to share with you all a revelation regarding 'feeding on demand'?

[EccentricaGallumbits]

I have ed my self with what I think may be an unusual and radical kind of idea.

I feed myself on demand!

When I am hungry I eat something!

When I am thirsty I have a drink!

Sometimes I need a bit of comfort in the form of choclate or cake and it makes me feel good.

Some days I am hungrier and thirtsier than others and then I eat and drink a bit more, more often.

Sometimes I fancy a snack.

Why on earth would anyone expect a baby to be any different

Who thought it would be a good idea to make babies feed at certain times of the day, even if they needed a little something at other times?

Why is the thought of babies acting like other humans so horrific?

MrsHeffley

^Because mums are human too.

Try feeding twins on demand then a newborn with 15 month old toddlers and you might get an inkling why not feeding on demand is so popular.^

I can understand you may take offense to others being prescriptive, as you see it.

I am not going to dream of telling you that you should have done things differently. That would be unreasonable. Your family is and was different, as you are different people.

However, I fed my twins on demand, and I take offense to your snideness, and implication that it is impossible, and Cannot Happen.

Thank you for reading.

Baby cries. Feed it. That's my motto. Who'd put up with a baby crying when you could make it stop instantly just by feeding it?

I used a feeding/sleeping routine for my DS and he certainly wasn't screaming for food inbetween. I think, like with all approaches to parenting, you have to do what fits in best with your lifestyle and personality. The routine approach was best for us and made DP and I more relaxed confident parents and DS was a very happy baby. DS is now 8 and is doing very well at school (despite our routine approach to feeding ) and eats 3 good meals a day. And as for the "drink when you're thirsty" argument, you shouldn't wait until you're thirsty to have a drink, thirst means you are dehydrated.
Each to their own.

Babies don't just cry because they're hungry.

Being attentive to your baby involves working out what they actually want, not just whipping the boob out at every complaint.

Also, babies are often noticeably hungry and giving feeding cues long before they start to cry.

It's not as simple as just offering the breast when they cry and presuming they are fine if not crying.

"Snideness,implication it cannot happen"-what rot.I simply illustrated how it is not that easy for many.

Great you managed feeding on demand with twins.I suspect you're in the monority.My dsis has twins as does my best friend and several other twin families we're friendly with-none of us managed it.

All power to you.

Also unless you're tandem feeding(which my twins hated) you're not strictly feeding on demand with feeds if you're making one wait whilst you're feeding the other.

I breastfed my eldest two on demand and am now bottle-feeding my 3 month old daughter. I always assumed it was impossible to bottle-feed on demand, but i was wrong. I feed on demand. There's no way I'd leave her crying because it didn't fit the feeding schedule. Every 4 hours seems way too long between feeds. New Mothers are under silly pressure to get babies into routines straight away and babies don't understand or need routine when it comes to milk. They need it when they need it and that's not always when we're ready to give it.
I can understand how this is much much harder with twins though.

AThingInYourLife - yes I agree that babies give hunger cues before they start to cry. However, in my opinion, small babies cry because they are hungry, thirsty or need a nappy change - the first two CAN be solved by offering a breast.

When they are older babies they may cry for other reasons such as pain, feeling ill, boredom - again, I would say, from my experience, all of these can be solved by offering breast

You're still being snide! Passive-aggressive smilies all over the place.

I may well be in the minority. Never said I wasn't. I still exist. Although perhaps things would have gone differently, if I'd never heard from twin mothers who had managed it, as well as those who used a routine to keep everyone in their family happy.

I never fed on demand, I did breast feed both DSs but they had routine feeding that increased as they could drink more and got older etc.

I can't see how it is healthy for anyone to be stuck indoors breast feeding a baby constantly for hours on end etc, what about if you have a toddler as well - how would this work?

Children do need to eat routinely, they can't just graze all day at pre-school or school. Drinking is different, water is on offer all day at pre-schools and schools - not really related to the routine eating discussion.

Also, if a baby is not crying - I do presume that it is fine! (is that not normal?)

I must live in a hobbit hole or something because I have always been under the impression that everyone feeds their baby on demand? How do you feed a baby thats not hungry? Or ignore a hungry crying baby?

