeding 'makes babies fatter'

meltygarden

Oh, whatever. Babies need to be fat. Unless the development of brain tissue isn't a big priority.

cyclingben

I should have wore my glasses... I thought it said Spooning makes babies fat...... i was like why would that effect babies?

MummyOfSeven

I have seven children. Five that I gave birth to and twins that I 'inherited' when I married Hubby (and have raised as my own).

When I had my first child twenty years ago, there was no such thing as 'baby led weaning'. It was simple. You started feeding your baby solids when they showed signs of being too hungry for milk alone. You did this with baby rice and a spoon.
In fact, if your baby wasn't on solids by four months old, the health providers were telling you that you were starving your child.

How times change. By the time I had my youngest, five years ago, we were advised not to start him on solids until he was at least six months old or we'd risk damaging his stomach lining.

When I started my children on solids, I rarely used baby food from a jar. I made my own. Mostly, I would puree some of the food that I had made for us, then freeze it in ice cube trays. Once it was frozen, pop it into bags and there you go. Single sized servings ready to go.

I know that a lot of people don't have the time and I'm certainly not bashing them for using jars. I always kept a few in stock for emergencies or trips out and had no qualms about using them.

None of my babies ever gagged or choked on the spoon, because it never got that far into their mouths. The tip of the spoon was pushed just past their bottom lip and the food scooped into their mouths.

Today, of all my children, the only one that is 'fussy' about his food is my youngest. The one that was put on solids at a later stage. The others will eat just about anything.

Every last one of them, from Mr20 to Mr5, are what my grandmother used to call 'Skinny Minnies'. Not an ounce of spare fat between them. They (especially the boys) will eat anything that's not nailed down, they are healthy, they play sports and they are happy.

The only one to gain weight has been my eldest daughter (aged 18) and that didn't happen until *after* she had left home and fell into bad eating habits with her boyfriend. Too much 'convenience food'.

As for breast feeding, I fed all of my children until I couldn't.
Two of my boys were bf for about four months before my milk started drying up and I had no choice but to change to formula.

My daughter was breast fed until just after she turned one. She bit me. Hard. Time for formula.

One of my other boys had a medical condition that, initially, was put down to my breast milk being insufficient. I was medically advised to change to formula and, like most people, took their advice for the health of my child. As it turned out, it had nothing to do with my milk, but by then it was too late and my milk had dried up.

My youngest was the hungriest baby ever. I could feed him for two hours straight and he was still hungry. This time we knew that my milk was fine, he was just always hungry. When you're trying to run a home and look after six kids as well as the baby, you don't have time for two hour feeds. We put him on formula at three months.

There will always be a debate on breast vs formula. As far as I'm concerned? You do what you think is best for your child, regardless of what the latest survey says or what the neighbours think.

[Sorry my reply is so long, the words got away from me!]

Collinsky

Oh, whatever. Babies need to be fat. Unless the development of brain tissue isn't a big priority.

I totally agree, a healthy amount of fat in the diet is necessary for maintenance of brain tissue. However, I want to add as the mama of five babies who were all on the thinner end of the "normal" spectrum, a lack of total chubbiness doesn't necessarily mean a lack of brain tissue development. My kids' brains are just fine. There's not really a correlation between size of the thighs and the health of the brain in the usual course of things.

And honestly, it has very little to do with *babies* being fat, which is healthy and normal and no one should bat an eyelash at it. IMO it's about the development of habits and a relationship with food (like, continuing to eat past the point you would have stopped) that affects obesity later in life.

kimtpa1417

My son was put on rice cereal at 5 days old and i fed him from a spoon then. I didnt feed him jar food he ate mashed food of whatever i cooked for dinner. My son is far from fat healthy as can be and will eat almost anything.