To ask for your tips on getting a BF baby to accept a bottle?

[Monkeynuts18]

Hi everyone

I’m sorry that this isn’t an AIBU but I’m a bit desperate and posting for traffic.

I’ve done plenty of Googling on this topic but have found with other things that often personal experience of others is often really helpful!

I’ve found out I need to have surgery next week so I need my 16 week old EBF baby to accept a bottle of EBM or formula.

We have tried a couple of different types of bottles (Medela and Tommee Tippee) but he just howls and howls!

Has anyone else been in a similar position and managed to persuade them to accept a bottle? Any advice/suggestions gratefully received. Thank you!

We tried giving DS (now 7 months) a bottle every day from 4 weeks to 5 months, would never ever take anything. The longest we waited was 6 hours before i fed up. We tried all the different bottles there was, many many different teets and he still wouldn't take anything!
We got to 5 months and i tried a sippy cup, took a couple of weeks but it worked! He now takes it no problem out of a sippy cup. Maybe try one of those?

I couldn't manage it. Like PP I just went straight for the sippy cup. Even that was a bit of a struggle, but we got there eventually and then didn't have to have the fight from bottle to cup later.

I could never get my second child to have a bottle and struggled to stop breastfeeding, it meant I couldn’t leave him overnight until he was 2. I tried on one occasion and he cried all night. Not what you want to hear sorry. I don’t think there is a magic answer I tried pretty much everything (different bottles, pretending I wasn’t there, my husband feeding etc etc), he would only accept milk from the source.

How long will you be gone? Will you be able to take a pump with you to keep your milk supply up? You are going to be pushing it to sort it out in a week, is there any way the baby can be brought to you at regular intervals in hospital?

I went out of the house shortly before feeding time and left DD with my sister and a bottle, so DD had no choice. I managed to stay out for a couple of hours and came back to a fed and sleeping baby. It wasn't easy to leave her but had to be done as I was going back to work and had to take my boobs with me

We had advice from an experienced nanny on this. We use Mam bottles which she said were good. She suggested making the milk warmer than you might expect (obviously not too hot). We were trying to switch to formula so she suggested mixing a bit of expressed milk in, although that doesn't seem the problem here. Someone other than you to give it, ideal if you are not in the house, or at least not in the same room as apparently they can smell you and your milk. Distract while doing it eg nursery rhymes on. Try putting a muslin in their hands. If baby gets upset wait until properly calm before offering breast, otherwise teaching them that they'll get what they want if they cry.

It took a good few goes over a period of weeks but got there eventually (there was outright refusal to start with). Baby now excited when she sees the bottle and hears the perfect prep machine beeping!!

I had to have an emergency CT scan when DD was two weeks old. She was breastfed and we hadn't tried her with a bottle before hand and I wasn't allowed to feed her for 24 hours afterwards. DH and her older brothers say that she put up a good fight and screamed for hours but did eventually give in and take a bottle from him.

Try a thin necked bottle rather than wide necked - the teats are longer which is what happens to your nipple when they suckle- you can get them from chemists for around £1

Cheap poundshop bottles. They have long nipples which mimick a real one more.

Hi, thanks so much for your replies. Still no luck - he screamed for an hour this morning and wouldn’t drink a drop. Tried some Philips teats - no joy. Now he’s happily breastfeeding away! I would try the MAM ones but I could only find a box of 3 for £20 - I was reluctant to spend that given the likelihood he’ll reject them ☹️

I’ll try and get some of these long teats today. We’re rynning out of time as my surgery is on Monday. It’s just a day surgery but I need to be put under a general, and the surgeon doesn’t want me to have a general unless the baby will take a bottle because the dehydration of being nil by mouth beforehand might affect my supply. I’ve asked if I can have IV fluids on admission but they said no

Not being around helps. We were never really sucessful, but DH managed to get the odd ounce in in my absence.

With DS1, we were on a hiding to nothing as it turned out that we were trying to force feed him allergens. No wonder he protested. Plus he's a very sensory child so have had years of battles with things like tooth brushing which may also have been a factor.

You need to go out for the day. Can someone else that isn't you or your husband try? My baby realised that if her dad was there, I probably was around too and gave a good fight. My mum suceeded in the end!

Go straight to a cup. Either normal open top cup or Munchkin Miracle 360.
Mine were both bottle refusers but took cups around 4 months-ish.

