Gina Ford

[Taler]

I know Gina Ford is not everyone's favourite person so would really appreciate replies from those people who have used/are using her CLB method (as have already had an ear bashing about routines not being the way forward for very young babies.

So my question is regarding her feeding times and quantities.

If you're using he method yourself you'll know that she provides a feedin chart for the first year. We are on week 6-8.

The guide is to give the baby 70ml of milk for each pound of her body weight. My DD is 10.2 so she should receieve approx 700ml a day.

The 6-8 week routine consists of 6 feeds a day (7:30am, 10:45/11:00am, 2/2:30pm, 6/6:30pm, 10/11pm and 4/5am). The 7:30am feed and the 10/11pm feed are larger ones.

The middle of the night feed was always supposed to be a small amount (60-90ml) but we knew we would have difficulty with this particular feed as there'd be no way our DD would go from 10/11pm through to around 3am I then only be given 60-90ml and then be expected to last until 7am! We therefore offer her 4oz (120ml) and let her take the full amount if she wants it (sometimes she will take less).

I understand why it should be a smaller amount as the whole point is that the baby comes to not need her middle-of-the-night feed, but I'm just not sure how we will ever get to that point if we are offering her the 4oz!?!? If we don't offer her that then she'll constantly be wanting another feed between 5-6.

Any advice would be most welcome.

Thank you

(Sorry, posted too soon)

I meant to add that yes, some on here were very vocal in their dislike of her methods, but threatening to sue a parenting website where your advice was discussed in GOOD and bad ways is not really the way to garner good attention is it.

You might want to check out the (free) Gina Babies forum on babycentre. You'll get advice from those experienced in using Gina (and no judgemental comments).

If your baby

OP: if your baby is smaller than average then I would use the routine for a slightly younger baby. There's no rush to move them on to the next routine until they were ready. DS3 was 4lb12oz at birth, and this is what worked for him.

Co-sleeping and feeding on demand contributed to PND so severe I ended up in hosiptal. GF's book saved my sanity and rescued my relationship with DS1. I did the sleeping times and feeding times/amounts with DS2 from birth. When I had twins and the boys were 4 and 2, the twins were put into a routine in SCBU, we adapted this to the CLB routine when they came home. This enabled me to meet the needs of four children under 4.5 whilst recovering from a C-section with complications, which I think I would have struggled to do otherwise.

I know these routines aren't for everyone, but no one is forcing anyone to follow them. For some babies and some mothers, they are helpful (in my case a lot more than helpful) and the OP is just asking for clarification on something that has already been positive and worked for her and her baby.

Taler I am using GF loosely. My DS is 13 weeks and I've not cut down the nighttime feed. I might start to if he makes it from 10.30 past 4ish but right now I'm happy that I know he will wake in the night when he's hungry. Her routines work for me but I don't follow them to the letter.

GF does also advocate the use of dummies; sucking is one of their natural pleasures. I offered him a drink of water and a dummy at the 3/4am slot and it got DS through to 6am(ish).

You will need to check if water is ok for your child's age group though. I also know of someone who used sugar water (apparently because sugar is a soother, or something), but again I don't know if this is recommended; just something I heard of someone doing and it worked.

Plenty of my friends use GF, as did a family that I nannied for (and all have lovely and happy babies - just as much as my friends and I who cosleep and feed on demand ) and all found that following the advice loosely is the key to sanity, unless you happen to have a baby whose natural rhythm is very similar to her techniques. Small deviations from the routine will allow to flexibility for your DD to build in growth spurts, teething and the like, and also ensure that you don't end up chained to the house or with a screaming hungry child for longer than necessary. Do also remember that at this age they are still in the process of acclimatising to the world, part of the reason she calmed at 4 weeks may have been GF but another big part would have just been age and growth. By 8-12 weeks she'll be a different baby!

Whatever you do, please do not take the advice to use sugar water, it is 50 years out of date and very unhealthy, and even water is really not a great idea at this age, especially with a baby on the smaller side! If you do end up finding the routine doesn't fit her, I'd second the earlier ssuggestion of the Baby Whisperer and EASY - it is a bit more flexible and also helps as you might want to get out and about a bit, one disadvantage I do see with some of my stricter GF friends is that they can have very restricted lives due to rigid following of nap and feed times.

Whatever you do, hope it all works out!

Hi Taler- on baby no 3 and have used GF with all 3 of them and always tweaked them but she was an amazing godsend. A previous post mentioned the slower teat in the night which has worked wonders- DD is 10 weeks and was really hungry at 3-4am and not wanting a feed at 7ish. I had moved her onto a faster teat as she was falling asleep half way through during the day, and then last week I went back to the newborn teat at the middle of the night feed and she took longer and took less but then slept straight away and then wanted a massive feed at 7.

Many people have a strong opinion on GF and I can understand that - but I am on my own from 630am until 8pm - with a 4.5 and 2.5 and a 10 week old- and GF saved my sanity and even now they are in bed by 7pm and going through the night-

The strictness of the routine allowed me to cope when the inevitable sleepless nights, bed wetting, new baby arrival and general chaos of life and when things got bad. So for me it worked so hang in there and don't be too hung up on the quantities- I just make up the feed and she takes what she needs but the second the slower teat - good luck

I didn't use Gina Ford as it seemed too rigid for me personally. However, I still found that feeding on demand didn't work for me as my DS would breastfeed constantly until he vomited. At about 2 weeks old, I put him onto 3 hourly breastfeeds, which worked just fine. I didn't tell anyone what I was doing because I thought that I would get "told off" but made sure that he was weighed every week so any weight loss/reduced gain would be picked up quickly. My DS thrived, and we continued breastfeeding until 12 months. It worked so well that I did the same with my second child, again until 12 months with no problems.

I know that this doesn't answer the OP's original question but just wanted to show that feeding on demand isn't always the only/best way - and what is best is what works for you and your baby!

I feed both of mine on demand. If I had given dd2 700ml at 6-ish weeks she would have been screaming hungry. dd1 would have been fine, she ate loads less than dd2 despite being the same size. I would advise trying upping the milk amounts. Even babies of the same size take vastly different amounts. They will never sleep properly if they aren't getting enough to eat.

I want to agree with you that not all babies respond well to 'on-demand' - I did that for 6 weeks with my DS and it was living hell. He screamed all day every day because he was tired and could only sleep by feeding so he thought he screamed to feed. Within two weeks of starting a 'routine' he was so much happier.

But. You HAVE to use books as a guide only and ignore some bits. I used EASY. TBH about half of what was written in the Baby Whisperer was absolute turd-wash (I haven't used or read GF but know the gist of it) and didn't in the slightest bit fit with my scream-bomb, but the bits that did helped me along. IOW don't limit the feeds.

I tried GF when DS was a few weeks old but didn't get on with it until I got fed up with feeding on demand when he reached 3mo. The feeding times work really well for us and DS (now 6mo) only ever cries for milk when he's extra hungry due to a growth spurt. We don't follow the amounts but use them as a guide. I started reducing the night bottle when he reached 4mo by offering less milk but the same amount of water every few days so it was becoming diluted until we only had 3oz milk, 5oz water when we decided to try water only. It didn't take long. I wouldn't have expected him to reduce night feeds at 6wks though!

Nap times however have never worked as DS has only recently started sleeping more than 45mins at a time so the 2hr lunchtime nap wqs never going to happen!

I found her routines helped me make sense of things during a very chaotic time as I couldn't cope with not knowing what was coming next continually!