Sugar Water Question

Here is a strange question for you mommies!

I have begun working with a brand new mommy. The baby is 3 weeks old now and some people are telling her that she should give the baby sugar water in between feedings. l sort of remember giving this to older babies when they were breastfeeding and mommy wasn't home. But l have no idea how to advise this new mommy on this subject. This baby is feeding very well!

So what are your ideas about this?

Did you give your infants sugar water?

What is the reasoning behind giving them this water?


Thanks so much for all your help!  

Um. No. That child needs one thing : Breast milk and maybe formula.  I can't even begin to tell you how bad sugar is for infants.  Lord.  If sh'es not home can't she pump?

I can get you a more clinical explaination from my best friend whose a pediatrician and a new mom if you want, but I know we had talked aobut sugar and also rum (some mothers in the south use it for teething pain).

I agree - everything I am reading about babies at the moment says on no account to give them sugar until at least 6 months.  

Thanks for your help! l did some research on the subject and l tend to agree that using sugar water is not a good thing.

l am not babysitting for this woman l am there as a Family Support Worker for Social Work. She is a young new mother and l am there to advise her on caring for the child. This was just one area l was very unsure about!

Waayyy back when they used to suggest mom's give babies sugar water in between feedings. When my almost 17 year old was born they gave me little bottles of it at the hospital to give to him between feedings but he didn't like it. It was water with glucose in it or something like that. But they had already changed that when I had my 10 year old. They said only breast milk or formula was necessary. They change things so much that just in the 7 years between my kids everything had changed. I can't even remember which kid it was now but with one of them they were saying give formula with iron and with the other do NOT give formula with iron. Good news is even though the advice was different on so many things they both are alive, well, healthy and intelligent.

Ditto what everyone has said - my midwife & I were talking yesterday about how things have changed over the years, and one of the things she mentioned was how they used to give babies sugar water and now it's not to be done. Sugar is totally void of anything good for your body, no nutrients or anything, and all it will do is bad things that sugar normally does to people.

The only time I gave Juliona some sugar water was when she had the hiccups and then it was just a small amount to get rid of them. She had the hiccups alot when she was small.

My mother used to give us a spoonful of butter covered in sugar to get rid of the hiccups!  Ugh.  

What could be more American than giving the kid a can of coke?

What could be more American than giving the kid a can of coke?

Interesting theory, Scoobie, but I'm not sure that I see the value of posting such a suggestion.  The parenting board is a place for people to share advise and support  and to gush about new babies.  There is a board for 'chuckles and food for thought' if you have some other jokes to share.