to be upset by this?

[mrsbean78]

I suspect that this may be my last thread on mumsnet, as I think I am going up against a regular.

I posted this thread today:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/breast_and_bottle_feeding/877382-Slow-to-gain-wt-baby-panicky-mi dwife?msgid=17836631

I cannot believe that someone would interpret my panic as a reason to suggest, in order, that my 12 day old first born might have a metabolic disorder or have something so serious wrong with them that it might affect their survival.

When I said I wanted to know what the concerns would be, I meant from MY health professionals. I appreciate this might not have been clear.

I appreciate my second post might have been misread but I am very upset and worried about my baby and I really think that the use of sceptical faces was really unwarranted.

As it is, my baby did not gain weight today.. although the midwife was not concerned and will just review it.

Now I have to worry at the back of my mind that my baby might have something that makes him 'just survive' instead of grow..

And people saying I just wanted a pat on the head.. that is so lacking in compassion! I am in floods of tears as I write this..sbsolute floods of tears.. but I guess the important thing here is that I was 'rude' or not considered in my response to someone else (which I actually tried to be, though I was angry..).

I am so, so, so upset and worried. I wish to God I had never posted..

This sounds very promising Mrs Bean. I hope you can work through it. Keep snuggling up and enjoy the cuddly bits of having a new baby.

And yes, EAT! Flapjack, wholemeal toast, bananas, porridge and oatcakes are all handy, slow-release carbs. My DS1 is six this week and I can still remember the day I "forgot" to have supper, fed him all night, and then fed/slept on and off in the morning. I nearly fell over when I finally stood up. After that I kept a stash of oatcakes in a box by my bed, and my mobile phone for calling DH when supplies were low.

Glad you came back

That sounds great Mrs Bean. It's so much more reassuring when you have proper support and an action plan. I feel for you, it's SO stressful having a newborn and establishing feeding can be the most stressful thing you ever do in your life IMO. Although it doesn't feel like it at the time, the newborn stage passes so quickly and it gets easier as they get older. By the time he's six months you'll be flinging him around the place changing his clothes and nappy without a thought, like a true pro

Take care of yourself. I think PND is much more common than we think, and that many women go diagnosed. I didn't admit to myself that I had PND until dd was 8 months old, and as soon as I admitted it, I started to recover. I didn't see anyone about it or take anything. I thought PND was something much more severe than what I had, but in reality I had been super stressed, in shock, miserable, anxious and cried loads every day, and there are varying degrees of severity. I have so many friends who have since said they thought they probably had "a bit of PND" when they had a newborn. Anyway, I'm not saying you have/will have PND, just that it's very common, and look after yourself! Very un-MN, but .

That sounds like a really positive consultation Mrs Bean.
I'm glad you came back.

Wishing you and your baby all the best Mrs Bean. I hope you can put this disagreement behind you x

Glad things are looking a bit brighter, MrsBean, and glad what I said helped a bit.

Hello MrsB. I have been on a rollercoaster ride reading through both your threads. I had a huge lump in my throat, took me right back to when DD was a newborn. She had reflux which meant she cried an awful lot. I remember someone suggesting she might be lactose intolerent once and how distraught I was that someone might look at my PFB and think there was something 'wrong' with her. Eventually, I had to admit things weren't quite right and at 3 weeks (after going round lots of different GPs and HVs) she was diagnosed with reflux. Its just indegestion really, but at the time it felt like the end of the world. Like you, I was in floods of tears all the time

I definitely had baby blues and I was paranoid I was developing PND. One of the worst things was that DD's medicine (gaviscon) worked better when mixed with formula, she was always much happier after a bottle feed. Despite this I knocked myself out trying to express enough milk to bottle feed her. We eventually settled into a routine of mixed feeding. When i look back at how hard I tried to EBF and how upset it made me, I keep asking 'was it worth it?' and thinking 'hell no'.

Mixed feeding is almost a taboo subject on MNet and with the NCT brigade. But it can work - especialy if you are determined to BF. DD was then BF up to 14mo.

