to expect a bit more support and information re formula feeding

[Cazm2]

I have been ff since three days after my 3 week old was born.I had terrible labour and lost a lot of blood . I coukdnt get a proper supply going and in baby's,best interests we switched m. However cos nhs health professionals won't be very forthcoming with information re cf. I know breast is best but I can't fins hardly info. Official doc were made bug xestoyed. Very conflicting info re making up feeds in advance et !
Ldnt

great idea theskiingGardener

Since the ff guidelines have changed between my dcs I have found ff this time round much more complicated! I fretted over how to make up in advance and what temperatures etc! I mixed feed and lots of times iv thought I wish I'd stuck out ebf as bottle feeding has been such a headache! but now ds is nearly 4 months and I'm not worrying as much! Op its early days and it will all fall into place and it is shit when you get conflicting advice!

If I'm at home I make up as I go along, if I'm out and about I take a flask of half hour boiled water and dispenser (I also did this for night feeds) if I'm going to someones house I make a bottle cool it quick and put it in their fridge as soon as I get there. You will find your own way, I agree with other posters the most important thing is making bottle with hot enough water to kill bugs in powder

I think I understand what you mean, Cazm2.

I began life with my DS in a very similar way to you. Yes, the Birth to Five book has the best info, but what would be SO helpful in those early days, is someone who will TALK to you about it! Or, at the very least, point out where the best source of information can be found. Who has time at that point to put down the baby and go and carefully look something up?

It's easy to read the side of the tin of formula, but if you're like me, you would like a little bit more explanation of WHY these guidelines exist (i.e. risks etc...). I had a Nursery Nurse pull a cat's bum face at me when I enquired about how easy/sensible it is to swap between brands and she flatly refused to discuss it with me! I wish I could have found a local feeding group that was more inclusive and could have helped me with people's previous experience and knowledge. And could also have helped me with the emotional difficulty of not being able to EBF my DS, which nearly pushed me into PND. The guilt was crippling.

Also, I recently witnessed a friend who had EBF and then swapped 11m DD onto FF make up her feed with cold tap water, because she had never been told otherwise! It genuinely upsets and confuses me that so many HCPs refuse to enter into conversations about FF and as a result, leave new mothers feeling ill-informed, confused and guilty.

I BFed for 10 weeks (very successfully, I've got a proper little chunker of a baby who pretty much doubled his birthweight in those 10 weeks), but then I nearly lost my mind from the hassle of it all so switched over to FF. BFing or FFing is such a personal choice, that I think all reasons for making the decision (either way) are perfectly valid. (As long as they aren't based on crap information).

As far as making the milk up - follow the instructions on the side of the tin, they're there for safety reasons. (Only thing I would say is rather than leave the water for half an hour to cool to 70C in the kettle, pour it into the bottles and leave for 5 minutes before adding the powder, it cools to 70C much quicker in the bottles). For overnight I make up feeds in advance, fast cool them, then heat them up in a bowl of boiling water. The WHO website says its OK to make up in advance as long as they are made properly to begin with and cooled and stored properly. For out and about you can get some really good thermos flasks that keep the water up to temperature for ages, or you can use the little ready made cartons.

I FF roughly on demand - DS wants feeding at approximately the same times each day, but sometimes he's more hungry than others and I wont make him wait until his next feed if hes hungry. Use the guideline amounts on the tin as just that; a guide. You baby may need slightly more or less, but as long as they are having plenty of wet and dirty nappies, and gaining weight nicely, and generally seem content, I wouldn't worry.

Different baby formulas are all much the same (they have to be), but you might find one might agree with your babies tummy better than another, so it might take a bit of experimenting with different brands, or even the comfort milk if she seems like she's very windy or constipated.

Your GP might be bale to give to advice too, if you're finding the HV isn't. (I always feel a bit sorry fo HV when they get picked on for not giving advice on FF, I get the feeling they have very strict guideline on what they can and cant say to mothers. Saying that, mine is lovely so maybe I'm a bit biased!)

Speaking of FF on demand, DS is now squawking for food and trying to eat his sleep suit, so I guess I should get off the internet and feed him. Sigh.

We use a flask and pour in freshly boiled water and change as necessary.

Then make up as the baby showed signs of wanting a feed. He makes a sucking motion.

Gardener, how do you make sure the water gets to the right amount? When I pour water and then add powder it goes higher than the original amount of water. Do you measure the second lot of water using another bottle?

Your way sounds quicker, just clarifying the details!

Some of you were unnecessarily rude to the op. Have some empathy FGS.

I'd like to make a point about having to give formula very early on.

