Make Baby Led Weaning Work For You
Let’s talk about Baby Led Weaning. When I grew up, babies started on purees, and worked their way through more advanced textures until they gained entry to the ‘clean plate club’. Now that I’m a mom and speech-language pathologist, Baby Led Weaning is something I find myself talking about almost every day. The term ‘Baby Led Weaning’ does NOT mean that we just let our kids decide when to start eating at whatever age they want.
Put simply, Baby Led Weaning, or BLW as the internet community may call it, is the concept of offering babies the food that the rest of the family is eating and allowing the baby to feed themselves, while preparing the food in a way that makes it safe for the baby.
What does that mean? If you made tacos for dinner, you would not give your 6 month-old a taco and call it a day. You could offer your baby a plate with a portion of ground beef or shredded chicken, avocado cut into spears or thin finger length pieces, some grilled peppers and onions cut into long thin finger length strips, some shredded cheese, and some salsa or guacamole. Offer a variety of tastes and textures to encourage your baby to learn to like all kinds of foods.
Some parents choose to adopt this concept 100% of the time, and some parents give their babies strictly purees. There is not one ‘right’ way to do this, as long as your child is offered foods that are safe for them.
For your baby’s first few months of eating, what do I mean by a variety of textures? Try:
Soft foods- cheese, peanut butter, hummus
Puree- applesauce, yogurt, traditional baby food
Chunky foods- oatmeal, chili, tomato sauce with ground beef in it
Foods with some crunch- bell pepper, crackers,
Mushy foods- raspberry, scrambled eggs, soft granola bars, banana
Wet solids- strawberries
Foods that have a different texture in the middle than the outside- blueberries (smashed for new eaters), clementines, cherry tomatoes (cut into quarters for babies), grapes (cut into quarters for babies)
BLW Mythbusters
Mythbuster # 1- You should start feeding your baby at 4 months at the table if they seem interested.- FALSE!
The reason the AAP recommends starting solids at 6 months is so that the baby can have more trunk support, and because starting solids too early is linked to obesity. You’ll want your baby sitting up on their own before you start solids, so that they can focus their energy on chewing and swallowing, and not on keeping their head and neck upright and their airway open
Mythbuster # 2- You shouldn’t feed your baby solids AND purees because they will get confused.- FALSE!
We need to give our babies some credit. They are so smart. Milk and puree are different textures, right? Babies do not get confused by trying different textures; starting multiple textures at once, meaning in the same day or during the same meal, will help babies learn new textures and be more willing to try new foods as they grow, rather than getting ‘stuck’ on a favorite texture. For example, some babies struggle to progress past purees because they get really comfortable with them. Just offer different textures and let baby decide which ones they want to go for.
Mythbuster # 3- Baby Led Weaning is better than traditional weaning. - FALSE! This can be true for some, but is not true for everyone.
This decision is up to the parents. Benefits of baby led weaning include independence and variety for the baby, but if the parents feel more comfortable starting with traditional purees, or your doctor has instructed you to start on purees only for medical reasons, Baby Led Weaning will not be the best fit for your family. It is 100% ok to start your baby on purees and slowly advance to more textures as time goes on. If you choose this approach, focus on helping your baby learn to self-feed by using thicker purees like oatmeal, or having them hold a spoon of their own while you can feed them some.
When researching Traditional Weaning and Baby Led Weaning, find reputable sources that are pediatric professionals. This may be a speech-language pathologist, occupational therapist, or pediatrician. If you’re reading blogs and scouring instagram for information, make sure you are finding facts, rather than persuasive marketing that is trying to convince you to take an approach of something that worked well for someone else child, but may not necessarily be the best fit for your family.
Still have questions about safe implementation of Baby Led Weaning? Not sure if Traditional Weaning or BLW is the best fit for you?
Promote positive mealtime behaviors at the table by pre-registering for our Solid Start class HERE, where we take you through the ins and outs of your baby’s first few months meals at the table!