Baby Led Weaning

Growing healthy babies with healthy appetites

Baby Led Weaning Diary.. And it’s goodbye from Siobhan and some stuff about choking.

Hello all, Siobhan Courtney has finished her diary for us now, having returned from the country and done a bit of practise infant resus… (truth be told she returned some time ago and this got rather lost in my inbox at Christmas. Bad Aitch.) I hope you’ll join me in thanking her for her thoughts and experiences over this exciting developmental (emphasis on ‘mental) stage.

For the record, the first image I have used to illustrate the piece is what one would do for a child of 12 months and over, where you place over your knee and give five blows between the shoulder blades, using the flat of your hand.

With babies, you lie the baby over your forearm so that you know you are giving support to the neck, illustrated further down. If that doesn’t work, it’s onto chest thrusts, which are explained in more detail by the St John Ambulance below*.

“Fellow BLW’ers is sadly the end of our journey. I have really enjoyed sharing it all with you and it’s been wonderful to read all your comments and tips – thank you so much.”

“Back in the country and back in the classroom – (well kind of….)

So I’ve managed to transport a BLW’ing baby back into the country safely and soundly after my very first road trip with Alban. We only went to Wales but what a wonderful adventure it was. I packed a special BLW bag for Alban as I didn’t want to get caught out again. Our ’essential stock’ consisted of breadsticks, apple slices, cheese chunks, red pepper wedges and a banana. Needless to say all very manageable finger foods resulting in a rather varied lunch for the little man at the motorway services!
　
Our little trip was relatively drama free to be honest. I feel so much more confident about eating out now with him – practice really does make perfect. However, most of the time it’s a real job to get him to eat any of his lunch because he’s just too busy nosing around. I was also very impressed that he had an extremely spicy penne arrabbiata that he ate quicker than me. What a proud parent moment that was – isn’t it funny how you just get so excited over something that must sound so mundane to others?!

One really interesting outcome of our week away is that Alban’s taste buds seem to have totally changed. He’s now not overly fussed about melon, broccoli, carrots and spinach despite not getting enough of them previously. However, I suspect that may have something to do with Mummy serving them to him practically every day. Maybe he’s just decided he’s had enough of those for a while and is enjoying embracing his new found penchant for potatoes, toast, banana and breadsticks. Carb overload anyone? It seems pretty normal though for the fickle little things to love one type of food one week and hate it the next. Anyone else found this?

So, 6 weeks into our BLW journey the subject of choking does tend to linger at the back of my mind. Not in a scary way, but just (god forbid) if anything did happen I wouldn’t have a clue what to do – apart from scream and panic. With that in mind I thought it would be sensible to book onto a first aid course. I’m writing this now after just returning from it proudly brandishing my first aid certificate (my first one ever!) Anyway, I feel so much better after this evening. I really would recommend attending a course – mine was through my children’s centre and they run pretty regularly throughout the year.

Interesting highlights from this evening was the trainer telling the class the two biggest causes of choking in babies is grapes and cherry tomatoes – in that order. There are very few cases of choking though so that should be put into perspective. Our trainer said he’d recently been working with a number of nurseries, who are now cutting the grapes and tomatoes into quarters rather into halves. He said they’re taking the initiative because ‘one can never be too cautious’ and to also soothe parental worries. The advice for parents is to squish them flat before offering them to your child.

We were also told never ever to hold our babies upside down by their feet if they’re choking. Even if you’re so hysterical and think this may be a good idea at the time the baby’s head and neck would be totally unsupported. This dangerous position would also not help at all in dislodging a stuck piece of food.

As I’ve only attended a short course I should state strongly that I am by no means qualified to give medical advice – these are just my experiences from my class tonight. I really do feel the advice we were given tonight though was invaluable. Even if you can’t get a babysitter, take your sleeping baby with you and just park your buggy in a quiet corner of the room – the course is really worth it. There’s also some excellent advice on choking on the St John’s Ambulance website which was recommended as an essential resource. I had a quick look at the site before signing up to the class and was pleased that the trainer made us practice the back blows and abdominal thrusts on plastic dolls until we knew what we were doing.

It was really reassuring to know we were being taught best practice even though I didn’t actually attend a St John’s Ambulance course, but everything we covered was the same as the information on their website and that of the British Red Cross. The trainer also recommended we regularly test our skills online to keep refreshing what we learnt on the course. And finally, apparently this First Aid Manual is an absolute must have for every home with children. It covers how to deal with every emergency and I‘m actually finding that it’s not that bad of a bedtime read.”
　

