"it is up to the baby to determine when that middle arrives; some are ready
earlier
than six months, some later...i don't advise delaying solids when the baby
indicates
readiness."

Right as usual, Carol - but the big trick in this is to teach parents that
"when the baby indicates readiness" does not mean whenever you can stuff
something other than a breast or bottle into his mouth. My impression is
that for many women, having their babies start on solids is a big status
thing - they seem to think that having a baby who "needs" (and that is
invariably how they describe it) solids early is a sign that their baby is
"advanced" or extra intelligent or unusually robust. This may be related to
socioeconomic factors - it has been mainly among the mothers on WIC that
I've observed this.

Hard to discourage early food additions when WIC automatically issues
vouchers for cereal at 4 months and juice at 6 months! And even more
difficult to teach about *how* babies show their readiness for foods other
than breastmilk when parents are getting pressure to shove food into those
adorable little mouths - often starting as soon as the first week home from
hospital. In our area, the doctors invariably "give permission" for adding
cereal to the bottle and adding solids way, way early; my hunch is that
they've just given up on this one, because they've found through long
experience that this is an area where their influence is less important than
a woman's peeer group or family standards. (And then the moms are calling up
saying "oh, he has diarrhea" or "oh, she's allergic to orange juice - when I
gave it to her on her 2-wk birthday she got diaper rash", and when you
suggest that babies really can't handle these foods at such a young age they
tell you "but he wants it! He won't go to sleep without his mashed
potatoes".)

Cathy Bargar RN IBCLC Ithaca NY

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