Baby Led Weaning, Breastfeeding Q and when did bubs start "eating"/swallowing more?

Hello,
My DS is 7 months today and we have been doing BLW since he turned 6 months. We started him off on spoon feeding from 5 months but he was refusing the spoon due to teething just before 6 months.
He has been liking and tasting foods, practicing bringing hit to his mouth and sometimes he does swallow bits. But not nearly like he was truly eating.

I know the food is just for fun till one, so pls no nasty comments, but I am just interested to see when we can expect DS to start eating more and did your LO start eating more, when did it click?

Also, I am still breastfeeding and he is on 7 BFs in a 24 hr period atm. Do I start nightweaning now or wait a bit longer till he eats more? Im really confused. There is not a lot of info out there when it comes to BLW and BF. I know spoonfed babies drop milk feeds once they eat a decent amount. DS wakes up once or twice a night for a feed/cramps in his tummy I can only settle him with a BF.

Also when he is 12 months I will need to return to work and he will be in daycare for 4 days a week. I was hoping to BF till at least 12 months but possibly longer. Do you think he will have dropped some milk feed by then?

any advice for those mums who did BLW?

TIA

Hi there

We found BLW to be fantastic with both of our children.

Bubs let us know each time when they wanted to feed less from me (both in terms of amount and also in terms of frequency) so we didn't "wean" in this way - but we were intentional about generally offering food before feeding from me, or EBM.

That way, they weren't experimenting with food when already full, if that make sense.

In terms of actually swallowing more etc, it would have been around 12 months before that started happening. Obviously they were eating and swallowing before then, but it really was just experimentation.

The main thing for our children seemed to be them understanding the connection between food and the feeling of fullness - and that took around 5-6 months. Until then, they were just exploring, and learning to love the taste and sensation of food.

It was a lot of fun. A huge amount of mess and wasted food, but they are now well and truly set up for good eating habits, which makes it worth it :) And they've always been able to feed themselves, and try new things a lot more readily than what I've seen from others.

Good luck!

We just offered Spock a small plate of whatever we were eating from 6months. Some days she wouldn't even look at it, other days she would play with it, others she would put it in her mouth. It was until 12-13 months we would say she actually ate. As in had some full mouthfuls and swallowed. The only time we fed her was if she was having yogurt or custard and I didn't want to clean up the mess, if we were eating outside or I knew she would be having a bath straight away I would just let her go for it.
She was still very much full time bf too. I didn't night wean until 16ish months, and only because she was still waking ever 2hours, and this was my last resort for more sleep. She is now 2y4m and has a few bf a week. But is a fantastic eater, she will try everything we offer to her, she will say if she doesn't like it and refuse to eat it, but will always try first.

And yeah, we just gave them a small plate of "fingers" of whatever we were eating, and both children sel weaned around 10 months.

Hi,
When breastfeeding, there's no need to actively cut feeds out as babies will naturally adjust their milk intake as they take more food. At this age, as you say, it's the milk that's more important to nutrition, so if you were to actively cut breastmilk from the diet, it should be replaced with formula. As baby approaches 12 months, this will change.
As for when.... well it depends on the baby. 7 months is still quite young, you're likely to see a significant change in the next 2-3 months.

Babies do reduce their milk intake naturally, though they don't necessarily reduce the number of feeds (just take less per feed). However, after 12 months you can cut feeds without having to introduce formula if your baby is eating food.

ETA - my son was 'eating' by 8 months, my daughter about 10 months.