My milk didn't come in for a week with DS1 (and we had a 'normal' VB, immediate skin-to-skin etc). 24 hours after birth he was floppy, lethargic, struggling to latch, moderately jaundiced and producing urates in his nappy (indicating dehydration).

The midwives said I HAD to give formula immediately because he was clearly struggling. I complied and it was amazing how quickly he improved. He then became a bit of a greedy guzzler and we never managed to exclusively BF after that, but if I had insisted on exclusively BFing until my milk came in I think he'd have been a very unhappy newborn.

I didn't give up before my milk came in and I didn't do anything because I was uninformed; I made the choice to do what was best for my baby at the time.

OP, the instructions on the formula cartons are usually pretty comprehensive - just follow them and you should be fine. You also have the convenient option of buying a few pre-made cartons for emergencies!

By the way, one midwife I met in hospital did comment that they give tons of advice on how to correctly breastfeed but barely any advice on proper bottle cleaning and preparation of formula feeds - in her opinion those topics should be thoroughly covered antenatally as realistically a lot of parents will formula-feed. I couldn't agree more!

Ooh, forgot to include this in my previous post.

As part of my attempts to re-instigate BFing, the midwife recommended a gastric remedy called Motilium; it contains the active ingredient domperidone and one of the side-effects is that it causes your body to produce a large amount of excess prolactin, which is rather useful for milk production! It's safe to take while BFing of course.

I am preg with DS2 now and recently discovered a left-over pack of motilium lurking in the kitchen. They had a noticeable effect on increasing my supply last time, so I'm hoping that if I start taking them immediately post-birth this time my milk might come in considerably quicker!

Hope that's useful to someone :)

YANBU

When I left hospital with my DTs, my DTD was 4lb and ff as she hadn't been able to latch on yet. I asked MW how much to feed her, told me 40ml every 3 hours. When HV came she had not put weight on and I was told to double her feeds!

We used cartons at first but when we moved to powder we were told to use bolied then cooled to room temp water, the side of the tin could be ignored! Thankfully I did my own research and always use 70deg water now.

However I don't think the information on bf is any better. I was given conflicting advice in hospital on bf, one MW said to feed on demand, another said to feed every 3 hours, was told to top up on day 3 as not producing enough milk, told by paed feeding 'expert' to allow 15 mins on breast then give a bottle. Its all very well going on NCT bf courses etc but when you are hormonal and vulnerable in hospital you tend to listen to the HCPs, most of who don't seem to know what they are talking about.

I ff my DS and we make up several bottles at a time.
Boil the water, leave to cool a little (to about 70 or 80 degrees), pour water into bottles, add formula, put straight in fridge to rapid cool. Re-heat in a mug of boiling water as needed.
For going out if it's a short trip make up a new bottle and put in insulated bottle bag (bottles last 2 hours before they need tobe changed) or get cartons just for going out I normally do both,take a fresh bottle and always have an 'emergency' carton. HTH

Morning, I also had to FF my 3rd child, due to a rare complication, I produced no milk and yes I do mean no milk.
It took me, my sister and my husband 30mins to work out how to use all the equipment and what to do re making bottles, there was just not enough info.

I decided to demand feed the same way I would have if I was BF, I sterilised the bottles and then made them up as needed(adding water & powder at time I needed to feed) I then had to cool the bottle down. It is really hard during the night, especially in comparison to BF where with my other I could just roll over feed and then go back to sleep.

Good luck with your new baby and the feeding, remember we all do what we have to, to get through x x

YANBU as others have pointed out, yes you have instructions on the tin but you might have other questions i.e.: should I go for Avent bottles or Dr Brown's? are all formula the same? When do I know when I need to change teats? How can I simplify the bottle making process and still have safe formula for my baby? what happens if your baby has more/less than the quantities suggested on the tin?
When I was expecting DS1, I experienced bags of info on bf, but 0 on ff. When asked for info on ff, I was told "what do you want to know?" to which I replied "I don't bloody know, I have never done it before!".

I meant to say also I used a microwavable steriliser, it was so so good, invest if you havent already x

Second vote for microwave sterilisers, they are great. They take up minimal counter space and you can take them to other people's houses if you're staying away from home.

My only proviso would be to check the size of your microwave - DH got dispatched to Tesco for formula and a new microwave when we came home with DS1 to find the steriliser didn't fit in the one we had!!

Out of the four of us who had babies at the same time, I was the only one who breastfed - others all didn't start or stopped within 24 hours. I was also the only one who knew that formula has to be made up with 70c water and most importantly the ONLY ONE WHO KNEW WHY, and I only knew that from reading The Politics Of Breastfeeding.