Thanks, Siobhan!

*Management of Choking – Children

For all children (above 1 years of age), the management of choking is the same as for an adult:
1. Ask child to cough up obstruction.
2. Give five sharp blows between the shoulder blades
3. Give five chest thrusts.

Management of Choking – Infant (to 1 year)

Lie infant face down on your forearm with head low.
Support infant’s head and shoulders on your hand.
Give 5 sharp blows between shoulders.
Check after each back blow to see if the obstruction has been relieved.
If the blockage is still not cleared, your last resort is ‘chest thrusts’. For infants, this is performed by placing the infant on a firm surface on back. Place two fingers in the CPR compression position and give 5 chest thrusts; slower but sharper than CPR compressions.

Choking Summary
· Encourage the casualty to relax and breathe deeply.
· Ask the casualty to cough to remove the object.
· If unsuccessful, place the casualty with the head low.
· Give 5 sharp blows between the shoulder blades.
· As a last resort, try ‘chest thrusts’.
· While waiting for the ambulance, if the blockage has not cleared, repeat back blows and chest thrusts.
· If the casualty becomes unconscious, remove any visible obstruction from mouth and commence CPR.

There’s a really great summary here as well, from BabyCenter.

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Posted on March 9th, 2012 in The Gagging Thing... with 9 Comments

Further to the Banana…


Is everyone opening them like monkeys do? Well, ARE YOU?

I haven’t been, and to be honest it’s not been that much of a struggle cracking open the stalk end but it can be a little fraught… however, it turns out that yer average chimp has it sussed.

Look here, you absolutely owe it to yourself.

SO, it turns out we’ve been doing it wrong all this time… just squeeze the bottom of the ‘nana and the skin will kind of split, and you can just pull the sides down as per. It does leave you with the black endy bit sitting right at the top, but at least you can get rid of it straight away rather than have a small child present it to you by wiping it on your trousers.

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Posted on February 29th, 2012 in Getting Started - Finger Food Basics with 12 Comments

It’s Pancake Day! My Old Grandmother’s Recipe for Scottish (Scotch) Pancakes

We love pancakes in this house, ESPECIALLY if we remember to open the windows before DH gets to work on the griddle. Scottish pancakes have more in common with American ones than French crepes; fat, thick little things that are perfect for little babies to get their carbohydrate fix on. I’ve never been completely clear as to what the English call them… used to be drop scones, now everyone probably follows the Yanks on this.

Here’s the recipe, as per my auld grannie mother’s instructions… i have NO IDEA about conversions I’m afraid.

4oz Self Raising Flour
Pinch of salt
2oz Caster Sugar
1 Egg (I don’t bother about the size, I bet my Grandma used medium but they are fine with a large. Just don’t stress over much if the kids lose some down the side of the bowl if it’s a large, the recipe can handle less egg).
4 tablespoons-ish of milk

I do this in a food processor/mixer/whatnot but it’s really just a batter so a whisk will be fine, if tiring.

Mix dry ingredients a bit, then egg and then the milk, gradually. Ta-Dah!

Honest, that’s it. It’ll be a nice drippy, dropping batter. At this point, the women in my family leave it for an hour. All of them apart from me, who never has time. But I am told it improves the batter, so do it if you can.

If you have a flat griddle or frying pan, get it out and grease it a bit. Nowadays people seem to use veg oil or whatever but I actually still save up my old butter wrappers and rub them on the surface. A teensy bit of oil, like, MINISCULE rubbed in as well will stop the milk in the butter from burning too much.

Slap on heat, wait until it’s preeetty hot, almost smoking, then test a drop of batter in the middle. You want bubbles appearing on the top fairly quickly, that’s when you know it’s at the right temp. Plus, you’ll see how brown it is on the bottom, some like golden, some like darker. My DH likes burned.

Discard tester into the mouth of waiting child.

Then go for it. Drop a loaded dessert spoon-ish of batter onto the pan, three or four at a time. Wait for bubbles, then turn. Repeat, repeat, repeat, fiddling about with temp occasionally, and carefully rubbing a bit more butter on (remember that thing is HOT) and serve with raspberry jam, butter, cream, those sorts of things.

Also, can I just say if you are thinking of doing crepes… Delia’s recipe is Far Too Eggy. Avoid. There, I have done you a good turn.

PS Hey I’ll tell you what we used to do when we were kids, with the end of the batter and the griddle switched off. Me and my little sister would do our initials with the last drips off the spatula and for some reason they were always the tastiest…

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Posted on February 21st, 2012 in Recipes with 28 Comments

Further to Dr Ellen Townsend’s statement re BLW in the BMJ. Some more info on carbs and breast-feeding.

