Starting combi feeding-help please

[Heg1984]

My son is just over 5 months old and up to now EBF. I took him to get weighed today. He has always been small (birth weight 5lb 10) but he has now dropped under the 0.4 line. HV suggested starting solids a bit earlier but I was also thinking about starting to offer a bottle of formula a day as well. This as something that I was planning to start from 6 months onwards as I want to very gradually move DS off the breast by about 10 months. Has anyone else introduced formula for a similar reason and did it help? Also any suggestions on how to introduce. He regularly takes a bottle of expressed milk so am not worried about him taking the bottle, more about him rejecting what's in the bottle. Also any general advice about combi feeding would be greatly appreciated as I do not want to stop breast feeding completely just yet. Thank you

[FindingNormal]

I'm no expert but wouldn't have thought formula will put weight in him- if it just replaces a breastfeed then it won't be additional calories/nutrients and in my experience you can't force a baby to take more milk than they want so wouldn't have thought it would result in an additional feed in the day. Don't get me wrong I am all for parents making their own choices so I'm not anti-formula in any way so I'm not trying to persuade you to continue with ebf if it's not right for you anymore. Do you think he's hungry still after a breastfeed?

[tiredmumsclub88]

My LO is BF. He was 5lb 4 at birth (1 month early) he was only on Breast milk until after he was in SCUBU where we introduced a bottle of formula a night- he is now 10lb. The formula will help, and equally you can (as with expressed milk) see how much your LO is taking. Good luck& remember if your baby is happy, alert and feeding, it doesn't matter how baby is fed xx

[AprilShowers16]

I started combi feeding at 3 months for various reasons. The way I did it was starting with the little ready made formula bottles and mixing it with expressed Breast milk and then gradually increasing the amount of formula compared to breast milk. I think the hardest bit is getting them to take the bottle so if he already does that I’m sure you’ll be fine. For what it’s worth mixed feeding saved our breastfeeding relationship and I was able to bf until he was over a year. I just gave him formula at bedtime, don’t have any advice about the weight gain thing but it did mean my DH could do bedtimes which was lovely

[StripySocks1]

I’m just wondering if there’s another option, if you’ve got no problems breastfeeding then it seems a shame to have to start paying for formula.
A friend of mine had a very skinny baby who hadn’t gained much weight, she’s vegan and eats very small portions and her dr advised her to start eating more fatty food and fish so the baby would get more calories from her breast milk.
It may be worth looking at your diet to see if there’s anything you can do there to help your baby gain weight.