Mixed feeding - help me to stop feeling guilty

[Littlepic]

Sorry this will no doubt be long!

My DD is just over 3 weeks old and is my first child. We had a long and difficult labour that ended in a C-section due to her being very badly stuck and me never progressing beyond 5 cm dilation.

I was very keen to bf and so we still had skin to skin and bf within the first hour of birth. However due to us both being very tired and me being unable to move easily bf feeding did not go well for the next few days.

Once home on day three I organised to go to local community hospital for breast feeding support. We worked on my latch and got a good feeding regime going. However DD remained very sleepy and had to be woken fir most of her feeds. At day 5 she was noted to be jaundice and had lost 11% of her birth weight. I still wanted to ebf so I started expressing and topping up as well as bfing.

Her weight has only very slowly increased over the past few weeks and she still hasn't got back to her birth weight. I've had a million pieces of advice from different midwives and hv and a lot of tears.

In the end the hv sent us to the prolonged jaundice clinic. I've now been advised to breast feed for 10 mins, and then give x amount of milk if I don't have enough expressed milk then it has to be formula.

I have already seen a difference, she is more settle, gaining weight much better and her colour is better already.

However I have double guilt. Firstly that I am giving formula when I really wanted to exclusively bf but secondly I didn't supliment sooner when she clearly needed it!!

I guess I want to hear people say i've done the right thing but also stories of people who managed to get back to ebf after topping up with formula as I still live in hope that this can happen.

Thank you for reading if you got this far xxx

Yes - exactly the same happened to me. I have since learned that if you have a CS (esp. an emergency one with full GA) it can be difficult to establish breast feeding - but no one told me this . I really struggled to get going with breast feeding - also our DC was born with a serious medical condition, again the news of that can affect BF (but we were not told...) - however once I got home it all got a lot easier and I mixed fed for a couple of weeks and then managed to exclusively BF for a few months - can't remember the details its a long time ago now ! I then mix fed from about 4 months; there is nothing wrong with mixed feeding, I wish it could be promoted more but I believe it is due to a 'fear' that mothers will stop BFing altogher rather than continue to mix-feed.

I also had the guilt about not introducing formula earlier in hospital - in fact my DH practically had to shout at the staff to 'allow' us to give formula they were so insistant on BFing even though it was clear that DS was losing weight in hospital - they kept us in for a week - the minute we gave him formula he thrived and we were allowed home.

:( :( littlepic sorry you are so down about this.

Clearly, formula was /is a treatment needed for your baby's well-being and health....there is nothing to be guilty about.

Being disappointed and sad is allowed - you wanted to bf exclusively and this did not work out - but the self-blame (which = guilt) is not needed.

Almost five years ago I wrote a post about buying a ticket for the breastfeeding bus, and feeling upset and confuddled when you find yourself on the formula/mixed feeding bus....still with a breastfeeding bus ticket in your pocket. www.mumsnet.com/Talk/breast_and_bottle_feeding/274983-omg-you-d-think-i-was-feeding-my-3-week?#5504964 Have a read and see if you relate :)

You can call any of the bf helplines and discuss how to get back to excl breastfeeding. You might also ask the clinic why they think you should only bf for 10 mins - seems a very short time, and unless these short feeds are done frequently and on both breasts, your breastmilk production may be affected. Formula may well be needed at the moment, but people do manage to drop formula in these circumstances.

It sounds like you had a very hard time in the early days - totally outside your control. Early days are important for breastfeeding, as you know - so it's not a huge surprise you are having problems further down the line. But these can be resolved.

Ofcourse your shouldn't feel guilty, you did the right thing which is to nourish your baby, allowing him to gain weight and thrive.

I also had to mix feed for a few weeks and then managed to exclusively breastfeeding, by expressing whenever my dd has to have a topup and offering the breast as much as possible.

I switched sides often, compressed the breast and co-slept. All the above encouraged my milk production and gradually dd stopped taking her topups. Because she was putting on weight and had lots of wet and dirty nappies I knew we could stop the formula topups. It's not easy but you can do it. Get as much help as possible from a breastfeeding consultant, a breastfeeding cafe, breastfeeding helplines. Ignore housework, concentrate on your baby and yourself.

Duly did the right thing, what good would letting your baby starve do? Good luck!

Thank you for quick replies, I know it's crazy to feel guilty! It's good to hear stories of people getting back to bfing.

I'm expressing as much as possible to hopefully reduce the need for formula and I think rather than just feeding for 10 mins I'll feed till she takes herself off for the first time. What do you think?

I'm sure tiktok will give you the correct facts about this, but I think the reason that you're advised to feed for 10 minutes is so that baby doesn't get exhausted by long but ineffective nursing. Sometimes they may feed for ages but they're not actually drinking as much, and they lose calories by the effort. That was happening to my dd, the first few weeks was feeding for over 40 mins each time but wasn't putting on weight. But 10 minutes only might not be enough - I was also advised the same but "cheated" to around 20-25 minutes, ensuring I compressed the breast almost constantly to give baby extra milk and encourage her to feed. Then I would topup, a hungry undernourished baby that's not putting on weight is not helping breastfeeding either.

Hopefully you'll get more advice, meanwhile remember to stay as calm and optimistic as you can, whatever happens you're taking good care of your baby!

Oh that makes sense. DD has done some incredibly long feeds in the first few weeks sometimes over an hour and a half. Never thought she could actually loose weight by feeding for so long and it was making us both very sleep deprived as well!

Apart from the great advice on mumsnet and the breastfeeding helplines, what really helped me was a breasteeding consultant that corrected my positioning and spent one to one time with us. It's hard work but it's worth it... Do try to keep your breasts stimulated by feeding and suckling, lookout for your baby's feeding cues and offer the breast at any opportunity!

'Tis true that long, unproductive feeds can take more out of the baby than they put in, IYSWIM.

This is why watching the baby is important. Is the baby transferring milk, or is he just hanging about unproductively? Babies where bf is going really well can do this, of course, but not babies where there is already an issue, and this is where breast compression comes in (the baby has to be watched and when sucking dwindles, that's where the compression starts, glad it worked for you, elephant, it's a useful technique).

If the baby is still sucking heartily after 10 mins, it makes no sense to use the clock as a guide - 10 mins is a very rough and ready cut off point. Can you call the clinic littlepic or your HV and ask about this? Ditching their advice on the say-so of an internet forum is a bit dodgy :) They have seen your baby and we haven't!

Seeing my hv tomorrow so will discuss the initial breast feed with her tomorrow. Her effective sucking ranges from about 5 to 12 mins and will shorten each time she goes back on.