Adventures in Baby-Led Weaning: First Foods

It's happening. What we parents dread from the very moment we see those two lines on our home pregnancy test. The one thing we wish we never have to face but we know is as inevitable as the rotation of the earth around the sun...

My little boy is growing up.

It feels like he was tiny and squishy and helpless only yesterday. Where did this active, expressive, curious little guy come from? And it feels like only yesterday I was plastered to the couch with a tiny person attached to my breast for hours on end. Now I'm lucky if I can get him to nurse for five minutes...total. And he's begun the journey that will eventually lead to him weaning off the breast entirely (although that will be a slow and gradual process, and doesn't look like it will happen anytime soon).

He's started eating solid foods.

Adventures in Baby-Led Weaning: Introduction

Dominic is approaching the six-month mark. That magical age when he begins the journey into the world of solid foods. The beginning of the end of our breastfeeding relationship (more on that). Time to begin replacing his feedings of nutrient dense breast milk with nutritionally void, iron-fortified rice cereal!

Wait a minute. That doesn't make sense.

Rice cereal, like all refined carbohydrates, breaks down into sugar in the body, raising blood sugar and insulin levels. Chronic high levels of insulin contribute to obesity and diabetes. Not to mention young babies lack intestinal amylase, the enzyme required for the proper digestion of grains. So we probably won't be stocking up on Gerber rice cereal, or any baby cereal for that matter. Unfortunately just about every pediatrician and well-meaning grandparent in the country advise rice cereal as the first food introduced to an infant, sometimes as early as two months. The only reason I can imagine for this is that rice cereal is the least likely food to cause an allergic reaction and/or the mistaken notion that after six months (or two months) milk (whether breast milk or formula) isn't enough to sustain a growing baby.

The latter is simply nonsense, of course. But enough about that.

I've had a lot of time to think about how to start Dom onto solid foods. Before he was born I bought Cooking for Baby, a cookbook full of wholesome recipes and tips for starting solids. We knew right from the beginning that we didn't want to feed him commercial baby food. It's full of preservatives and added sugar and the organic baby food requires a small loan to purchase enough for the first three months. So we planned on making our own purees from foods we regularly eat (flavors he would have likely been exposed to through my breast milk). Sure, it's a little extra work, but it seemed worth it.

I didn't take into account how much of a lazy mom I am.

Yes, lazy. Why? Let's review my parenting decisions over the past six months:

• Breastfeeding: No bottles to wash, no powder to measure, no cans to open, highly portable, always the right temperature, and (after the initial 2-3 months) so easy. Definitely lazy.
• Co-sleeping: I don't have to get up out of bed when Dom wakes in the night, no worrying about waking him up to put him down in a crib, no need to sleep train. The ultimate in laziness.
• Babywearing: No need to lug a stroller or car seat around (those bucket seats are heavy!).
• Cloth-diapering: OK this one is admittedly more work than disposables, but I don't have to go out and buy diapers when I run out, so it's kind of lazy.

There are a few others that are slightly more controversial, so I'll leave them for another post. But you get the picture. So why on earth did I think that I possessed the motivation required to not only prepare separate meals for Dom, but also to puree, label, date, and freeze the individual portions for later use?

Luckily for me I soon discovered baby-led weaning. No purees, no cereals, no "baby food". Just give them table food and let them at it. Perfect!

Obviously, there are guidelines. You can't hand your kid a bag of Fritos and let them go to town. And you probably want to avoid peanuts and honey for the first year. But the essential principle still holds true. Babies can feed themselves actual food around six months (or later depending on the child). Nutrient content is important, of course, but he still receives all the calories and nutrients he needs through breast milk, so no need to obsess over whether he's "getting enough" (had to obsess enough about that in the first weeks of breastfeeding). We can focus on letting him try a wide range of flavors and textures without pressure. It's the perfect solution for us!

