What exactly is baby led weaning?

Question

and what are the pros/cons of baby led weaning?

Answer 1

Baby Led Weaning is where you skip the pureed foods, jarred baby foods and go straight to table foods allowing your child to feed themselves.

Answer 2

Pros?

I don't have to worry about baby food.

I can eat my food while baby eats his instead of feeding him and eating when everyone else is done.

I know exactly what's in my baby's food.

Pureed food stains are a pain in the butt to get out of food...but broccoli brushes right off.

Cons?

My mother in law thinks I'm crazy for skipping cereal and purees.  She also thinks I'm crazy because my baby is still rear facing and still nursing.  Eh, whatever.  She's crazy, too...but that's why I love her!

Mal- The first poster was right :)

I don't usually use wikipedia as a source, but they're pretty spot on with baby led weaning:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_led_we...

Answer 3

Um, the first poster is not accurate. Baby led weaning is when you let your baby decide when he/she no longer wants to breast feed. It allows the baby to call the shots--when he/she's had enough, you'll know, and you can let the baby feed or not depending on his/her wants at the moment. Some still feed babies solids starting at 6 mos, and basically let the baby choose when he/she wants to breast feed or solid feed. You'll know when your baby no longer wants the breast--he/she will cry, pull away, suckle for two seconds and stop, or just plain get angry and bite you repeatedly. Others exclusively breast feed until the baby no longer shows an interest in it. It's not just to do with when to feed solids--it's all about the baby choosing when to feed or not.

Answer 4

Baby-led weaning is basically doing what people for most of history and all other mammals do.  

They only real marker of when a baby is physiologically ready to digest food is when they voluntarily eat it. They can physically pick it up, but it in their mouth, gum it/chew it, move it back with their tongue, and swallow it.

The benefits include:

-Less allergies because the baby starts solids when they are really ready

-Reduced risk of choking

-Baby controls how much they eat which prevents overeating.  This may reduce future obesity (though it is only a piece of the puzzle of course)

-Its cheap, baby eats what you do, you finish what baby doesn't

-Its easy -you were making the food anyway

-Low stress, you don't measure exactly what baby eats.  You don't compare what they ate yesterday to today.

-Less waste, less small packages, no "baby foods" with nasty ingredients like annatto, synthetic vitamins, etc.

-Reduced constipation (partially because of reduce over eating)

-Reduced pickiness in toddlers and preschoolers -specifically when it comes to texture

-Proper development of oral skills which can aid in speech development

-Because foods are introduced in smaller amounts, and generally "in rotation" not 3-7 days in a row this may also reduce the incidence of allergies.  Also allergies often start with an unpleasant mouth feel.

-etc

Pureed baby food is 'unnatural'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/676279...

Gill Rapley, deputy director of Unicef's UK Baby Friendly Initiative said feeding babies in this way could cause health problems later in life.

She said children should be fed only with breast or formula milk for six months, then weaned onto solids to improve control over how much they ate.

This could prevent babies becoming picky about food.

Mrs Rapley has spent 25 years as a health visitor, and she said: "I found so many parents were coming to me with the same problems - 'my child is constipated, my child is really picky' - and they couldn't get them on to second stage baby food."

Guidelines for implementing a baby-led approach to the introduction of solid food

http://www.borstvoeding.com/voedselintro...

Won't he choke?

Many parents worry about babies choking. However, there is good reason to believe that babies are at less risk of choking if they are in control of what goes into their mouth than if they are spoon fed. This is because babies are not capable of intentionally moving food to the back of their throats until after they have developed the ability to chew. And they do not develop the ability to chew until after they have developed the ability to reach out and grab things. The ability to pick up very small things develops later still. Thus, a very young baby cannot easily put himself at risk because he cannot get small pieces of food into his mouth. Spoon feeding, by contrast, encourages the baby to suck the food straight to the back of his mouth, potentially making choking more likely.

It appears that a baby's general development keeps pace with the development of his ability to manage food in his mouth, and to digest it. A baby who is struggling to get food into his mouth is probably not quite ready to eat it. It is important to resist the temptation to 'help' the baby in these circumstances since his own developmental abilities are what ensure that the transition to solid foods takes place at the right pace for him, while keeping the risk of choking to a minimum.

[...]

Babies who are allowed to feed themselves seem to accept a wide range of foods. This is probably because they have more than just the flavour of the food to focus on – they are experiencing texture, colour, size and shape as well. In addition, giving babies foods separately, or in a way which enables them to separate them for themselves, enables them to learn about a range of different flavours and textures. And allowing them to leave anything they appear not to like will encourage them to be prepared to try new things.

General principles of good nutrition for children apply equally to young babies who are managing their own introduction to solid foods. Thus, 'fast foods' and foods with added sugar and salt should be avoided. However, once a baby is over six months old there is no need (unless there is a family history of allergy or a known or suspected digestive disorder) to otherwise restrict the foods that the baby can be offered. Fruit and vegetables are ideal, with harder foods cooked lightly so that they are soft enough to be chewed. At first, meat is best offered as a large piece, to be explored and sucked; once the baby can manage to pick up and release fistfuls of food, minced meat works well. (Note: babies do not need teeth to bite and chew – gums do very well!)