My friends were not told by MWs and HVs about this, or why it was important, in fact two were given wrong advice i.e. told they could make up feeds with cooled boiled water.

All new parents need to be told this, especially when you look at the stats for how many are actually exclusively breastfeeding - it's not many, so we are putting so many babies at risk.

The fault to my mind lies with the formula companies, why can't they reduce the cost of ready made, or I believe in the US you can buy concentrated sterile liquid formula that you dilute with water, but the NHS should be more responsible and teach parents how to bottle feed safely - and it's not just formula, I sometimes gave ebf in a bottle and didn't know about "bottle propping" being wrong until I happened to read on here about it.

I am very very pro breastfeeding and think that support for that is lacking woefully, but failing to support ff parents properly is not going to increase the bf rate is it!

yy our microwave didn't fit the steriliser either!

I did the same for making bottles up as some others - pour some slightly cooled boiling water on the powder then top up with totally cooled water to make up the quantity, it's then a good drinking temp though. Takes some experimenting with water quantities - I just made a full bottle up the recommended/tin way to find the total volume of the bottle. It's true that a 150ml feed will not be 150ml of water!

Really I just wanted to add something nobody told me - make sure baby's tongue is under the teat, not over it! Don't know if all baby's have this problem or if it's just that DS was a 34-weeker on normal post-natal ward discharged at 2 days old who was then subsequently readmitted as it was discovered he had no suck reflex.

I also agree with HCPs bad attitudes towards FF - DS had to have formula at 12 hours old & then every few hours as his blood sugar levels kept dropping dangerously low despite my [rubbish & ineffective] attempts to BF - as soon as I mentioned I would have to FF him at home then, wouldn't I? we were discharged. We had to stop at the 24-hour supermarket to buy bottles & milk FFS as it had never crossed my mind not to BF!

Good luck!

I ff and do four bottles at a time as this is what fits in the microwave steriliser. bottles made according to instructions on the tin and refridgerate. I take a bottle out of the fridge an hour before i need it to take the edge off. I dont reheat, dd has hee milk at room or fridge temp.

Thanks for the replies I am glad I am not alone. I can read instructions on the tin that's not the issue its advice about how to store. I can't make to demand following the tin instructions baby just won't wait for fresh feed all the time. I tried expressing for three days she got some colustrum. However I lost 3 litres of blood during labour had to have two blood transfusions. I came out of hospital after 5 days. I was knackered still anaemic and struggling to bf

Well said princess!

Just out of curiosity to other posters how do u clean that inner tube on dr browns bottles? I use avent but liked the look of dr browns but worried a teat brush wouldn't fit?!

Also I used cow and gate ready made but heard that ready made is too heavy is like carnation milk, so use powder and a friend recently said apitmel is what has been recommended by her neo natal nurse friends and her midwife as the best.

And also try diff teats and bottles too.

breast is best but i would venture to say even better than that is a mother being supported with a new born, to be a happy and relaxed mum, not a stressed worried guilty one!

Op you have had a terrible time. You DON'T have to justify not bf. Hope you get better and enjoy your newborn x

bionicemu - 'my [rubbish & ineffective] attempts to BF' :(

I'm sad that you feel that way about the whole ordeal! I felt exactly the same though and was bewailing my uselessness over BF to DH recently. He then mildly pointed out that I wasn't remembering clearly because he was there to witness the whole thing and to his recollection I tried like hell to establish BF and he honestly didn't see how, given the medical advice and situation, I could have done anything more.

He may have been being kind but it did cheer me up immensely. Please don't beat yourself up about the BF experience - as long as the baby (and you!) are happy/healthy now then that's really all that matters.

That goes for all of you in fact

Ooh yes microwave seriliser a must.
bionic we had a terrible couple of weeks trying to persuade DS to take his tongue off the room of his mouth when trying to feed, would take us about 2 hours to get an ounce of feed down him. He got the hang of it eventually though.
OP I agree with buttery you don't have to try to justify FF your baby is getting fed that's all that matters :)

X posts herrena well said :)

I don't get the using half and half of hot water and cold - don't you have to measure it out in a separate bottle to get the volume correct? A six oz feed - six scoops of powder and 6 oz of water, is closer to the 7 oz line when made up (but is still a six oz feed), but then it can look even more if you have given it a good shake and the top is all frothy (this will make your baby windy like you wouldn't believe though, so avoid excessive shaking!)? If you just made it up roughly to the six oz line, or a bit above, you wont be using the correct amount of water?