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Subject:
From:
Jack Newman <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Lactation Information and Discussion <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Fri, 21 Feb 1997 07:57:47 -0500
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I have a easy way to introduce solids to a baby.  It depends on the
baby's cues rather than any set time or way.

Now we all know that one of the almost mystical truths about babies is
that it doesn't matter how long they usually sleep--they always wake up
just as the mother (not the father) sits down to eat and is about to put
a fork of food in her mouth.  Thus babies are often sitting on their
mothers when the mother is eating.

Around four months of age, the baby starts eyeing the food and becoming
very interested.  By 5 to 6 months, the baby is trying to grab the food.

My advice to mothers?  When the baby is trying to grab the food give it
to him.  Make sure it's not too hot and then let him have it.  It does
not matter, really, what it is (peanuts, blazingly spicy curry and some
others excepted).  If the first thing he grabs is the steak, cut off a
slice and let him gnaw on it, teeth or no teeth.  There is no reason to
limit solids to one food per week, and the order--cereal, vegetables,
fruit, meat--is absurd, in my view.

The rules of a little at a time, starting with rice cereal, one food a
week were developed when physicians (wrongly) were advising mothers to
start solids at 2 to 6 weeks of age.  By the time they were 6 months of
age they were eating sushi and steak tartar.

How do we know anyways that the "reaction" the baby had was an allergic
reaction?  Because he gets a red rash around his mouth?  How many
children are not allowed to eat strawberries because the juice irritated
the skin around their mouthes (not an allergic reaction)?  Poor kids.

No research to back this up.  I feel this is just common sense.  The
mothers in Africa where I worked often didn't know the age of the babies
(born before the rains came, born during harvest, was about it).  But
with their babies on their backs, preparing food, they just handed it
back when the baby became all excited.

Jack Newman, MD, FRCPC

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