Baby doesn't stop eating/how much formula?

[strangerjo]

My son is 7 wks. He eats more formula than suggested on the bottle and more than the calculation we were given (between weight in kilo x 150 and weight in kilo x 200). He never refuses food and when we feed him, he never stops. We're blindly guessing when he's full which means we tend to feed him until he's asleep. He'll definitely get very overweight at this rate! Everyone tells me that he'll know when to stop but he doesn't. We use a slow teat and pace the feed slowly in the hope that would help but it hasn't.
If anyone has any suggestions, I'd be so so grateful!

[Junosmum]

Are you waiting until he tells you he's hungry before feeding him? Babies will often suck when not hungry (e.g dummy) but if there's food in there they'll take it.

[FATEdestiny]

My DD was between the 91st and 97th percentile line for weight from about 6 weeks old.

She would eat way more than suggested. I would aim for more frequent feeds to keep a more reasonable volume of milk per feed. She was generally fed every 2 hours from 7am to 11pm.

By the time my DD was 16 months old and entering toddlerhood she was down closer to the 50th centile without me doing anything. She just needed more calories as a baby, that was all. Not indictative of long term weight issues.

Just follow the baby's lead. Don't worry if she wants more milk than others

[AJ279]

My DD was the same, she was feeding large amounts constantly and we had conflicting advice of "you're over feeding" and "you can't over feed a baby" from different health professionals. I found if she had too much, it would just come back up. DD piled on weight but not to a concerning level, and its dropping off now that she's a bit more mobile. Speak to your health visitor if concerned or try a dummy, but my advice would be to just go with the flow, they will bring up anything they don't need.

[unimagimative13]

How much exactly are you feeding him?

I see so many posts where people are flapping over 5oz bottles.

My DS was on 7/8oz bottles very early on.

[strangerjo]

At one point last week he was having 150mls (just over 5oz) every couple of hours and would have happily accepted more milk than that.

[unimagimative13]

Honestly that is nothing!

Make a 5oz bottle, if he drains it up it to 6oz, if he drains that up it to 7oz.

Personally I found in the early days feed could be every 4 hours. Generally it'll be every 3. Some days it'll be 2 hours.

Then you'll think you've cracked it and suddenly they will only take 3oz.

My DS is on 50th centile and had big bottles since birth but over a 24hour period only ever has 4-5 bottles. Some babies will be grazers others won't.