Solids, 2 Months and Eating Cereal?

My girlfriend began feeding her son cereal once a day a few weeks ago. One
day, he even ate applesauce.

He was born 3.12.04. Isn't that too soon?

He is not breastfed.

~Carol Ann
Mom to Morgan born 3.24.04
http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeBNnDdizZNneg ---Pictures!

My girlfriend began feeding her son cereal once a day a few weeks
ago. One day, he even ate applesauce.

He was born 3.12.04. Isn't that too soon?

Yes. *Way* too soon. The recommendation now is for solids starting at 4-6
months, with longer being considered ideal.

He is not breastfed.

Irrelevant. Formula is far more balanced nutritionally for an infant than
cereal or applesauce (neither of which provides a balanced or healthy diet
for a 2mo, who can't even digest it properly in all likelihood). It was
fairly routine to introduce solids much earlier when I was an infant, but
all the evidence now suggests early solids are a BadIdea(TM).

That's what I thought. I didn't say anything b/c he is her son. She is the
one who had so many problems with him crying all the time. After she gave
him cereal, he stopped being so fussy.



~Carol Ann
Mom to Morgan born 3.24.04
http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeBNnDdizZNneg ---Pictures!

Carol Ann wrote:
My girlfriend began feeding her son cereal once a day a few weeks
ago. One day, he even ate applesauce.

He was born 3.12.04. Isn't that too soon?

Yes. *Way* too soon. The recommendation now is for solids starting at 4-6
months, with longer being considered ideal.

He is not breastfed.

Irrelevant. Formula is far more balanced nutritionally for an infant than
cereal or applesauce (neither of which provides a balanced or healthy diet
for a 2mo, who can't even digest it properly in all likelihood). It was
fairly routine to introduce solids much earlier when I was an infant, but
all the evidence now suggests early solids are a BadIdea(TM).
--
Be well, Barbara
Mom to Sin (Vernon, 2), Misery (Aurora, 4), and the Rising Son (Julian, 6)

Aurora (in the bathroom with her dad)--"It looks like an elephant, Daddy."
Me (later)--"You should feel flattered."

All opinions expressed in this post are well-reasoned and insightful.
Needless to say, they are not those of my Internet Service Provider, its
other subscribers or lackeys. Anyone who says otherwise is itchin' for a
fight. -- with apologies to Michael Feldman

On Sat, 29 May 2004 03:10:37 GMT, "Carol Ann"
wrote:

My girlfriend began feeding her son cereal once a day a few weeks
ago. One day, he even ate applesauce.

He was born 3.12.04. Isn't that too soon?

Yes. *Way* too soon. The recommendation now is for solids starting at 4-6
months, with longer being considered ideal.

He is not breastfed.

Irrelevant. Formula is far more balanced nutritionally for an infant than
cereal or applesauce (neither of which provides a balanced or healthy diet
for a 2mo, who can't even digest it properly in all likelihood). It was
fairly routine to introduce solids much earlier when I was an infant, but
all the evidence now suggests early solids are a BadIdea(TM).

That's what I thought. I didn't say anything b/c he is her son. She is the
one who had so many problems with him crying all the time. After she gave
him cereal, he stopped being so fussy.

In general it's too early, but to some extent it depends on the child.
My mother started feeding me cereal in addition to formula when I was
2 months old because I was a huge and very hungry baby and no matter
how much formula I was getting, it wasn't enough. The pediatrician
told her, "The babies don' t ead the books. If you've got a hungry
baby, feed her what makes her stop being hungry."

Naomi

Yes that's too soon whether he is breastfed or not. The earliest you should
introduce any solids is 4 months.

"Carol Ann" wrote in message
news:P6Ttc.3683$3x.627@attbi_s54...
My girlfriend began feeding her son cereal once a day a few weeks ago.
One
day, he even ate applesauce.

He was born 3.12.04. Isn't that too soon?

He is not breastfed.

~Carol Ann
Mom to Morgan born 3.24.04
http://share.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=EeBNnDdizZNneg ---Pictures!

That's what I thought. I didn't say anything b/c he is her son. She is
the
one who had so many problems with him crying all the time. After she gave
him cereal, he stopped being so fussy.

That's because his poor little body is working so hard to digest those awful
solids. Just goes to show that some mom's still make up their own rules
regardless of all the information out there about introducing solids.

Naomi Rivkis said:

In general it's too early, but to some extent it depends on the child.
My mother started feeding me cereal in addition to formula when I was
2 months old because I was a huge and very hungry baby and no matter
how much formula I was getting, it wasn't enough. The pediatrician
told her, "The babies don' t ead the books. If you've got a hungry
baby, feed her what makes her stop being hungry."

This was standard advice in those days. My MIL was following the same advice
when she put cereal in my husband's bottle when he was less than a week old. A
lifetime of asthma and allergies have been the result of that poor advice.

In addition to posing a significant allergy risk, the early introduction of
solids crowds out the good nutrition baby needs. A baby who is full of slowly
digesting cereal is a baby who is drinking less breast milk or formula, much
higher quality foods that have the nutrients the baby really needs.

As far as the big hungry baby thing goes, I think I'm qualified to speak on
that issue: My 11.5 lb. baby, my 12 lb. baby, and my 13+ lb. baby were
exclusively breastfed until six months or thereabouts. Big babies needing
early solids is a myth.

Some babies show the common readiness signs earlier than others, but no babies
are ready for cereal at 2 months.