Thanks NotAnotherNewNappy..
I had never intended to even consider formula etc but I can see it will be difficult to avoid indefinitely. Because ds is so sleepy, I am using a stop watch to ensure he gets 30 mins active suckling per feed on the boob - this is taking about an hour and a quarter to achieve, and he is so unsatisfied. Then I need to express for the next feed.. sometimes I am only getting out 5mls.. at 2am last night, having fed/pumped/refed without break for three hours, dh took him and I could hear him screaming with hunger. Dh told me that he was trying to eat the side of the pram downstairs when he was put down . I didn't realise this at all! I just can't justify him starving in this way because I have a desire to bf only - there was literally nothing left in my boobs last night.. he was fussing and pulling at the boobs when he was on as it was clear he was getting nothing.

I am surprised mixed feeding is viewed so negatively.. I am literally working my boobs off to keep up here. I would happily express while he took a formula top up to stimulate my supply but after expressing in the mornings, when I can get out 1 oz or so, I can't get more than 3.5 or 5mls out the rest of the day yet so topping up with my own supply isn't an option if he loses weight. We're trapped in a vicious circle where, basically, he hasn't the strength to feed enough to stimulate my supply and that in turn reduces his desire to feed..

NotAnotherNewNappy posted

Mixed feeding is almost a taboo subject on MNet and with the NCT brigade

Careful of generalisations NANN. I'm an NCT Antenatal teacher so firmly part of the NCT brigade & I have no hang ups at all about mixed feeding if that's what someone needs to do. So I don't appreciate you implying that I do. it suggests a rigidity of attitude I just don't posses on this issue, and what's more neither do most of my NCT teacher colleagues. I dislike being misrepresented, please can I ask that you don't do it?

OP,expressing should also stimulate your supply.

Would it work just to express if he feeds better from a bottle?

MrsBean - mixed feeding worked really well for me with ds3. As I said earlier, he had me during the day, then a bottle late evening, and one during the night, and this was enough for him to gain weight satisfactorily.

I was able to keep up this mixed feeding for much longer than I'd ever managed to exclusively breastfeed, and I did feel much better about that than about solely formula feeding ds1 and ds2.

I mix fed aswell (one bottle a day, occassionally two) and I breastfed until they were over 1. I have always felt like I could not post about how successful it had been for us on MN though. I think at the end of the day you just have to do what is right for you and your baby

Glad things are better. ThingOne said "Eat!" and I would second that wholeheartedly, you just don't realise how much difference it makes. But I would also add to that, sleep! A night (or day) where you sleep as much as you need, by whatever means, dh giving formula or whatever it is, will make the most enormous enormous difference. Slightly crappy thing to say when sleep is so hard to come by for you but if, by hook or by crook, you can manage it, it could really help.

And I mean just one big sleep can be enough for a sort of kickstart effect. That's just my experience anyway.

Drinking stacks of water (really lots!) upped my supply by an astonishing amount - if I drank a lot of water in the morning I would be dripping by mid-afternoon, on the days I forgot I had noticeably less.

fenugreek is good for increasing supply aswell. You can get it from Holland and Barret

it makes you fart though

missismac - you can ask but the way that you asked (i.e. to shout me down rather than offer any pearls of wisdom or support to OP)does nothing to endear me to the aforementioned NCT brigade. IMHE - Mixed feeding is almost a taboo subject on MNet and at NCT classes.

My sister in law had terrible problems establishing BF, she had been told at NCT classes if she caved in and gave her DD a bottle she could never go back. Both my DNs were FF as a result. I was told the same in NCT antenatal class but also watched my sister occaisionally FF in the first few days then go on to successfully BF my nephew.

In fairness to the NCT, I should say that I was never made anything less than totally welcome at coffee mornings etc with my bottles of formula. I never once felt judged by anyone there (except myself, but that's another story).

I am an NCT breastfeeding counsellor and a regular on mumsnet. I don't agree that 'mixed feeding is taboo' either with NCT or mumsnet.

If an NCT specialist worker (teacher or bfc) has said that the use of one bottle means you can 'never go back' then of course a complaint needs to be made and she can have supervision and support to ensure she does not make such a factual error again.

