formula making babies fat?

[Sarah10]

lol fair enough

 

[special_kala]

I was FF and have always been slim but my OH was BF and hes overweight

My SIL was BF and is super skinny but my sister who was FF is fat



I do wonder whether formula fed kids are more likely to be overweight then BF kids because BF mothers are more likely to be aware of healthy eating and pass that on to their kids.

I am in no waying saying if your FF you will feed your kids crap. River is FF and she has no sweets etc

 

[OmarsMum]

A friend of mine FF all her 4 kids & they'r all skinny. It has to do with their genes. They eat non stop & they dont add weight. Their mom is also skinny & eats all types of crap. & they will not get obese while growing up, they'r already 24, 22, 9 & 4 yrs old.

If I drink an extra glass of water, I add weight, & I was exclusively BF for 2 years. Since I was 21, I wear size UK 6, but I watch out what I'm eating like crazy. I'm obsessed about gaining weight again. I was an obese teenager, & I dont want to get back there.

Dragon Fly, we all know the benefits of BFing, but a concerned FFing mom posted this thread, she needs assurance & this is why she posted this thread in the FFing section instead of the debate section. She needs assurance from FFing moms with similar situation.

20-30 yrs back when u & me were kids, parents were not that educated when it comes to feeding their children. It's different now. We'r more educated. I was BF as it was the norm in my country not because my mom was seeking what's better. All those she knew BF. Chocolates & cakes were food for us. Everything we had were deeply fried. We used to drink juice instead of water. Those factors made us obese.

ETA: if an adult or a child who eats healthy a excercises regulary/ active is still over weight there is definately sth wrong with him/her & need to do some check ups at it's not something normal. I find it really sad to blame FFing instead trying to change bad eating habits & overall life style

 

[sophxx]

breast feeding mums dont always eat healthy or teach there kids healthy eating theres 2 mums that i know one drinks ints and eats cream cakes and lots of rubbish no meat or fish and the other drinks nothing but hot orange and eats junk food but there made to look fab cos they breast feed

 

[Dragonfly]

Sorry everyone else was giving opinions maybe because mines different I shouldnt post at all. Seems fair and all dosnt it. So many in here said they where ff and are not fat I say I am and I get it.Sigh.

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

I think there area million and one reasons that a child becomes obese and not breastfeeding is possibly one factor, but because you cannot have two clones of a child, FF one and BF another, with every single other factor being equal, you can't know for sure. There may well be a link between not BFing and obesity but maybe because the other factors also linked to obesity are more commonly seen in children who were not breastfed.

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

Sorry everyone else was giving opinions maybe because mines different I shouldnt post at all. Seems fair and all dosnt it. So many in here said they where ff and are not fat I say I am and I get it.Sigh.

I understand what you were getting at and I think it is completely fair for you to say what you said.
Just because so and so was FF and is slim, carries no more or less weight to the discussion than so and so being FF and overweight!
All of these type posts are kind of irrelevant to the issue at hand but everyone has the right to share their experiences.

 

[HLS]

Thats nothing new,.... I remember hearing this years back. Rubbish.

 

[aob1013]

My brother and I were FF and my brother was really overweight as a baby, my Mum said it was because it's too easy to put too much powder in or something x

 

[Janidog]

I was formula fed and i am fat so is everyone I know that was formula fed.

Do you go around asking fat people if they are FF or BF then cause i certainly don't think just cause you're fat that you must have been FF, i assume fat people are fat because they have a very poor diet and don't exercise

 

[freckleonear]

There are so many factors that can affect obesity. Metabolic programming during early life, unhealthy diet, lifestyle, activity, emotional factors, poor sleep habits, hormones, medications, genetics, even race! Whilst formula definitely increases the risk, there are so many other things you can do to reduce that risk. It's highly unlikely that your child will be obese just because they were formula fed. The risk is a tiny bit higher but it's unlikely to happen unless combined with other risk factors.

 

[Dragonfly]

I was formula fed and i am fat so is everyone I know that was formula fed.

Do you go around asking fat people if they are FF or BF then cause i certainly don't think just cause you're fat that you must have been FF, i assume fat people are fat because they have a very poor diet and don't exercise

No just so happens people inform me when they find out I dont formula feed that they where formula fed. My diet wasnt great when I was a child either my mum though pizza and chips was a great dinner but I was a slim child just not now. There are other factors in it to I dont see why poeple should leap on me because I am fat and formula fed where as others are saying they arnt.

 

[Szaffi]

It does state that BF'ing can help to later prevent obesity. I've read lots of info on benefits of BF'ing and that was one that was medically studied.

I was formula fed and have had weight issues my whole life...but I'm not really blaming it on being FF either. There were a lot of contributing factors to my weight issues. I haven't really gone into depth on FF, so I don't know much about it causing weight gain etc..

I've heard about it too. I was also FFed and also had weight issues and I really need to struggle to keep weight off - losing it is a nightmare. I'm not big (size 12 - so not really skinny either) but I do have to work super-hard to keep at this weight - need diet + excercise and hardly any desserts and such. It was hard for me as a kid too - I had a healthy appetite, but even then I was always under feeding control, while other kids could eat as much as they wanted and still were skinny.

