Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Behaviour/development

Talk to others about child development and behaviour stages here. You can find more information on our development calendar.

Flip

Original poster

8 week old daughter won't take a bottle - HELP!

14 replies

flamingnora · 07/04/2008 18:05

She's breast fed well since birth & now dh and I are trying to get her to take a bottle of expressed milk - with no success! She actually has started gagging on it when we try now. Can anyone offer any advice? I'm worried we're not holding her correctly or something - I don't want to give up but I feel dreadful for traumatising my baby!

OP posts:

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

FloriaTosca · 07/04/2008 18:30

Hi Flamingnora
Personally we had great sucess feeding ebm from 2 weeks to 9 weeks with "first years" "breastflow" bottles, available from Mothercare...double teated to work like the breast so she certainly shouldn't gag on them..it was great Dh did the 2am feed so I could get more than 2 hrs unbroken sleep..

...However, at 9 weeks my ds started refusing these bottles too...we tried the next size teats and then other bottles, my Mum tried (she was a childrens nurse and used to fussy feeders) but the upshot was he preferred his milk on draught and still does at 6 months....good luck

hbmummy · 07/04/2008 18:47

DD1 took the odd bottle here and there since 4 days till 8 weeks. From then on, she just plain refused.

We tried different tricks every now and then when we thought she has forgotten about the earlier attempts - DH feeding, cousins feeding, sitting up, on the play mat, different teats, nothing worked. After about a month, we just gave up trying and I got lazy making bottles which eventually went down the drain. So am breastfeeding exclusively now - she is 20 weeks now.

At times I really do want her to take the bottle as it gives me the flexibility and allow me to go out on my own without worrying about her going hungry.

NellyTheElephant · 07/04/2008 20:29

DD1 would always take the odd bottle of EBM so I hadn't expected any trouble with DD2 and indeed for the first 6 wks or so we were fine, she'd take a bottle every other day or so then suddenly she just refused point blank. I tried all sorts of teats and bottles to no avail. I desperately needed her to take a bottle as Dh and I were going away for a long w/e and my Mum was looking after her. The way I managed it was to lie her across me on a V shaped pillow and start breastfeeding, then half way through the feed pop her off and stick in a bottle of nice warm EBM (I found it helped if it was a bit warmer than I would have expected - although not hot of course!), she then kind of got the hang of it. While I was away my Mum fed her bottles of EBM in that way i.e. lying across Mum on the V shaped pillow in a breast feeding position rather than the standard bottle feeding cradle hold (if you tried to feed her a bottle in the normal bottle feeding position she'd scream the place down). She was absolutely fine when I was away, but once I was back she screamed blue murder if I ever tried a bottle again. To be honest it was more trouble than it was worth with her so I continued to exclusively bf until I decided I wanted to wean to formula around 6 months. Then I pretty much went cold turkey - I still breast fed her first thing in the morning and at at bedtime for a couple of weeks, but all other feeds were bottle or nothing (she had great weight gain and was healthy so I wasn't worried), she was then fine with bottles after about 2 days.

nappyaddict · 18/04/2008 11:18

have you tried the closer to nature bottles or MAM or NUK teats?

Meandmyjoe · 18/04/2008 11:19

Ooo yeah I reccommend MAM teats too. My ds got awful wind using normal round teats but he MAM teats are flatter and and have a more natural skin sort of feel to them. He still uses them now and he's 8 months. They are fab!

CantSleepWontSleep · 18/04/2008 11:23

It's a common problem fn. Not what you want to hear, but dd wouldn't drink from amything except me until 10 months, when she started sipping a bit of water from a playtex cup.

AMumInScotland · 18/04/2008 11:26

I found the cross-cut teats were better - the milk doesn't flow out of them, you have to suck, so she might be less likely to gag on it.

Natacha21 · 18/04/2008 17:42

Hi,

I had a similar problem with my daughter, after trying all milks available it turned out that the problem was in fact the hole in the tit of the bottle that was not big enough, therefore dd was getting really frustrated at sucking in and refused bottles. In the end, I simply changed the tit and she took all bottles presented to her very happily. It's definitively worth a try!

Natacha21 · 18/04/2008 17:59

Hi,

misselizabethbennett · 18/04/2008 18:05

Keep trying different teats.

My son screamed blue bloody murder if offered a bottle until he was 5 months, but he did eventually take one.

What worked for me was latex teats (the horrid brown stained-looking ones), and the orthodontic shape - they are softer than silicone.

Just keep trying different ones - I'm sure you'll get there.

nappyaddict · 18/04/2008 18:15

the playtex natural latch ones are meant to be good too.

Sunflower100 · 20/04/2008 20:33

Same problem with DD! I sympathise - I thought I'd be bfing forever but she did eventually take one after I'd left it for a while so I felt the pressure was off, it was less of a battle of wills and she'd started on food - NUK latex teats were by far the best for us!
Keep going - I never thought we'd get there but we did (I do have a cupboard full of different bottles though!!!)
Good luck!

claraquitetirednow · 20/04/2008 20:41

Another vote for MAM teats here.

peacelily · 20/04/2008 20:45

Hi flamingnora my dd started refusing ebm in a bottle at 8 weeks too. For a month I just accepted it but then the restriction on not being on 24/7 call out began to get to me. Dh tried every evening with me out of the house with a bottle for 6 weeks. A long haul but worth it, she took it in the end! I preferred this method to the "cold turkey" method all though I do know some parents who've had to repsort to this because of returining to work.

Just gently persevere, she'll accept it eventually ( my dd would only take the really cheap and nasty old fashioned latex teats, superdrug I think, no tommy tippee or avent for her!)

Flip