I thought you couldnt overfeed a brestfed baby? can you ?

[homebertha]

Hi there, i m coming from a demand feeding, attachment parenting, co sleeping baby led weaning ( but nor religeous about it) bit of a hippy kind of stance.. My son is 7.5 months old and is on the 25th centile for height but alas 99th for weight... the hv says i need to stop feeding him apart from 2x a day.. she also uttered painful words such as controlled crying, separate room, dummy and such like.. i dint dare to mention the co sleeping bit...this is when he does most of his feeding ...through the night. He has always woken generally 3-6 times a night and feeds to go back to sleep/comfort/hunger etc. last night i limited it to 4x and so this mornign my boobs are rock hard and lumping up like i m heading for mastitis...cant imagine what will happenif i feed him 2x aday?!!feeling a bit bleak about enforcing limited feeding wanted him to naturally self regulate...thats the idea isnt it?? yesterday i tried offering different activities nd solids instead of milk and he was very upset each time. i feel heart ache with it all but think that i need to do something as dont want his health to suffer. any ideas from like minded folk or others with little guzzlers?

I agree. They tend to slim downs bit once weaning is more established and they become more mobile. He's still young.

Tell her to piss off (politely)

homebertha, what a shame your HV came out with such unsupportive stuff :( :(

HVs are under pressure to pay attention to their local obesity stats, but this has not come with any real training to improve their support for bf - and support for bf you probably know is actually part of national anti-obesity programmes. It sounds to me that she is confusing ff with bf - 3-6 ff a night would not be a good thing, but breastfeeding is different. It is physiologically normal for a baby to breastfeed several times in the night and at this age, restricting this could be very distressing. In any case, if there is a real issue with your baby's growth, a sensible, informed person would not suggest sudden changes or making your baby unhappy in this way.

Breastfed babies self-regulate in a way formula fed babies find harder to do. A baby whose height and weight are like your baby's is almost certainly just fine and if you continue doing what you are doing, he will 'even out' in time, when he becomes active (at 7.5 mths babies are not able to do the crawling and cruising and walking that burn energy).

The key to healthy eating is to ensure his solid foods are nutritious and not 'junk' and you probably already do. He can feed himself (baby-led weaning style) and gradually increase his repertoire of tastes and textures.

Review things when your baby is 12-15 months and the picture will probably be very different :)

It might be useful for you to seek a second opinion on all this, to boost your confidence, and to check there really is nothing to be concerned about - no one here can actually see your baby and we can only go on what you have written here :)

thanks ladies..he s not moving yet so not expending so much energy. just dont want to do wrong by my little love

Ignore the health visitor. Don't see her again. Trust your instincts.

i back everything that tiktok said.

I posted a really similar post to yours when my DD was 5 1/2months. The HV said I would make her obese if I continued to feed her as much as I did and certainly if I weaned her.

She was on the 99th percentile and a big chubby bundle! Thankfully everyone on here said to ignore her and carry on. I did, she's now 17 months and not in the slightest bit obese! (and still a milk monster) As soon as she started moving about her "rolls of baby loveliness" as my DH calls them, disappeared.

I'm going to go against the grain here and question the idea that demand feeding has to continue indefinitely. I let DS feed more or less on demand (Iweaned at three) and he got huge (as did a friend whose DS also co-slept).

Both boys simply added increasing amounts of solids to the amount of breastmilk they consumed and both boys are still heavier than would be ideal (DS3 is slimming down but it is taking a long time, he is nearly 8).

I honestly think he grew used to 'snacking' and still asks for food constantly especially when a bit bored. I think I should have offered him alternatives to the breast for comfort at an earlier stage but I was a bit 'anything for an easy life'.

I hesitate to use a perjorative term but i think some babies can be 'greedy' and there can be too much of a good thing, even with something as beneficial as BF.

Twice a day is a bit harsh though, I would ignore that bit!

yes his favourite solid foods are green beans and he mostly has just veg and various lentil/ aduki bean phenomenas. but he doesnt eat so much yet and is just having a go and checking it out.. bloody health visitors... ours is called inch high private eye.the last time she came round the cat brought a live mouse in so i reckon i m already quite visible on her radar.

