When to Give Babies Cereal?

Giving cereal to an infant before they are ready can lead to major health problems: constipation up to blacked and perferated bowel. You are taking a great chance. Their stomaches are not able to digest the cereal at this age, only formula and breastmilk which is what leads to the problems. I would highly suggest not giving them cereal anytime before 3 months of age at the earliest. Try increasing the amount of formula or breastmilk they take before they go to bed and throughout the day instead.

1) No, it won't help them sleep
2) the AAP and the WHO advise waiting until 6 months
3) babies' tummies are sensitive, I know you are tired, but it comes with the territory, lots of moms of single babies don't get any more sleep than you do. Don't hurt your poor babies in an attempt to make yourself feel better, this too shall pass and you will look back and hardly remember how sleep deprived you were.

Cereal for your one month old twins is definitely too early. I know that in your situation sleep is hard to come by. Not only are your twins too little to eat cereal but they are also too little to develop a sleep pattern that you are longing for. At the earliest, a three months old baby is able to develop a sleep pattern that allows the baby to sleep through the night. It really has very little to do whether the baby ate more or less or enough before going to bed. I know you have no time right now, but maybe you can go online to this website: http://www.childrenshospital.org/views/june06/sleep.html It is part of Dr. Richard Ferber's website. He is an expert on pediatric sleep issues. You may have to end up buying his book which is wonderful but I think that you can glean enough information from the website for now.

I would take a look at this site before you give your little guys cereal. It's very unsafe & might not even help them sleep through the night at all.

http://www.babycenter.com/404_will-my-baby-sleep-better-i...

A lot of "older"or "seasoned" moms/grandmas highly reccommend this, and they say that's what they did in the old days. Please keep in mind that they didn't use carseats in the old days! Things have changed & we now know more about how babies develop than ever before.

I hope you get some sleep soon...hang in there!

Ask your pediatrician if you should do this. Most infants that are only 4 weeks old are definitely too young to be eating cereal; their immature digestive systems cannot handle it and you might be setting yourself up for more harm than good.

Sleeping longer stretches of time is a neurological issue, not a nutritional issue. At this age, your children NEED to be fed every 3-4 hours. I urge you to be patient and just deal with the lack of sleep. There are way more negatives to premature feeding of cereal to your babies than there are positives for you getting a few more hours of sleep.

Please don't give your babies cereal in a bottle, first of all they are not physically ready to digest, and second of all if you are going to then give it to them on a spoon. However I am giving you some nutritional guidelines and reasoning behind them. I work with infants and mothers to help guide them through this process and babies who are given food or cereal too soon are at a higher risk of allergies as well as other health related issues.

http://www.fns.usda.gov/tn/Resources/feedinginfants-ch2.pdf

please use this resource, I know sleep is important but it will get better and in the long run your children will be better for it

I started my son on cereal at right around a month old. He was constantly hungry and my mom said she thought it would be a good idea to start giving him a little. It was a GREAT idea, all of our lives were much better! When I took him to the doctor at 2 months he asked if he was on cereal yet and I told him yes and he agreed it was the thing to do. Some babies just need more! I have not had any problems resulting from it and he is now a year and a half old.

I have to say I started off with cereal in the bottle right away. My son kept spitting up alot and it was like the formula alone wasn't heavy enough to stay in his stomach. I added some cereal and never had any problems what so ever. I do think it does keep them fuller longer but still expect to wake up b/c most babies do wake up during the night... sometimes they just need attention, diapers changed, many times .. my son just lost his pacifer and once I put it in he would go right back to sleep. Then around 4 months I added the single grain oatmeal instead of the cereal..I know how you feel on the sleep. I work 3rd shift. I get off work at 5am and my husband leaves for work at 6:30. I have a 4 year old and now just turned 1 year old. So I only sleep 2hrs a day at this time. My youngest always has slept really well. He goes to bed b/t 10-11 and gets up at 11:30am... Thats a long time! and then naps too. He is a happy baby and healthy! It could be the cereal.. I have always given it to him from the first week home. Anyway you can always just give it a try.. but once you try they will probably perfer it that way..

Children that young are not able to digest the cereal. It can really cause a lot of problems in children that young. I've done quite a bit of research on this subject and most people say that it doesn't help them sleep any better than a regular bottle. I can totally understand the sleep deprivation and wanting it to end soon. Is there any family you can ask to help out a night or two a week? Or even during the day? That way you could get some sleep. You may even want to consider hiring a sitter to come to the house during the day. There are so many people looking for summer sitting jobs right now. I hope you can figure something out soon! Good Luck!

M.,

Check with your Dr if it is safe. I know there is formula actually mixed WITH cereal for babies that spit up too much so I highly doubt that is causes a digestive breakdown or allergies. But its my opinion.

I believe I introduced cereal to both of my kids at 3 months, for the same reason and they slep from 11 to 5. Could have been the cereal, could have not....

I know how exhausted you can get, I had no idea before having children. I totally feel you and know that you're not alone. My daughter was born in 06 and my son 07 and when I was beggining (they're 11 months appart) to feel like I was getting some sleep, he was born. They're both sleeping through the night now, 21 months and 10 months, but we're starting over in Nov and although we're very happy we're DREADING the endless nights, very very tough for me ;)

I put a small amount of cereal in my boys' bottles when they were very young to get them to sleep through the night and I don't think it really made a difference. They still woke up every few hours. They liked it, but it didn't help my tired self out much!