First, I should explain the use of the word "weaning" in this context. This method of infant feeding is based on a book by the same title published in the UK, so the word means something slightly different than what we in the US consider weaning. Here it means the cessation of breastfeeding, but in the UK it means the introduction of solid foods (so the cessation of exclusive breastfeeding). So we're not talking about the end of the breastfeeding relationship, although starting solids does signal the beginning of such a process, as solid foods will eventually start to replace breast milk as the child grows.

So how do we know when he's ready to start rubbing mashed potatoes into his hair? Here are some of the signs to look for:

• Your baby shows interest in food and family meal times.
• Your baby can sit without support.
• Your baby has lost the tongue-thrust reflex (pushing solid foods out of the front of the mouth).
• Your baby is ready and willing to chew (though he may not have many teeth).
• Your baby can pick up items with the thumb and forefinger (pincer grasp) as opposed to using the whole hand (palmar grasp).

The last one is debatable, I think. It's sufficient if he can grasp an object accurately and bring it to his mouth. Pincer grasp is more important for smaller bits of food, like peas. Dominic is already showing some, but not all of these signs. He becomes transfixed on our actions whenever we sit down to eat, has begun imitating the way we chew, and can grab fairly accurately. I'm not sure if he's lost the tongue-thrust reflex entirely and he can't sit up unassisted yet, so he probably won't be delving into a plate of spaghetti the day he turns six months (this coming Thursday), but I'm sure it's not far off.

It's a fairly relaxed approach to starting solids and quite different from the way most of us are accustomed to feeding babies. The basic principles of this approach are:

• At the start of the process the baby is allowed to reject food, and it may be offered again at a later date.
• The child is allowed to decide how much he wants to eat. No "fill-ups" are to be offered at the end of the meal with a spoon.
• The meals should not be hurried.
• Sips of water are offered with meals.
• Initially, soft fruits and vegetables are given. Harder foods are lightly cooked to make them soft enough to chew on even with bare gums.
• Foods with clear danger, such as peanuts, are not offered.
• Non-finger-foods, such as oatmeal and yoghurt, may be offered with a spoon so baby can learn to self-feed with a spoon.

Remember, milk is still the main source of nutrition, so solid foods are offered more for exploration than for nourishment. Food before one, just for fun!

As Dominic approaches this new stage in his development, I plan to chronicle our experiences with this method in a series of posts (including pictures). So look forward to some sloppy shenanigans in the weeks to come!

Mothering, Feelings, and Great Expectations

I remember taking the Myers-Briggs Personality Type Indicator test during high school at our diocesan Christian Leadership Institute one summer. I think back then I figured myself out to an ENFJ, because all the people I most wanted to be like were ENFPs or ENFJs. I took the same test a year later as a member of the Maine Diocesan Council of Catholic Youth and came out as an INFJ, because both of my best friends at the time were INs. Is there a point to all this? Yes, yes there is. I'm simply trying to show how easily manipulated such a test can be. And how little stock I actually put into its results. Which is why I was surprised when this quiz, based on the Myers-Briggs Types, actually got it right.

The 'Know Thyself' Mother

Sensitive and family-focused, the INFJ mother looks for and encourages the unique potential of each child. Self-knowledge may be her byword. Her aim is to help each child develop a sense of identity and cultivate personal growth. In fact, she may value the mothering experience as a catalyst to her own personal growth and self-knowledge.

The INFJ mother spends time observing and understanding each child. She is drawn to intimate conversations and seeks a free exchange of feelings and thoughts.

Sympathetic and accommodating, the INFJ mother strives to meet the important yet sometimes conflicting needs of each family member in harmonious and creative ways.

She is conscientious and intense as well. Probably no one takes life and child-raising more seriously than the INFJ. She approaches mothering as a profession requiring her best self.

It gets really eerie when it starts discussing the particular struggles this personality type may have to contend with:

Details. The INFJ mother may gravitate toward the idea of getting the family and household organized and in order, only to exhaust herself with nitty-gritty follow through. Regular baths for small children, weekly laundry, daily meals, picking up clutter, and ongoing repairs can be overwhelming.

Real life vs. the ideal. Because she lives with an ideal in her mind, the INFJ mother often has unrealistic expectations of herself and others. She may feel inadequate and critical of herself when reality falls short of her ideal.