I asked for a wee bit further clarification on the breastfeeding rates – HUGE in both instances, if you look at the peer reviews it says ‘nearly all children in the matched sample were breast-fed (92% in the SpoonFed group, 97% in the Baby-Led group). Indeed, in the whole sample 94.8% of the children had been breast fed’. As you can see I asked if this was a bad thing, as it is unusual, or good because it meant that the study compared like with like.

Here is the reply from Dr Townsend.
“The breast feeding issue is interesting and crucial. On the one hand the fact that there was no difference in breastfeeding status in our matched sample (which we based our preference analyses on) is a good thing – because as you acknowledge that means we have homogeneity between the groups. With the BLW group the high rate is understandable as it is such a natural extension of breastfeeding. With the spoon-fed group – we had a sample who were willing to come to the lab to be tested etc – so again probably not entirely representative at a population level. We do now need to do research now that engages more parents who have used formula/bottle feeding. We do say this at the end of the paper …”In particular, a study is needed that includes a greater proportion of children who have been formula/bottle fed in order to compare the relative impacts of weaning method and milk feeding practices on food preferences and health outcomes in early childhood.””

Likewise the carbs thing, what were they using as their definition of carbohydrates?
And here is the answer.

“With regard to the carbohydrates issue. There are a number of ways we could have categorised/classified the foods in our study. We used typical food pyramid categorization where ‘starchy’ carbs are found at the bottom. Yes – sweets are carbs but of the ‘simple’ rather than ‘complex’ variety.”

Any thoughts?

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Posted on February 12th, 2012 in Updates with 12 Comments

A quick statement from Dr Ellen Townsend re BLW in the BMJ

I say statement, really I just buzzed her and said ‘givvusitinplainEnglish’… and she is a kind woman so she complied despite this probably being Quite A Busy Day for her. She says;

“We conducted a survey-based study with parents. Some of whom had used traditional spoon feeding and some who had used a baby-led approach. We asked them about their child’s food likes and how often they ate 151 different foods.

We then compared the groups on their liking for foods in the major food categories (carbs, proteins etc). What we found was that children weaned using a BLW approach like carbohydrates more than the spoon fed children. (In fact they liked carbohydrates the most as compared to the spoon fed children who like sweet foods the most.)

This is interesting because carbohydrates form the building blocks of healthy nutrition (being found at the bottom of the food pyramid). We also looked at health outcomes and found that BLW children generally had lower BMI compared to spoon-fed children. There was a small incidence of underweight in the BLW group but a larger incidence of obesity in the spoon fed group.

Carbohydrates are an ideal first finger food – so what we may be seeing here is an ‘age on introduction effect’ where BLW children are exposed to these foods in their whole food format earlier on. In relation to the BMI findings it could be that BLW learn to self regulate their intake because they are given control of the feeding process. We need longitudinal studies now that can tease apart our findings further.”

Tell you what I’m interested in… the breast-feeding rates seem high in both groups. I’m wondering whether that’s a good thing in terms of correlation of samples or whether it throws everything up in the air a bit. Anyway, I’ve asked her and hope that she’ll answer when she gets a minute.

I did ask if we BLWers should be worried by the fact that some of our kids were underweight and the answer came back “Not a big worry – most children in both groups were a healthy weight for their age and gender…”

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Posted on February 7th, 2012 in Updates with 15 Comments

BLW in the BMJ – New study says Baby Led Weaning promotes healthy food choices

I don’t have a lot of time to digest it all right now so I reckon the best thing to do is give you all the Actual Links to both the University of Nottingham press release and the article in the British Medical Journal.

The press pieces all seem okay so far but seem to be reporting the kids as still having been spoon-fed at 20 months which seems a bit… unlikely. I presume that this is a mis-interpretation of the fact that the parents were looking at what their kids eat after 20 months as by then weaning is well and truly over.

Anyway, as we say to our children faced with a bowl of lasagne, dive in…

Daily Mail from the paper that likes to terrify you with choking stories…

Guardian from the paper that likes to publish Zoe Whatsername saying we’re all loons. ;D

The Australian from the paper that likes to use eighteenth-century weaning terminology.

BBC slight erk at headline…

Press Association aaand here’s what went out on the newswires.

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Posted on February 7th, 2012 in Updates with 7 Comments

The Ikea Antilop Recall… important news(ish)

It’s a sad day for us Antilop-lovers… there’s been a recall.

