Sleeping & food & swaddling @ 6 months

[mordwen]

Our angel is now 6.5 months old. She's started on solids - baby-led, she only eats what she can grab and shove into her mouth and she loves it. We're having a tough time trying to work out how this fits in with her day, like when to breastfeed and so on. Some books say just beforehand, some say an hour before. She's refluxing a lot less than she

Comments

[wholuvsya]

your icon is SO cute :P

How long have you been feeding her solids? that many foods seem like a lot at only 6.5 months BUT each child is different. Yes it could be gas disrupting her sleep, or it could be a major growth spurt/developmental growth spurt happening. My little ones never wanted to be swaddled so I'm no help there. As for nursing and solids, I always nursed before solids AND after to be sure that she was getting what she needed; they should only be eating about a tablespoon of solids and still getting their primary needs fed by breastmilk. Good luck!

[mordwen]

She started grabbing my food and licking it at about 5 months. I've really only been offering her sticks of her own steamed vegies for about three weeks. She eats maybe four little sticks of vegies at a sitting, maybe 4cm long (an inch-and-a-half?) and pretty thin. And if she's had a big breastmilk feed before, she'll only eat one or two or maybe play with them and throw them all on the floor!

I know the food is more about learning to eat and starting the gut closure than about nutrition. In fact, I wrote a long post on it at my blog: http://modernmama.world-changer.org/2009/07/first-foods/ (which, looking at the date, means she's actually been eating solids for more like four weeks now, although the pieces then were *tiny*).

[wholuvsya]

that's a great article; I'd never heard the theory that the gut closes with the introduction of solids!

[mordwen]

Thanks! I hadn't either, before I started researching it!

[katesmash]

Our babies are extremely physical AND space hogs, so neither really took much to swaddling, so I can't really help you there. It sounds like you're at a sleep regression: sleep disturbances linked to growth spurts. Some people insist that the introduction of solids also starts a regression

[mybabythomas]

I transitioned both of my kids from a swaddle to a baby sleeping-bag. They were much younger than that, but there's no reason why you can't introduce a baby sleeping-bag at 6 months. I use the Grobag brand, it's a British brand, I don't know if it's available internationally.

Yes it could be food-related. Not necessarily an allergy though. My daughter couldn't handle sweet potatoes or bananas till she was closer to a year old, they gave her tummy aches and made her constipated. I would stick with pumpkin, carrot and pear (my daughter was fine with those three foods anyway) and see if things improve.

She's far too young to start cutting out naps. If she's tired she's tired, and should be allowed to sleep. If she was napping for more than about 3.5 hours a day then I might consider restricting naps, but I wouldn't cut it back further than that.

[mordwen]

Thanks for that. I'll try cutting back to those foods for a little and see what happens.

And that's my instinct on the naps too, I just wondered since I'd read other people talking about it. Thanks for the encouragement.

[wait]

A good rule of thumb is to introduce one new food every two weeks. It really does take that long to see any allergies or reactions.

At 6.5 months, they are eating to learn about new foods, not to get any significant nutrition. And if you think about the first foods, they tend to be sweet, but not have many calories. Its entirely possible that she's waking up because she's hungry. She's filled her tummy with things other than breastmilk during the day.

[mordwen]

Thanks! 8^)