priority is most important to you.
Is There Really a Difference?
Responding promptly to a newborn’s hunger cue is referred to as demand-
feeding. Responding promptly to a newborn’s hunger cue is also a central
part of Parent Directed Feeding. Yet, in reality both approaches are
parent-directed. Parents always decide when a baby will eat regardless of
what you call it. But there is a subtle and significant difference between
the two approaches. Demand-feeding’s more standard, moderate
approach as used by Julia and Barbara introduced in chapter two,
instructs parents to feed their babies every two to three hours based on
the baby’s hunger cues: putting fist toward mouth, making sucking
motions, whimpering. (Crying is a late signal of hunger.) On the other
hand, PDF parents will feed their babies on a flexible routine every two to
three hours based on the same hunger cues and parental assessment. In
terms of nutrition, both methods are the same. But as demonstrated
earlier, the physiological outcomes are drastically different because one
method is child led and the other parent directed.
As stated earlier, Babywise offers an alternative to hyper-scheduling
at one extreme, and AP style of demand feeding at the other. It has
enough structure to bring security and order to your baby’s world, yet it
has enough flexibility to give mom freedom to respond to any need at
anytime. Some moms rely too heavily on watching and waiting for their
baby to signal a desire to nurse. They may be discouraged when their
babies nurse so irregularly or want to nurse every hour. These mothers
worry about their baby’s getting enough food. The expectation that a baby
should nurse at every whimper usually leads to frustration for both
mother and child and may be the single greatest reason mothers give up
breast-feeding so quickly. It is the predictability within the routine that
helps PDF moms pick up any deviation from the norm.
“Just listen to your baby’s cues” is common breast-feeding advice and
good advice if you know what to listen and look for. Babies provide
parents two sets of response cues. Those that are immediate need cues,