I don't know if FF was a factor or it's bad luck and bad genes (noone in my family has this issue ), my brother was BF until 3 months, and he never had any problems. Just saying that while it's true that anyone can control their weights, for some people, genetics or whatever make it a much harder job and a constant struggle. For me, it was actually the biggest factor in deciding to BF DD.

 

[Jo]

I think if you carry on giving formula as a drink 3/4 times a day alongside 3 meals a day, then yeah baby/child has a good chance of being overweight as the calorie intake will be massive.

max has 3 meals a day and 3 bottles of formula, so he's gonna be overweight?

this is why i worry because theres no guidelines about amounts when it comes to weaning!

also, i purposely put this in the FF section not baby club so we wouldnt have the bf vs ff argument. so plz dont turn it into a debate that gets deleted. to tell me that bf will reduce the chance of obesity for my child is a bit silly i think considering he is already ff and is nearly 6 months old (just didnt find that very helpful thats all)

No sweetie of course not.
at 6 months etc.. yes they still need that, that is the guidlines, I guess I was thinking more of "proper meals" not baby type meals.
does that make sense?
I'm thinking more along the 1+ mark when they don't need milk for their food, but have really proper meals, you know the full meat and 2 veg thing with mash and yorkshire puds.

 

[trumpetbum]

This was also a study about calorie and vitamin enriched formula versus standard formula (not breast milk). So to say 'formula milk can make your child obese by the age of 5' is not a fair headline. It should be 'enriched formula could make your baby obese etc'. As the finding suggested that babies feed standard formula would not see this much of a rise. So the headline is unfair and might worry some mothers. The research is also not comparing breast fed babies to formula fed babies so it is an unfair comparison to then bring up breast fed babies as this was not what the original study was about. All in all a poorly worded article but then what do you expect from the Daily Mail?

Exactly.

 

[aliss]

Actually, I think it makes sense that FF use can be an indicator of future obesity. All anecdotes aside (and I'm an FF mom), people who are more overly concerned with nutrition may be less likely to choose formula or formula supplementation for their children vs breast milk. Those mothers can carry those values out throughout childhood affecting future obesity risk. It's not much different than economic or social factors affecting future obesity. There ARE general trends affecting future obesity *risk* that we can't ignore, no matter if so-and-so was skinny but FF or fat but BF.

Anyways I don't care, my son will be active, we model healthy habits. That has a far greater impact.

 

[Jo]

I was formula fed and i am fat so is everyone I know that was formula fed.

Do you go around asking fat people if they are FF or BF then cause i certainly don't think just cause you're fat that you must have been FF, i assume fat people are fat because they have a very poor diet and don't exercise

No just so happens people inform me when they find out I dont formula feed that they where formula fed. My diet wasnt great when I was a child either my mum though pizza and chips was a great dinner but I was a slim child just not now. There are other factors in it to I dont see why poeple should leap on me because I am fat and formula fed where as others are saying they arnt.

Seriously is there any need for a row?

BF or FF you are always gonna get fat babies/kids/adult?
I certainly don't think that FF plants a "fat" gene, but I could be wrong.

Your going to be fat if you eat crap 9/10 times (although some people are thin as rakes and can eat anything)

You are going to be thin if you eat salad and go running.

Again this should not turn into a BF v's FF debate.

 

[Jo]

Actually, I think it makes sense that FF use can be an indicator of future obesity. All anecdotes aside (and I'm an FF mom), people who are more overly concerned with nutrition may be less likely to choose formula or formula supplementation for their children vs breast milk. Those mothers can carry those values out throughout childhood affecting future obesity risk. It's not much different than economic or social factors affecting future obesity. There ARE general trends affecting future obesity *risk* that we can't ignore, no matter if so-and-so was skinny but FF or fat but BF.

Anyways I don't care, my son will be active, we model healthy habits. That has a far greater impact.

Hmm I kind of agree with you there.

I have always said though when these things crop up time and time again, that a milk feed is such a small part of a child being fed, It is what you do after the milk has stopped that is of great importance.

No matter which way fed BF or FF you feed your baby/child rubbish, greasy stodgy stuff all the time problems are going to occur later in life.

 

[Lara310809]

I wouldn't worry about it at all - in my opinion its the parents that make the children overweight and not the formula.

I assume they are talking about formulas like hungrier baby formula

I used to think this too, but also you have hungrier babies, and they just want more. I demand feed my LO, but she just so happens to have a very small appetite, so she's not overweight at all. She's actually below average. They say that fatter babies are overfed, but have you ever tried to force feed a baby? I have, when my LO was "supposed" to be on 35oz per day (according to the formula pack) and was only taking 15oz. Force feeding isn't a pretty sight, and TBH you're impressive if you can make a baby eat when they don't want to. I never managed to get more than an ounce in her if she didn't want it, so I don't think it's possible to feed a baby unless they want it.

But had she been a hungrier baby, I would have fed her what she was crying for. I don't believe in denying a baby the food it's asking for. Besides, most kids will lose the weight once they become active.

At the end of the day, if your HV isn't worried, you shoudln't be worried about your LO's weight either.

 

[stephx]

Personally- i think its a load of rubbish! Whatever milk you feed your baby, as long as they have a healthy solids diet and excerise, chances are they wont become overweight!

xx