Information and link below, seemingly the belt is coming open on some of them (which is why you need to check the product number) and small children are escaping their bounds. To which I say oh dear that is a shame BUT let’s face it, guys, the belt has always been pretty rubbish.

Sure enough, mine always held fast but given that it didn’t go over the shoulders of my Houdini-esque children it was never enough to hold them if they wanted to mount a serious break-out. Which I liked, rather controversially, as I always figured if they were keen to get out of their seats, let ’em out, they were probably done with eating. Very BLW, har har.

Everything depends on circumstance, of course, and had it not been for the fact that they only used the highchair for eating so I was watching them anyway, I might have been less relaxed about it. Or indeed had my children been less greedy.

Anyway, chisel the Weetabix off the bottom of your highchairs, look for the product number and call Ikea if you’re in the relevant group, but the message is… don’t get too complacent even if you aren’t. If your child is inclined to lurch suddenly in a bid for freedom and your reflexes aren’t up to it, consider getting some kiddie reins like these Clippasafe ones and threading them through the chair. Don’t fret, they’re washable…

IKEA RECALL INFO

“IKEA recalls ANTILOP children’s high chair belt
2012-01-05

IKEA kindly asks customers who have an ANTILOP high chair from supplier #17389 and production date 0607-0911 (YYMM) to immediately contact Customer Services.

The high chair belt can open unexpectedly in use, creating a fall hazard. IKEA has received eight reports of belt opening, including three resulting in minor injury when a child fell from the high chair.

Only ANTILOP high chairs from supplier #17389 with production dates 0607-0911 (YYMM) are affected. The supplier number and production date are moulded into the underside of the seat:

Customers with an ANTILOP high chair are asked to check the supplier number and production date. If the supplier number is #17389 and the production date is 0607-0911 (YYMM) customers are asked to visit IKEA or contact IKEA Customer Service on 0845 358 3364 to receive a replacement belt, free of charge.

No other high chairs are affected. IKEA apologises for any inconvenience this may cause.”

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Posted on January 24th, 2012 in Updates with 4 Comments

Today is World Prematurity Awareness Day.

Here’s some info, click here.


I’ve not yet blogged about the fact that my second daughter was born Caesarean Section nearly seven weeks premature (I say ‘yet’, it’s ridiculous, she’s three years old now) but actually I think I just take a long time to get beyond these things. I’ll do it one day. We were lucky, she hardly spent any time in the Special Care Baby Unit, she was a comparatively ginormous 4lb 1oz, but the whole experience was, and remains, a terrible shock. Basically I went in for a scan and came out with a baby. Big fright.

However, I must say that Baby Led Weaning was an absolute godsend when it came to knowing when to start giving her solids. The advice is so conflicting, some doctors say that you should leave it until the baby would have been 6 months, some say that you should do it 6 months after birth, and indeed some say you should go earlier because babies have missed out on that valuable ‘fattening up for the winter’ time late on in the womb.

My instinct, of course, was to leave it later. It didn’t make sense to me that my child’s internal organs would be maturing any faster than her outsides (and I did ask, many times, for an explanation). ‘It has been exposed to food early’ never really chimed with me, and I didn’t feel that my daughter was lacking in vitamins and minerals because we had supplemented (when I could get her in a half-Nelson to administer them – she might have been small, but she was determined) with liquid vits since birth.

Thank God, then, for the fact that my experiences with Baby-Led Weaning my first child had given me the confidence to trust HER to make the decision as to when the time was right. Of course the memories are hazy, and what with her being an NSC (Neglected Subsequent Child) the photographic record is less complete than with my first daughter, but at round about a birth age of 5 and a half months she reached out and grabbed her first bit of solid food and chomped away. She was a very different kid to wean, actually, for lots of reasons that I should blog about sometime, but I can say that at the age of three she is a wee darling, robust as they come, and her favourite food in the whole world is ratatouille.

So thank you to all the staff of the hospital who looked after us so beautifully, who calmed our fears and dried our tears when we realised that it was all going to happen A Lot Sooner than she or we expected. Kind thoughts to those parents who spent longer in SCBU and strength and courage to those little, little babies who keep going against all the odds.

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Posted on November 17th, 2011 in Getting Started - Finger Food Basics with No Comments

Baby Led Weaning Diary – in which Siobhan goes for a skive.

Greetings from the Welsh Valleys,

Oh, how I’m enjoying my BLW this week with views of lush, green rolling hills and dotted sheep rather than cars hurtling down a dual carriageway….

