On Monday 25th January Hayley and I were invited to attend a seminar exploring the concept of Baby-led weaning at the Sure Start Centre, Folkestone, Kent. We often advise parents on the correct foods to feed their babies and toddlers and since Hayley and I treat many pregnant mums and mums with young children using Herbal Medicines we felt it would be great to go along and here all about it.
The seminar was run by Gill Rapley, author of the book ‘Baby-led weaning – Helping your baby to love good food.’ It was a very informative talk, Gill explained that baby-led weaning is based on the way babies develop in their first year and it’s a way of introducing solid foods that allows the baby to feed herself – there’s no spoon feeding and no purees. The baby sits with the rest of the family at mealtimes, and joins in when she is ready. Her parents offer her food in sizes and shapes that she can handle and she feeds herself with her fingers, choosing what to eat, how much and how quickly.
Gill went on to explain that all healthy babies can do this. They don’t need their parents to decide when weaning should start and they don’t need to be spoon-fed; they just need to be given the opportunity to feed themselves.
There were many questions from the audience – the main question that people seemed to be concerned about was… ‘Don’t they choke!’ Gill explained that there is no more risk of choking with BLW than with any other method of introducing solids. A normal, healthy six-month-old baby is able to sit upright, pick up pieces of food, take them to his mouth and chew them. Adults and children are more likely to choke if someone else is feeding them and they can’t control what goes into their mouth – with BLW the baby is in control.
What I got out of the seminar was that we should trust nature and allow our babies to be independent. A sixth month old baby is developed enough to feed themselves and I’m sure that if more babies were weaned this way then children wouldn’t be as fussy and it would be easier to feed them a healthy and balanced diet.
For more information on baby led weaning click here or call the Folkestone Sure Start Centre on 01303 856200.
Jodie Foreman
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