How do you know if your baby is ready for solid foods? Your baby may be 3 months old or 4 months old when you start to feel she may need "something more" than formula or breastmilk. Maybe she is beginning to awaken more often at night or eat more often than "usual" and you wonder if introducing solid foods may be what she needs.
A Growth Spurt May be Confused with a Readiness for Solid Foods
Please keep in mind that a growth spurt will occur between 3-4 months of age. Your baby may begin to wake more frequently at night for a feeding and/or may begin to eat non-stop (cluster feed) as she once did as a newborn. This growth spurt often accounts for the increased hunger in your baby and it should not be taken as a sign that your baby needs solid foods added to her diet!
Offer your baby more frequent nursing sessions and/or bottle feedings instead of solids; you will find that within a week or two, your baby is oftentimes over the growth spurt and back to feeding "as usual".
Loss of tongue-thrust reflex
Many parents say that their own pediatricians or their friends' pediatricians have said that it's fine to start solids (typically cereal) at 4 months of age. It is still common for pediatricians to just say "start solid foods when your baby is 4 months old" because this has been the norm for many years. You will find that the vast majority of pediatricians are not experts in pediatric nutrition and many are not aware of their own governing body's guidelines!
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) acknowledges that there are no "strict" age guidelines on introducing solid foods to your baby. However, the AAP, along with the CDC and the WHO do recommend that you offer nothing but breast milk and/or formula until you baby is at least 6 months old.
This ensures optimal nutritional exposure and may stave off food allergies amongst other issues. Further studies have shown that an infant's gastrointestinal tract has not or may not have matured enough to properly digest/utilize solid foods until around 6-8 months old! (See page end for reference links)
Studies show that babies are highly individual in developing a readiness for solid foods. One baby might seem to be ready for solids at 4 months, while another shows no signs of readiness until around 6 or 7 months. Just because your friend's baby may have began eating solid foods at 4 months of age does not mean that your baby should.
**Please keep in mind that "outward" signs of being ready for solids do not mean that your baby's inner digestive system is mature and ready! You should thoroughly discuss starting your baby on solid foods with your baby's pediatrician.
If your pediatrician insists that you start your 4 month old infant on solids, ask him or her to explain the benefits of starting solids early. You might be surprised to hear the answer is not based on nutritional science!
And remember, you never HAVE to begin introducing complementary foods simply because your pediatrician has suggested that you do so! Only when you have thoroughly discussed the pros and cons of introducing solid foods with your pediatrician will you be able to have a better grasp of just when you should begin offering baby solid foods.
Some parents believe that if they start solids "early" then their infants will sleep through the night sooner. As your baby grows, his sleeping patterns as well as eating patterns change continually.
Around the time a few parents begin to offer solids early is just about the time that an infant may be sleeping for longer periods at a time. This is a natural progression as an infant ages and it oftentimes coincides with the addition of early solids. This coincidence perpetuates the dangerous myth that early offerings of solid foods will help an infant sleep "through the night".
To further this explanation, let us recall that between 6-8 months old, baby is often back to waking at night for a feeding. By this time baby should be eating solids and it appears that those solids are no longer helping baby sleep through the night. In reality, baby is hitting another growth spurt and may wake again during the night for more feedings regardless of eating solids! This really is "normal" and your baby may wake again during the night for more feedings regardless of eating solids!
The best advice when considering starting solid foods for your baby, "Watch the Baby - Not the Calendar!" This is true for both breastfed and formula fed infants.
My Parent's Insist That My Baby Needs "Real Food".
Some parents may be tempted to give in to relatives, grandmothers and sometimes even their own mothers, who say "Give that baby some real food, she's starving!" or "Nursing that baby isn't enough to, he needs some real food". Remember that "real food" is breastmilk and/or formula and these contain all the important nutrients that an infant needs to develop properly! Breast milk in particular, and/or formula, will be enough to sustain your baby's nutritional needs for up to age 1 year old!
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Though they have been used for generations by our mothers and even by women today, walkers are extremely dangerous for babies. In 1995, the American Academy of Pediatrics called for a ban on walkers due to the extremely high rate of injuries, major, minor and fatal which occurred from the use of walkers.
Seventy-five to eighty percent of the more severe injuries were caused by falling down the stairs. Walkers may keep babies happy, they may provide them with a means of mobility, but they do not keep them safe. When you baby is in a walker, he can move faster and farther than he ever could on his own and the potential for falls, pinches and other injuries is very high. Walkers do not help your children learn how to walk and in fact, have been found to delay walking for a few weeks and once the children did begin to walk, they presented an abnormal gait in the beginning.
It is very hard to find a walker in the stores these days, but they are still around. Most companies have stopped making them for fear of lawsuits and due to the proposed ban by the AAP. A new brand of walker-type devices has cropped up, these devices are of the same premise, but they are not on wheels and the only movement a baby can make in them is to turn around in a circle or bounce up and down.
These Exersaucer type toys are great for keeping your child in one place to play, especially when they have learned to crawl and you are trying to keep them out of trouble. They don’t, however, provide a means for mobility for your baby. Without using these devices too often, your baby may learn how to crawl faster and find his own means of mobility.
The risk of injury from walkers is too severe and before long they will probably be off the market altogether. You will still find walkers in consignment shops however, don’t buy them. Keep your baby safe from injury and death and he will learn to walk eventually, what’s the rush?
http://www.essortment.com/all/babywalkersdan_rvun.htm
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) feels that walkers should be banned from the United States because:
From 1989 to 1993 there were 11 deaths involving a baby walker. Each year over 8000 children are treated in hospital emergency rooms for walker-related injuries. Many more children are injured and go to their health care provider's office. Walker injuries can be serious, such as skull fractures, head injuries causing bleeding inside the head, broken legs and arms, and burns.
FACT: Baby walkers do not help your baby to walk earlier. In fact, they often delay walking.
FACT: A baby in a walker can move at a speed of 3 feet per second. This is much faster than a baby can move on his own.
FACT: Gates do not prevent babies from tumbling down stairs in walkers. Children can take the gate down or the baby walker can knock the gate loose.
FACT: Baby walkers put children at increased risk for burns, poisonings, and drownings. This is because the child can move about faster and reach dangerous objects.
FACT: Most baby walker injuries happen while at least one parent is at home watching the child.
http://www.med.umich.edu/1libr/pa/pa_walkers_hhg.htm
