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6.5 month old won't take bottles from anyone but parents

3 replies

Some0ne · 23/08/2012 14:03

A bit of history: DS has had feeding problems since he was born. He was deprived of oxygen at birth and in hospital for a month. He had terrible problems feeding at first and we were told it was probably due to brain damage. He was tube fed for the first three weeks because we couldn't get him to suck from a bottle. He was diagnosed with very severe reflux then and once we started thickening his formula and put him on medication, he did better. He still goes through phases of being very hard to feed though, and his paediatrician is concerned about the volumes he takes generally. He's slipping down the centiles - he was off the top of the charts at birth and is now on the 50th and still slipping.

He's 6.5 months now and I came back to work this week. He's with my parents 3 days a week and in creche the other 2 days, and neither my parents nor the creche staff can get him to take a bottle. He refuses all day, then fills up when DH and I are home - so he looks for feeds every 3 hours overnight. He used to sleep through till this week.

He'll take solids from anyone and he'll drink water, and he is drinking plenty of formula overnight, so I'm not too worried about his intake, it's just frustrating that a)we're losing so much sleep when he'd been such a good sleeper until now, and b)that he's doing this at all, for no apparent reason that we can find.

Help?

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Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
OpheliasWeepingWillow · 23/08/2012 14:07

Mine is a nightmare to feed and has silent reflux.

Have you tried:

Feeding when watching a certain tv program or video? Then getting the nursery worker or other feeder to play when trying to feed? We use a ladybird app for iPhone which has a 'play all as video' function.

Also can you sleep with a blanket or t-shirt for a week and feed LO wrapped in it? Let it get a bit smelly to be honest. Then give to nursery to wrap baby when feeding?

Does your baby dream feed when napping? This might work for daytime naps?

Some0ne · 23/08/2012 14:29

Feeding in front of Jungle Junction sometimes worked when he wouldn't feed for us Blush I don't think he'd be bothered watching tv in creche though, the other kids are too interesting. He LOVES people.

The smelly clothing thing is disturbing and manky but I'll give it a go. Might use something of DH's though as he's actually best at feeding DS and then he could be embarrassed instead of me.

He feeds as he falls asleep for us but not for anyone else. And I wouldn't really want them to try a dreamfeed during his naps, the one thing that's going right this week is that he's sleeping for them - I don't want to mess that up too!

This morning he didn't take any of his 7am or 11am bottles so all he's had since 2am is a bit of ReadyBrek and a rusk, which apparently he demolished, so he must have been pretty hungry.

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OpheliasWeepingWillow · 23/08/2012 15:03

It's so worrying isn't it?

Mine has a really nice fluffy slumber tot bunny she sleeps with for naps that is now so crusty and milky I fear for it, but if I wash it she immediately wants the old crusty bunny back.

Anyway, nap feeding, TV or entertaining app, rocking backwards and forwards and smell associations work for us.

Our will now not feed at night at all despite hardly drinking during the day. Ironic!

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