Leslie

Leslie wrote:
Naomi Rivkis said:
In general it's too early, but to some extent it depends on the
child.
My mother started feeding me cereal in addition to formula when I
was 2 months old because I was a huge and very hungry baby and no
matter
how much formula I was getting, it wasn't enough. The pediatrician
told her, "The babies don' t ead the books. If you've got a hungry
baby, feed her what makes her stop being hungry."

This was standard advice in those days. My MIL was following the
same advice when she put cereal in my husband's bottle when he was
less than a week old.

I'm pretty sure solids were routinely introduced at 2 months when I was an
infant in 1964. I know I was started on cereal at that time. I was also
weaned directly from breastmilk to whole cow's milk (not formula or even
home-brew formular) at 20 weeks, something we'd *never* consider acceptable
these day (I don't even think people who think it's okay to introduce solids
before 4 months would think it was okay to feed a 5mo whole cow's milk!).

A lifetime of asthma and allergies have been
the result of that poor advice.

Well, to be fair, you can't be *sure* he wouldn't have asthma and allergies
if he hadn't been exposed to cereal and not breastfed; it's only that
statistically speaking, it's more likely. I have asthma and allergies, too,
but so did my father and, frankly, I'm don't believe that avoiding early
solids and cow's milk would have prevented them altogether, though I *do*
think it's possible that they're more severre as a result.

In addition to posing a significant allergy risk, the early
introduction of solids crowds out the good nutrition baby needs. A
baby who is full of slowly digesting cereal is a baby who is
drinking less breast milk or formula, much higher quality foods
that have the nutrients the baby really needs.

This, to me, is the biggest reason for avoiding early solids introduction.
Formula or breastmilk is balanced nutritionally for a baby; a few items of
solid food are not. And since the digestive system of a young baby is very
immature, the likelihood that they are reaping any real nutritional benefit
from solids at all seems pretty low, so feeding them cereal is the rough
equivalent of feeding them ground up treebark--it fills them up and little
else.
--
Be well, Barbara
Mom to Sin (Vernon, 2), Misery (Aurora, 4), and the Rising Son (Julian, 6)

Aurora (in the bathroom with her dad)--"It looks like an elephant, Daddy."
Me (later)--"You should feel flattered."

All opinions expressed in this post are well-reasoned and insightful.
Needless to say, they are not those of my Internet Service Provider, its
other subscribers or lackeys. Anyone who says otherwise is itchin' for a
fight. -- with apologies to Michael Feldman

Barbara said:

Well, to be fair, you can't be *sure* he wouldn't have asthma and allergies
if he hadn't been exposed to cereal and not breastfed; it's only that
statistically speaking, it's more likely.

My reason for believing that this is what caused his asthma is that none of our
kids, all bf exclusively until 6 months (and as you know, continued bf for LONG
after that!) have asthma, or any allergies except for atopic dermatitis which
was outgrown. Wouldn't it be likely that at least one of them would have
inherited the asthma if it were genetic (or if they had a genetic tendency that
was activated by early exposure to allergens)?

Leslie

Leslie wrote:
Barbara said:
Well, to be fair, you can't be *sure* he wouldn't have asthma and
allergies if he hadn't been exposed to cereal and not breastfed;
it's only that statistically speaking, it's more likely.

My reason for believing that this is what caused his asthma is that
none of our kids, all bf exclusively until 6 months (and as you
know, continued bf for LONG after that!) have asthma, or any
allergies except for atopic dermatitis which was outgrown.
Wouldn't it be likely that at least one of them would have
inherited the asthma if it were genetic (or if they had a genetic
tendency that was activated by early exposure to allergens)?

Well, first of all, just because your kids aren't showing any signs of atopy
now doesn't mean you can be *sure* they won't develop atopy later. My sister
never had *any* allergies in childhood; she was healthy as a horse. It was
only in adulthood that she developed a severe allergy to shellfish and
asthma as well. I was always so envious of her when we were younger because
she didn't have the problems I do, but it turns out, she's got them,
too--she just got them later than I did. So, you ain't out of the woods yet,
sorry to say.

Beyond that, as far as I know, neither asthma or allergies are really
"inherited"; both are basically atopic reactions and what you inherit is a
tendency to develop atopic reactions rather than asthma or allergies per se.
Even if *both* parents have asthma or allergies, the kids can still wind up
*not* having them and it's also possible for parents who don't have any
atopic problems of their own to have kids who do. Now, the *likelihood* of
those atopic reactions does seem to increase based on early solids/dairy
exposure, but there's also a fair amount of theorizing that part of the
reason allergies and asthma are on the rise is because we're *too*
clean--children's immune systems don't get built properly in part because
they're not exposed to potential allergens early and often enough to develop
the "right" reaction to them.

I'm not saying your husband's asthma/allergies *weren't* caused by early
solids. But my husband is the poster boy of anti-atopy, and he never
received a drop of breastmilk and, given his age (46), I'm sure he was fed
cereal and other solids at a very early age. So really, you just never know.
--
Be well, Barbara
Mom to Sin (Vernon, 2), Misery (Aurora, 4), and the Rising Son (Julian, 6)

Aurora (in the bathroom with her dad)--"It looks like an elephant, Daddy."
Me (later)--"You should feel flattered."

All opinions expressed in this post are well-reasoned and insightful.
Needless to say, they are not those of my Internet Service Provider, its
other subscribers or lackeys. Anyone who says otherwise is itchin' for a
fight. -- with apologies to Michael Feldman