Introducing Solid Foods

[mrt273nva]

My wife and in-laws are of the belief that we should be jamming food down my poor sons throat (not literally). He is now 11 weeks old and My wife is trying to stick various fruits into his mouth. A month ago my MIL was doing it. I was really upset with this so they stopped (turns out they stopped when I was around).

What age should we begin solid foods. And what is a viable argument against feeding too early that an Thai mother would understand?

[Goldenbead]

I introduced solid food (rice cereal) into my childrens' diets around 4 months. Up until about 6 months this was the only solid they had apart from a bit of papaya and carrot. After 6 months I introduced one new food a week. It is important to introduce new foods gradually as you can see if there are any allergic reactions. Also from six months I began to give them very watered down apple juice.

I am sure your wife and in-laws have their own beliefs on this but I would make sure that baby doesn't get too much variety too soon. 11 weeks is too young IMO.

[Newbee]

11 weeks is too young IMO.

agreed. wait till 4 month at least. six month is the most common...

[Boo]

6 months is now the current advice to start weaning in the UK although I started my son at 4 months, with some baby rice once a day, literally just a couple of small spoons just before bed, then started on some puree at lunch & after severla weeks ok this added a breakfast. Suggets you google Annabel Karmel as she has a very good baby & toddler guide for weaning & gives suggestions for various foods at the suitable times.

Also google the birth to 5 years book, there is an up to dat online version, which povide parents will all sorts of good & valuble advice for taking care of their child.

11 weeks is far to young imo, babies tounge probably hasn't even have dropped yet so there is a high risk of choking not to mention babies digestive systems need time to mature & develop, which is why only milk & sterile water is advised for the first few months at least.

[mrt273nva]

i think i've convinced her to wait. i compromised by allowing her to feed him a bit of fresh squeezed orange juice mixed with water to help him poop. he has been stopped up lately.

[torrenova]

Orange juice is not recommended as he is far too young to handle the acidic nature of this. Thais in general have not been to school to learn anything about biology or chemistry so they will not accept that what they did last time will not be ok now.

As for solids, I'd go for 6 months and agree that either some porridge or crushed rice in solution is the easiest way to start. After 6 months you can introduce items gradually. For now, milk and water is all that is required.

[g00dgirl]

Links:

Why delay solids?

Exclusive breastfeeding should continue to six months

Edited June 22, 2008 by g00dgirl

[yeti]

Breastfeeding, so doctor told us nothing, not even fruit juice, before 4 months.

[markwhite]

My wife and in-laws are of the belief that we should be jamming food down my poor sons throat (not literally). He is now 11 weeks old and My wife is trying to stick various fruits into his mouth. A month ago my MIL was doing it. I was really upset with this so they stopped (turns out they stopped when I was around).

What age should we begin solid foods. And what is a viable argument against feeding too early that an Thai mother would understand?

My wife wanted to start our son on solids at 4 months. I wasn't happy but agreed to try. And we tried a bit (bananas I think), and he couldn't swallow it so we left it for a while figuring he'd be ready when he could swallow. We tried maybe twice more in the next couple of months and he ended up taking his first solids just before he was 6 months old.

I was happy with our approach that he'd eat when he was ready, but that's how we try to be with much of his development. We did have a Thai woman tell us not to 'make' him walk too early as it would give him bow legs, which maybe shows that other people think differently about what a baby is able to do and what they 'should' be doing.

I wouldn't imagine there is a viable argument that every other person would accept as being completely right and an inalienable truth. There are so many other possible connotations behind you asking that question that I don't really know what else to say.

[HarryHerb]

Thai people, especially out in the sticks, have all sorts of odd ideas about infant nutrition. I was told that breast milk has no nutritional value after 3 months, so I would have to start my little ones on solids then . Explaining the facts was pretty hard, especially to people who's only rationale is "my mother did it like this, so I will too".

I found an excellent website, in Thai, to take care of this: http://www.thaibreastfeeding.com/webboardD...224&keyword

The 2 articles on this page explain the benefits of breastmilk, plus the dangers of starting solids too early. Print them off and show them to the MIL / sister / any interfering busybody who think they know better than you.

There's lots of other good stuff on the site too - though unfortunately nothing about the problems of adding shedloads of nam pla to 6 month old food. I ended up having to hide anything remotely salty that was in the kitchen so my nanny couldn't chuck it in the purees

[Heng]

We didn't rush anything and waited until around 9 months. We figured if nature wanted him to eat solid foods, she would provide him with some mean looking teeth first.

One reason that many 'out in the sticks' start their kids a little early is that they simply can't afford to have mom stay home and be a full time mom and that also baby formula is too expensive for about 60-70% of Thais. Heng Jr. consumes about 1,700 Baht of Wyeth S-26 and 1,500 Baht of Mamy Poko diapers each month. I'd imagine for folks earning between 6,000 and 15,000 Baht a month, and worse yet if they have an infant AND a toddler, that that might be too heavy a burden. You'll note that many supermarkets these days are starting to put security sensors on baby formula.

