Solid food for Aimee?

I’m now in dilemma on introducing solid food to Aimee.

Since last 2 weeks, she keeps wake up for nursing about 6-7 times at night. She even gets cranky before I nurse her every time. This is not normal for her since she usually have only about 3-4 nursing at night.

I have a few conversations with hubby about this. One of his staff has a baby about Aimee’s age. His staff had started to give solid food to her baby since she entered her 3 months, which I think was too early.

After experiencing the sleep-deprived, I’ve searched info from few websites. One of the best website that I feel very useful is this one.

Here are the cues that the websites list down that you can consider to show whether your baby is ready for solid food or not. Let’s check:

1. Head control – check!
Your baby needs to be able to keep his head in a steady, upright position.

2. Losing the "extrusion reflex" – Not really…
To keep solid food in his mouth and then swallow it, your baby needs to stop using his tongue to push food out of his mouth.

3. Sitting well when supported – check!
Even if he's not quite ready for a highchair, your baby needs to be able to sit upright to swallow well.

4. Chewing motions – check!
Your baby's mouth and tongue develop in sync with his digestive system. To start solids, he should be able to move food to the back of his mouth and swallow. As he learns to swallow efficiently, you may notice less drooling. He may also be teething around the same time.

5. Significant weight gain – check! Aimee now entering her 5 months in 1 week time from now. Her 4 months weight=7kg
Most babies are ready to eat solids when they've doubled their birth weight (or weigh about 15 pounds/6.8kg) and are at least 4 months old.

6. Growing appetite – Think so…
He seems hungry — even with eight to ten feedings of breast milk or formula a day.

7. Curiosity about what you're eating – check!
Your baby may begin eyeing your bowl of rice or reaching for a forkful of fettuccine as it travels from your plate to your mouth.

From the lists, Aimee had score 5. So, I guess she is ready for a solid food.

So, since last Thursday, I have introduced to Aimee this Nestle rice cereal.



She seems to be ok with it and starts to have good sleep at night, which of course very beneficial for three of us.

Though I had decided to give Aimee solid food, I still have this feeling of guiltiness. I’m not sure whether my decision on introducing the solid food to Aimee at her almost 5 month’s age is ok or not. If it is not, I feel so sorry for her for pushing her digestive system to work extra harder to process the rice cereal :(

To readers out there who have experience on this, could you please share yours? Am I choosing a wise decision?