The tips I found and tried were-

Get dad to wear a t shirt of yours so it smells like you. Cut a hole in a used breast pad and put over the top of the bottle. Warm the teat of the bottle as well, and squirt a little milk out onto the teat of the bottle. Try a million different bottles eg NUK. Go out for the whole day and the baby will be forced to take a bottle.

Really sorry to say none of these worked for us. You could always try feeding from calpol syringe

Could you ask the surgeon to be put first on the list for the day so that if he doesnt take a bottle then it wont be for as long?

Please as PPs have said try a sippy cup. I am breastfeeding but had to use formula top ups which were done from a sippy cup rather than bottle. This avoided any confusion. You can get them from amazon. Just make sure you rinse and steroids between uses.

Mimijumi, Comotomo and MAM are all meant to be good for this. We used MAM and he seemed fine when changing between breast and bottle but each child is different

The best bottle I found was a nuk with latex teat

Try the bottle as baby wakes and started to root for a feed

Make sure the milk is really warm, it loses temp quickly. Your baby is used to nice warm milk all the time. Keep a jug a warm water next to you so you can keep popping the bottle in

Cover the test with milk so it's dripping off and baby gets a taste/smell

Hold baby close as if you are going to bf and sneak in the teat.

Only small amounts to start with, just warm up 1 oz and use that rather than wasting a load of ebm

Good luck xxxx

https://www.boots.com/nuk-first-choice-bottle-with-latex-teat-150ml-10199442?cmmmc=bmm-buk-google-ppccPLAsAs--(GB:Whoop!)+NUK---(GB:Whoop!)+Boots+Shopping+-+Category+-+Baby+-+High+Margin+-+Mobile&gclid=Cj0KCQiAtrnuBRDXARIsABiN-7BcttysgUt5XnMeH7T4eNcBfcyEpTtZhUUrQ9xkfB22MeKYdnQtJEaAsv4EALwwcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

Try some milk on a baby spoon or in a calpol syringe - will take ages but it's another one worth trying

As others have said only mam bottles worked for us

Never managed it. Tried mam, avent, Dr Brown's, nuk, minbie.

From about 6m we could get some expressed milk in from a tommee tippee sippy cup.

Many people I know who managed with bottles did it by leaving baby with dad and disappearing for the day, and it seemed to usually take as long as 10+ hours to basically starve the baby into it

Also can you challenge surgeon on nil by mouth. I've had a GA where I was allowed clear fluids until prob an hour or two before.

You can have clear fluids up to 2 hours before you go in for surgery, so if they're able to give you an accurate time on the day, you should be able to drink enough beforehand that supply shouldn't be affected. Best practice would be for you to be allowed to have the baby with you while you wait until you go down to theatre, but not all hospitals actually have capacity (or experience with bf mums) to allow this. Likewise, as soon as you're awake enough to hold the baby, you can safely feed him/her, and there are only a couple of drugs e.g. codeine which should be avoided. So if it's a short-ish surgery and the day surgery unit are willing to be flexible with you, you may not have to be apart from baby for too long.

DS1 never took a bottle and it was very stressful, so I have huge sympathy! We spent loads on different types, and I don't think there is any magic bullet. With DS2 I was determined to avoid this, so have been giving him a bottle every other day since week 1, but that's not very helpful for you! Good luck!

Breastflow bottles are only ones ds would take. And had to kind of latch him onto the bottle

I was almost in tears at one point when nt DS wouldnt take a bottle, in the end it was a case if persisting and it being someone else giving it to him (and me nowhere to be seen).

Continue to offer the bottle regularly and you will hopefully get there. Good luck!

I tried constantly to encourage my EBF baby to take a bottle of EBM from 6 weeks old. I tried daily for months. My husband had a day of random success with giving our son an entire bottle but DS didn’t repeat this feat for another two months.
The answer in the end was for my husband to take baby out of the house, away from me. He then started accepting the bottle regularly. Initially, he’d refuse if I was out with them, or if they were at home, but it soon got better.

We went from having a 6 month old who refused to ever take a bottle of warmed milk (I had to delay my return to work as a result), to a 10 month old who will down a bottle of EBM (or sometimes oat milk in a pinch) straight from the fridge.

Good luck with this. I hope your operation goes ok.