Yes, I’ve taken a BLW’ing baby out of the country, well over the bridge – (£5.60 toll charge it costs as well- bloody cheek!) for a little break so have a very poor internet connection which means a week’s holiday!

I’ll report back to you all when we get back – have a good BLW’ing week.

Siobhan

xx

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Posted on November 16th, 2011 in Updates with 3 Comments

Baby-Led Weaning Diary – The Secret is OUT.

Is Baby Led Weaning our wonderful little secret?

The inspiration for this week’s blog arose from a somewhat confusing telephone conversation I had this morning. I needed to check something with my children’s centre so gave my lovely health visitor a call, only to find out she had now departed for her eagerly awaited maternity leave. Oh, how I remember that time fondly. Every day consisted of nesting, writing an unrealistic birth plan, shopping for useless baby gadgets, cooking, eating, cooking, eating, cooking eating…

Anyway, I was transferred to another health visitor and she asked me how old Alban was and then said: “Oh good, have you introduced finger foods yet or are you still just pureeing?”
“Actually, I haven’t tried purees as we’re doing Baby Led Weaning,” I replied.
“Oh right, yes I’m aware of it of course but we do tend to advocate the more traditional approaches,” she said. “Have you been to one of our weaning talks at the children centre?”
“I haven’t no, because there wasn’t a talk on Baby Led Weaning and I really wanted to try that approach.”
“Oh, OK, well if you need anything do give us a call.” “We don’t have any information on Baby Led Weaning, but I can send you some stuff on general weaning?”
“Ermmm – ok, that would be great,” I said.

Out of all my friends there are two of us doing BLW. Of course one should respect every parent’s decision over their chosen weaning method and appreciate what will suit one family would not suit another. I’m also conscious of not provoking a BLW verses pureeing argument and am certainly not presuming parents should or would choose BLW over pureeing. However, I do feel if there was equal emphasis and awareness of both, then parents could make a more informed choice as to what suits their family.

I heard (or I should I admit copied) BLW from a dear friend who’s two babies are such confident eaters. It was purely by chance I came across it. I wasn’t even pregnant at the time and in those days very concerned about extremely trivial things such as fashion, drinking and holidays – not small people’s eating habits.

I met my friend for lunch and her two adorable babies, who were sitting happily in their highchairs. They then did the most amazing thing – picked up pizza and salad off their trays and shoved it in their mouths. “Where was all the baby mush and plastic spoon and pots?” I asked my friend.
“Oh, we don’t so that – they just eat with us,” she replied.
I was so excited (much to my friend’s amusement) I even had to take a picture of them gobbling their pizza and salad it was that impressive. I then decided if I was ever lucky enough to have a baby, BLW would be something I would love to try.

When Alban was ready to be weaned, all I kept hearing was baby rice, rusks and pureeing – in that order! At around four months, well meaning extended family (not my lovely mum) and friends advised: “It’s time to get him onto a bit of baby rice.” Why was it time? He didn’t need it and I didn’t want to give it to him for so many reasons. That was my choice and baby rice lovers may disagree, but I was not advising others not to give baby rice and wait until their baby was 6 months old, so they could start BLW. I can honestly say that I was not aware or offered BLW as a possible weaning option . I reckon that if it wasn’t for that lunch with my friend and her babies I would probably be going berserk with a blender and broccoli right now, not writing this blog!

If you type weaning and then baby weaning into Google, the top search and result (on my computer) is Annabel Karmel’s site. Proof that pureeing is (according to the internet) the most popular weaning choice. There’s also a thread on the BLW forum right now discussing how common BLW is in your area – many have similar experiences to mine.

I asked a couple of friends who aren’t doing BLW why they decided to go for the puree option. I explained I wanted to know for this blog and to get a clearer understanding of the attraction of purees. Most said they chose purees as it was what their health visitor or children’s centre recommended, and were put off BLW because of concerns over gagging and choking. A couple of mums said it was easier and cleaner to spoon fed purees as with BLW there would just be too much mess. The majority also said they felt happier and believed it was more safe for them to feed their babies, rather than letting the babies them feed themselves.

My decision was based on the fact I knew I wouldn’t have the time, energy or patience to steam, mash and puree. I then didn’t want to have to resort to jar dinners because I was too lazy to puree. I also love the fact that Alban can control his own portions so if he wants 3 weetabix for breakfast (happened yesterday) and is not fussed about lunch – that’s up to him. It makes me so happy to see him enjoying fresh, (mostly!) healthy food that we’re eating and for all of those reasons that’s why BLW is an absolute no-brainer for us.
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　

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Posted on November 8th, 2011 in Updates with 18 Comments