[mrt273nva]

There are so many other possible connotations behind you asking that question that I don't really know what else to say.

I'm new at all this. I've never had a child before. There is an overload of conflicting information on the internet, and the information that does seem to be all the same is conflicted with the Thai way of going about things. I just want what is best for my child, but everyone has a different idea as to what that is.

[lost_in_space]

If you want a Thai speaking, western-trained nurse to explain things to your family, you might try googling the Bambi-Bangkok website. It has links to some nurses, one of whom explained the situation with breast-feeding to my wife. I think her name was Neena Sobsamai, and she didn't tolerate any "traditional" nonsense from my wife. I just called her, and she spoke to my wife, filled her in, and much was resolved.

[Sheryl]

4 to 6 months is the recommended age in a developed country setting (i.e. a setting where the food and water the child will be exposed to is clean). 6 months in a less devekloepd setting in order to delay exposure to contaminated food and water.

Breast milk or breast milk substitutes (forumula) fully meet nutritional needs up to 6 months but not beyond that. Certainly no reason at all to be pushing food on an 11 week old infant, and likely to unnecessarily expose him or her to intenstinal bugs.

[markwhite]

I'm new at all this. I've never had a child before. There is an overload of conflicting information on the internet, and the information that does seem to be all the same is conflicted with the Thai way of going about things. I just want what is best for my child, but everyone has a different idea as to what that is.

Yeah, I found that too... I've only been at it 10 months myself.

From my point of view then, and please don't take this personally - I don't know you and this might all be stuff you already know, so just ignore anything that doesn't work for you.

If you've been in Thailand for a while, you'll probably have a fair idea that much of what we learn in the west differs from the the Thai way of doing things. It's par for the course of living in Thailand and it applies to babies too.

And you'll get a lot of this sort of stuff. Your wife may get pulled in the way of tradition or what everyone else does, especially if family are close enough to have a big influence, and you might be pulling her in the way of the west, all the advice from websites that's nearly all aimed at US and Europe. And you'll need to do a lot of compromising between you both. If you don't have a general idea of how you want to bring up your baby together, agreeing how key stuff will be dealt with and such, then now is the time to do it. And agreeing it with your wife is the only way to do it.

It's cool that you want the best or your child. So will everyone else who gives you advice that you don't want. It's how you deal with it that's crucial as it will happen a lot. If you've got an idea of the general approach you want to take (extreme examples: attachment parenting against the Ferber method) then you will both have a good chance or being able to reject the advice you don't want together, rather than it coming down to rational arguments which I don't find always apply well to the real-world chaos of living with a baby.

That's what I meant about connotations. There was something in what you said that left me with the impression that you are not or are not being allowed to make those decisions. Maybe I'm mistaken.

I've been there a little with my wife. There were things she did that I just did not like, but I learnt by going with them and watching the outcome that often her was was more appropriate than some fixed idea I had from a webpage or book somewhere. And I've been spectacularly wrong about a few things that I've insisted on and I have to learn from those sort of cock-ups.

So I didn't have a good way of saying all of this without possibly accusing you of something with no good reason. But I've said it how I've said it and I hope you take it as it's meant.

Best of luck.

Mark...

[Sheryl]

The Thai Ministry of Public Health advises that children be exclusively breastfed for 4-6 months with no other food during that time. Thai language materials, brochures etc to that effect are availabkle form any Health Center of District Hospital. Many of these also host events to communictae this message to the community.

So it doesn't have to be a west vs east issue but rathet\r one of following the advice given by Thai publich health professionals to their own people.....

[markwhite]

So it doesn't have to be a west vs east issue

That's as maybe, but my last message to the OP was about the general connotations of what he was saying, not the specific matter of when solids should/n't be given.

Even so he does seem to be in the 'traditional Thai ways' versus 'western information on websites' situation right now, though whether that is an 'east vs west' issue or not is probably a more hoary point.

[nikster]

The Thai Ministry of Public Health advises that children be exclusively breastfed for 4-6 months with no other food during that time. Thai language materials, brochures etc to that effect are availabkle form any Health Center of District Hospital. Many of these also host events to communictae this message to the community.

Yeah it's pretty common knowledge nowadays. It's also the WHO recommendation (6 months of exclusive breast feeding). After decades of studying and research western medicine has concluded that breast milk is by far the best you can do for your baby. What an insight!

Start solids slowly when baby has first teeth, and not much before. Give him stuff to suck on and things like that, but if they don't want it, don't force them. Our baby book said that babys will show that they are interested in solid foods, and that's exactly how it was with our little one too (now 11 months).

Forcing a baby to "learn to eat" - like many other things people force babys to do early on - is silly IMHO. I always think, what's the alternative? Is my baby going to be the only human on the planet who doesn't know how to eat if I don't do it? Seems unlikely to put it mildly.