I certainly think it is normal to bf your baby twice or even three times a night at that age (I know I did), but presumably what your hv was addressing was the fact that you weren't getting enough sleep perhaps? I think her advice is so wrong about the two day time feeds, but perhaps you could feed him lots more in the day (bfds I mean) and try to distinguish between him feeding back to sleep and actual hunger at night. When my three babies were that age, they had solids but they still had at least six or 7 breastfeeds a day between 7 and 7 (and more at night), so what rubbish to talk of 2 feeds a day! If you are there to feed him, why not feed him in the day as often as you like?

But from point of view of your sleep, you need to think through whether you want to wake up six times a night. In the end your supply would adjust to giving him more milk in the day and slightly less volume at night.
Do you think your hv was confusing two issues, your sleep and the baby's weight? I'm surprised that none of the posters think it tiring to be woken six times a night, that's all, and I'm sure your hv thought she was being helpful to try and stop him waking you so often, and thus suggesting draconian methods to achieve this. But there are less draconian ways to get a baby to sleep for longer stretches, and suit you and the baby.

well she wouldn't like me Bertha, our cat was just chasing a mouse around the playroom. Then it gave up which was worse as the mouse was still there
I think sometimes with hvs you have to sort wheat from chaff, not everything they say is rubbish, but they can say things in the wrong way and from the wrong angle and then one loses confidence in everything they suggest, although some of what they say might still be relevant.

ah wiggly he s definitely a snacker.and what some have called a sucky baby but not really his thumb or fingers.I suppose what i m wanting to avoid is him just going off the scale getting heavier and heavier as he is so much wider than his friends of same age and much shorter. I wonder if u ve just got really calorific breast milk definitely got fast flow

My DS sounds like yours when he was that age.

He's still chunky but I think he's going to be short and stocky - unlike his sister who looks long and slender.

I stopped seeing HVs after one told me to give DS cheese when I asked for ideas as he was intolerant to dairy

xpost wiggly. The bit about the chubby older child holds true here, I became very neurotic about ds1 needing food all the time (after not feeding him enough at one stage as a tiny baby) and he definitely developed a snacking habit (although an excellent sleeper) But my other children fed often too, and they never had weight problems at all (or sleep problems for that matter)

I meant to add, so don't worry about it. You don't restrict a baby's intake of food especially not BM! he'll gradually reduce it I'm sure as he gets onto solids properly.

Um, ditch the HV.

Pronto!

homebertha,
my experience with this fwiw.
Ds1 was born on 6lb 5oz we breastfed and by 24 weeks he was 20lb. breastmilk only. we started weaning, over the next months the balance between breastmilk and food changed and he was 23lb's on his first birthday.
He is now a strong tall healthy 7 year old.

DS2 was 7lb 1oz he was 20lb at about 18 weeks and 22lb at 1 year.

I think the expected weight gain between 6 monhts and 1 year is significantly smaller than 0-6months, I think if you ignore her you will see (and so will she!!) that it all evens itself out.

swan thing.. on the sleep front she said it would be a bonus that i would get more sleep. her focus was definitely on his weight.
he seems quite distracted with all the goings on in the day and so not interested in feeding for long but then at night decides its time!because we co sleep its not too bad the waking generally because he helps himself and we go back to sleep.I think I ve adjusted and without teething pain its closer to the 3x

thanks neverknowingly that s reassuring. he s 23lbs now at 7.5 months and was 7.04lb when he was born entirely breastfed. i

oops wiggly just noticed my typo....it was supposed to say I'VE got calorific milk not u've.very sorry about that! last night he fed about 8x (everytime he stirred into lighter sleep). i think i need to take action.that was too much!tonight dad's turn...gulp.i think i will try and limit the amount of night feeds and get my partner to soothe him the rest of the time.

Just a little tip, if you are wanting to cut down feeds at night you could start by cutting down the time of each feed by a minute every few nights. This was the least traumatic way we could do it with our ds..

I think at that age they are building reserves for when they start crawling and walking as they don't want to stop exploring to eat. DS looked like a little round buddha at 8 months.

Poor you, OP. it can be really hard to get such advice and remain committed. You sound just fine, your little one sounds well happy, and your hv sounds wrong to me! Also, what tiktok said.

My DS was a real whopper. All bf til 6 months. Didn't really take to food till about 9 months but even then not much. When started moving off his chubby bottom his appetite for food increased yet he slimmed down. He still nurses at 12 months including some nights.

Don't worry, look back at 9 months then at a year and think, glad I stuck to what I felt was right! As an aside, I've had tellings off for co-sleeping in my time. Don't take it to heart- they parrot the same old stuff!