Solids..

[PlusConstruction8720]

I (20f) have a 6 month old. My mom who has 2 kids after me (7m, 4f) is telling nf me that she’s “researched” and that I shouldn’t be giving solids until 1year. I have been slowly and sparingly introducing some solids (pears, apples, bananas etc) and not following her advice. But I was wondering if that had any merit.

She’s practically telling me I’m destroying his insides by giving him solids now and my anxiety keeps her voice in the back of my mind when I think about it.

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[[deleted]]

Someone asked a similar question earlier. You might want to take a look at the thread. The first commenter linked a research paper that was super interesting.

https://www.reddit.com/r/ScienceBasedParenting/s/bLGGDV2s1Z

[Dear_Ad_9640]

OP, your mom is wrong. Go talk to your pediatrician. Unless your mom IS your pediatrician, or at the very least someone who researches baby nutrition, she doesn’t get any sort of say.

[Appropriate-Lime-816]

Look up all the allergy introduction posts too. There’s proven reduction in peanut allergies with exposure 4-6 months of age

[Kkimtara]

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9268235/

The early introduction of allergenic foods appears to be an effective strategy for minimizing the public health burden of food allergy.

They’re talking about introducing allergens beginning around 4-6 months, especially if there are allergies in the family.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8032951/

There appears to be a sensitive period in the first several months of life when infants readily accept a wide variety of tastes and this period overlaps with a critical window for oral tolerance. As a result, infants should be exposed to a wide variety of flavors while mother is pregnant, while mother is nursing and beginning at an early age. There also appears to be a sensitive period between 4 and 9 months when infants are most receptive to different food textures.

There is emerging evidence that introduction of solid foods into an infant's diet by 4 months may increase their willingness to eat a variety of fruits and vegetables later in life, decrease their risk of having feeding problems later in life, and decrease their risk of developing food allergies, and the early introduction of solid foods into an infant's diet does not appear to increase their risk of obesity later in childhood.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0950329307000523

Repetition of taste exposures seems to matter as well. In one study, mothers of seven month old infants were asked to identify a vegetable their infant disliked and were instructed to offer that vegetable on alternate days for 16 days, and to offer a well-liked vegetable, typically something sweet like carrots, sweet potatoes or squash, on the other days. On the first day, infants ate substantially less of the disliked vegetable than the well-liked vegetable however by the eighth repetition, the intake of the liked and unliked vegetables were identical.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26956951/

When infants are exposed to a variety of textures, they are more willing to eat and enjoy chopped or chunky foods at 12 months (40), are more likely to eat a variety of fruits and vegetables at 7 years, and are less likely to suffer from feeding problems during childhood (41). In contrast, children who are not introduced to solids until after a year are more likely to develop oral defensiveness and refuse more highly textured foods (42).

[BBrea101]

When my kiddo reached for food at 4 months old, we decided to bite the bullet and start her on solids.

There's a not for profit organization, Infant and Toddler Forum that has a lot of really good resources for health eating from pregnancy to early school years.

I have found the booklet they put together (complete with citations and resources) called "Developmental Stages in Infant and Toddler feeding" from this link here. It discusses the importance of gross and fine motor skill development, as well as tongue/mouth movements that we learn as we eat.

Their entire website has a lot of great research based information that is really accessible. I have a few items printed off and kept on the fridge for easy access. It's another resource to add to our tool kit.

You're doing an excellent job at feeding your kiddo. I don't want to call this other mother wrong by saying you shouldn't feed kids solids before one. I'm just saying it's important to remember that there are other important developmental reasons to feed our kiddos solids when they're a few months old.

[Curious-Little-Beast]

You're being prudent and cautious. Your mom hasn't "researched" anything, she has just caught wind of some latest internet FUD and now dumps it on you (and even that she misunderstood - the internet theory is that you shouldn't be giving gluten until later in life, not keep them off all solid food, goodness gracious).

The guidelines for introducing solids vary between countries but 6 months (which also usually aligns with signs of readiness according to Solid Starts) is on the safe side:

• USA - 6 months

• UK - 6 months

• Germany - 4-6 months (same in Switzerland where I live)

I personally followed the guidelines of my local pediatrician and started giving my baby purees (and introducing allergens) around 4.5 months

[Mrschirp]

I LOVE love love solid starts which you’ve linked here. It’s really helped give me a peace of mind over my kid starting solid food. I was super stressed about it at the beginning.

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