Yes and YES!

I am SO like this! I have this marvelous picture of a perfectly organized household that never seems to come to fruition for one reason of another. I'll be all gung-ho and rarin' to go about my FlyLady routine one day and just go crazy organizing, folding, putting away, washing, drying, etc, etc. Two or three days go by and my laundry baskets are all full of clean laundry I have yet to put away and the dirty clothes are just piling up on the floor around them, I can't see my counter top or the inside of my sink for all the dishes, and the mail is spilling over onto the floor. Meal planning? Maybe. If I get to it. Ugh!

It's that ideal, of the perfectly organized household, that ends up making me feel inadequate. As if not being June Cleaver makes me suck as a human being. Don't worry, the self-loathing doesn't last long. But it rears its ugly head on occasion, no denyin' that.

So what's a mom to do when faced with such difficulties?

How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

h/t to Just West of Crunchy.

You're Not In Kansas Anymore

Fun Factiod: I've actually never been to Kansas. Which is probably a good thing because I'm deathly afraid of tornadoes. And yes, I do realize that Kentucky sees the occasional tornado (my town tests the alarms weekly...to my chagrin), but Kansas is so much worse! Didn't you watch Twister?

Anyway, you may or may not have noticed that some things have changed around here (and if you are in the "have-not" camp, I highly suggest corrective lenses and/or a literacy course), most notably the very blog title itself. I realized, after typing my own blog url into the address bar several times, that "Chestertonian Paradox" was just too damn difficult to spell, and probably even harder to remember. That and I think it's probably a bad sign when one has to dedicate an entire page to the explanation of said blog title. I decided I needed something simple and easy to remember (and easy to spell!)

I chose "Home-Grown Catholic" because A) I'm Catholic, B) I was raised Catholic (or you could say "home-grown"), C) I was homeschooled and plan on homeschooling my kids, and D) part of living naturally and simply is either growing your own food or buying locally.

I also altered the design to reflect these changes (that and Blogger has some cool new features I wanted to play with *nerd*).

I know this doesn't really count as a blog post, but hey, it's something! Look forward to some new posts soon, though!

Just Roll With It

I so relate to this post about getting nothing done when you have a baby. It's been a while since I've had the time (and both hands) to sit down and type out a blog post, let alone do the laundry, make dinner, take a shower, wash the dishes, clean the bathroom, sweep the floor, organize the bookshelves, sort through baby clothes, solve world hunger, save the whales. etc, etc.

People, especially those with kids, always have some words of advice to give you when you're pregnant with your first child.

"Your life will never be the same again!"

"Be prepared for some sleepless nights!"

"I hope you're ready!"

My response to these people was always, "Oh yes, we're prepared. We're looking forward to it!" (not referring to the sleepless nights, mind you, as we planned to co-sleep from the beginning). I heard what they were saying, but I never really reflected on what kind of impact this kid would have on our lives until he was born. I was prepared (some would say over-prepared) for my labor and delivery, but what I was not prepared for was the near-complete loss of my independence once he was born.

Don't get me wrong, I love being a mom. There are significant rewards to this lifestyle (the contentedly sleeping child I'm currently "wearing" being one of them...and OMG he just let out a sigh...HOW CUTE IS THAT?!? Ahem...anyway...) However, I have to admit, in all honesty, that there are times when I miss being able to veg out and watch Jane Austen movies all day, or bake whenever I feel the inclination. Nowadays I have to run all my activities by a certain small person, who does not much like my attention being focused on anything but him. He's gotten better at entertaining himself in his bouncer while I do simple tasks like make myself breakfast, throw the laundry in the washer, or take a quick shower, but for the most part, he needs my full attention.

It got better once I became accustomed to babywearing. I learned how to wear him on my back so I could accomplish some things while still fulfilling his need for semi-constant contact. It took a month or so to surrender myself to this new life. I'm not just living for me now. This little guy is depending on me, as his primary caregiver, for all of his physical and emotional needs. The dishes will just have to wait.

Speaking of which, I think someone needs a diaper change...