To Answer Your Question...

I love you ladies (all of you, but particularly those who commented on my last post - both here and on FB). You are my people, lol! There's no education necessary for you all about the benefits of doing BLW, because you are already doing/have done it!

Lechelle asked me a question that I wanted to answer. Her question - and I paraphrase - is "do people really do things another way than BLW?!". And the short answer is absolutely yes, they do. Even more so, many professionals - pediatricians and WIC for starters - recommend it. WIC has very specific recommendations about what foods to start when (it used to be yellow veggies, followed by green ones, then fruits, etc... Now, I think, they start with meat, then go to veggies then fruits, with fewer specifiers about colors) and only covers baby food on its vouchers.

It's so interesting to me that the very families who would most benefit from the cost savings associated with feeding babies what you're eating (those who qualify for WIC) are so heavily encouraged to give them manufactured baby food which is infinitely more expensive. I get that many of those families may not have the best nutrition themselves, but, if we spent more time providing them with the information and resources needed to eat healthy themselves, then it wouldn't be an issue. Don't even get me started about how WIC is enabling, even encouraging formula feeding. That's another of my soapboxes entirely.

Confession time - I have been one of those professionals eschewing the importance of feeding babies only baby food, and in that very specific order. I bought what they were selling hook, line, and sinker. For al ong time I didn't take the time to research the reasons behind the recommendations (um, there isn't much). And I know if I (who is a bit obsessed about that kind of thing) don't ask for explanations, many people aren't going to either. While I knew I wouldn't ever be that anal about it all ever again, I didn't expect to cut out baby food completely. If I hadn't totally fallen into that BLW book, I don't know that we would have come into it on our own.

Today's lesson - it's so important to find your tribe, the group of people who truly gets you. These are the people who you don't have to explain yourself to. They're the ones who know where you're coming from. Or if they don't, they simply accept you anyway. They are a blessing. Even if you never meet some of them in the real world.