NCT bfcs regularly help mothers go back to breastfeeding after a time spent partially or fully bf. If they use some formula and want to stay with some formula, the NCT bfc will know that the mother needs to be aware that it can be hard to maintain breastfeeding if i) too much formula is used and ii) it is used too often...she has to know that, or her choice to 'mixed feed' will be removed and she will end up fully ff. She also needs to know the best health outcomes are seen with full bf, but that partial bf does not 'remove' the health effects of breastmilk.

All this is part of an NCT bfc's training, and if she does not put it into practice with a class, and instead says this 'never go back' thing, she's not following what she should be....and I'm sorry your SIL found this, NANN....what can I say, it's not typical.

On mumsnet, I find most posters are understanding and accepting of the fact that some mothers want to use formula/end up using formula alongside breastfeeding....I have never noticed a 'taboo'. Again, I think this would not be typical.

(Glad things are going better for you, mrsnbean).

MrsBean - I think mixed feeding can be of great benefit - I mix-fed (never sure of the past tense of that) ds1, and exclusively b/fed dd and ds2.

With ds1, because he was my first child, I didn't have as much confidence that I 'could' feed him, and found it all totally overwhelming. However, the benefits for me were;

I could 'see' the milk going into him - and this gave me confidence that he was not starving.

He was easier to leave, as he would take a bottle of formula happily (the other 2 never ever accepted bottles!).

The way I did it was to always offer the breast first. In the morning when there was plenty of milk he only had breast milk, then at lunch/tea/supper feeds he had a 3-4oz bottle of formula after he had taken as much as I could physically get down him - he was VERY sleepy, and difficult to maintain sucking. So once I really couldn't get him to drink anymore b/milk he would then get some formula. Any other feeds/snacks were all breast.

We managed to keep b/feeding till 13months or so. It was quite hard maintaining it, but having a routine really helped, as we weren't tempted to up the formula.

With ds2, he also lost a lot of weight, and we managed with expressing to up supply and supplement feeds for the first 6 weeks or so. My routine there was something like; (timings are just to give an idea)
8:00 sterilise breast pump/bottles etc
8:15 express from right side, and a little bit from left.
8:30 b/feed ds2, starting on left side, but switch feeding (swapping sides) until he REALLY won't take anymore.
9:00 offer supplementary bottle.
10:00 sterilise breast pump etc etc

and so on throughout the day. Night time we tried to ensure at least one good feed, and possibly two, even if we had to wake him up. I refused to express at night though, I needed some sleep!!!

Hope things pick up for you.

tiktok, long standing mumsnet members (I have been here for over 6 years) have come on to say that they feel it is taboo to talk about mix feeding. I have been shouted down for even mentioning it innocuously on some threads and I was suprised tmmj did not get shouted down for suggesting mrsbean give him a bottle earlier in the thread. The only reason I can think of is because this thread is not in the breastfeeding section. People regularly post that mix feeding did not undermine their breastfeeding experience and we are made to feel like silly little ladies for even thinking it, I know this from experience. As for the NCT, I found them supportive of my chopice to mix feed but I think this was due to my circumstance rather than choice. This is no way a post aimed at you tiktok, but the taboo is there because otherwise why would so many people think it was?

48 hours since the lactation consultant's plan put in place, also topped up with formula last night, milk seemed to be coming in..

M/w assistant came today and no change. He has put on no weight now in two weeks
I am doing everything I can think of and nothing is happening.

I am so terrified that there is a more sinister explanation for all of this... feel so worn out, want to know why this is happening and at the same time don't want to know..

keep thinking that maybe there's something seriously, seriously wrong.. that he has cancer or something that will make him poorly for the rest of his life. I know these are worse case scenarios but I just can't see how, when I gave him 4oz of EBM, 3oz of formula and fed on demand, insisting through switch feeding he had a minimum of 20 mins active suckling per feed, that he has gained nothing. Really at the end of my tether..

Oh Mrsbean, you poor poor thing. Has he lost weight or has he stayed the same???

How old is he?

i don't think any of mine put on weight for about a month and it was alwasy a 'concern' and then they all started ganing (excvept the first on but she is a complicated little madam)