I don't understand how you DON'T feed on demand either. Obviously be as sure as you can that it is crying hunger before you whip out a boob or bottle or whatever, but it just seems so much easier to deal with crying baby immediately.

That's not a criticism by the way, more admiration if anything, for those who were able to do something different if it worked for them!

Also, why is breast feeding different to bottle feeding? Most people wouldn't just feed a baby with a bottle every half hour but it seems ok to offer breast feeding as the answer to all cries.

I would never have left either DS starving of course but because I routine fed from pretty much day 1 (DS1 was in intensive care for a week so was a bit bigger when I started feeding) they were fine and drank enough milk to last a few hours, they were happy and reached all physical milestones etc etc.

You can't knock the method at the end of the day neither way is wrong but different things work for different people - there is no way I would sit breastfeeding DS2 all day and leave my just turn 2 yr old on his own needing/wanting my attention.

I was talking to DH about this yesterday and we both said how else could you feed a baby? Once you know how to recognise a hungry cry then how else would you respond but to feed your child? Do people really still feed according to a schedule?

Its not a strict dead-on 3 or 4 hours but roughly those times, we were able to go out for days out or holidays and know we could meet DS1's needs as well as ensuring we fed baby DS2 etc. We went to eurodisney when DS2 was 5 months old and he had his little feeding routine which dictated when we needed to stop for a break of course but it was pretty much at normal meal times but it meant we weren't just stopping every hour to feed him.

I think its a matter of balance and finding a compromise between everyone's needs. If you have a family with more than one child there are times when the baby is just going to have to wait. It is not fair to always expect the older child's needs to take second place. Sad to say there are times when you have ignore a crying baby.

However there is a middle ground between Gina Ford and permamently breastfeeding a toddler 24/7. Feeding on demand is important for establishing breastfeeding and building up milk suppy in the early days. Later on the feeds to space appart.

I found that both my children fell into routines that fitted in with everyone in the family. A baby who leads an interesting life will not want to breastfeed continously they will be too busy taking in the world.

I don't feed myself on demand. I'd be the size of a house.

I did GF with DS and fed DD ahead of schedule, ie; when it suited me before we had to get anything done. I didn't wait for her to want a feed as it might not have fitted into what I was doing.

Perfectly put ReallyTired! I think you have explained it really well.

Yes Gina Ford tells you exactly what minute you have to get dressed and eat your own breakfast - slightly excessive.

If you wait until a baby is crying before you feed it, you're not really responding to the first signs that it is hungry or thirsty. It may be normal to ignore a baby unless it cries, but it's not terribly responsive.

Newborns also cry when they are in pain or bored. Sure, feed a bored baby every time it grouses - but if walking it around a bit or talking to it makes it happy, why not do that?

These kinds of topics make breastfeeding mothers sound like monomaniacs who do nothing with their babies other than feed them.

I think the crux of the debate is whether the routine fed babies are in fact happy with their scheduled feedings - evidence being they don't cry for food before their allotted time OR whether they are unhappy - evidence being they don't cry for food outside their allotted times because they have learnt that they won't be fed then. To me is whether you take non-crying as happiness or compliance - I think it can be both. I do't think the comparison with adults is fair - of course we can learn to eat at mealtimes only and not when we are working - we're much more rational than babies! Also I do think four hour routines are very odd - such a long time to go without a drink assuming some of that time is spent awake. I think three hours is more reasonable...in any event I fed on demand. Worked for us.

I think there is some confusion about what feeding on demand means. Once the DC were a bit bigger ie 2 months or so I could roughly work out when they were likely to want feeding. Before that they would both feed pretty often and quite randomly. They were both bottle fed in the main. Just because you observe their routine and feed them when you think they need it doesn't mean you're not feeding on demand. You can pre empt it a bit I think.

It isn't rocket-surgery / brain-science is it? Still - there are always exceptions.

Some babies, ReallyTired, will BF a lot despite an "interesting life". My autistic DS did in order to cope with the stimulation we were giving him which, as it turned out, wasn't appropriate for him because the world was too much for him to take in.

Lou I soooo agree.

When you hear posts saying basically everything else can go hang when you have a new baby I think how awful that must be for other siblings. Kids need and deserve you equally until quite old.

Toddlers don't understand that mummy only has eyes for the newborn and only cares about the newborn's needs. It's not just it's verging on neglect.