Change over from EBM back to BF in 12 week old?

[KirstyDaisyBBandFifi]

Hi there - I haven't been on here for a while as all of the advice was so good and I have been exclusively expressing for my lo for ages now.. however now that she is older I wondered if anyone knew if it is possible/ probalbe that I can put her back to the breast.

Here are a few of the issues - she is my third DC and I have never been successful at BFing. She had tongue tie which was snipped and had failure to thrive because of lack of weight gain. I started to express and she managed to gain through bottle feeding my milk. Obviously this is a large undertaking and I always wonder if it is possible to get her back onto me. I have only ever managed to feed using a shield - and if I ever try with her without one I am in agony.. The local Feeding Co-ordinator has been helping me and has said that is is possible to feed using a shield and for the baby to gain and be healthy etc... She does not open her mouth widely - even when crying..... and I have tried everything to latch her on - most positions etc.. However I really enjoyed feeding her with the shield and sometimes wonder if I kept going with that as she became bigger that eventually she would suck strongly enough to feed successfully

At the moment my LO sleeps 7 - 7 and is a very happy and settled baby. I'm not sure if she will be able to keep that pattern up if I change to BF. However I still get up to express at 11, 3 in the night so not sure if that will affect things too much....

I am slightly afraid that at the moment we are all getting along swimmingly - I only have to pump 6 times a day and can normally manage to do this around the school run etc. However my Dh is a teacher and is off work this week so I thought if there was ever a time to try to change things now might be a good time...

If anyone has experience of this or can offer any suggestions please let me know..

Thanks again

No experience of this sorry Kirsty, hopefully someone in the know will be along shortly .

No personal experience but I would have thought that at 12 weeks she is still young enough to learn latching properly but, as you say, big enough to suck harder. Is there a feed where she usually takes least that you could pick as starting point?

That way if she only mananges a bit then you know it won't throw her other feedings off too much? And I would introduce changes slowly so maybe change one or two feeds this week and another next week depending on how things go?

If you are still wondering 'what if' I would say it's worth trying bf and then if it goes wrong you can happily return to exclusive expressing (BTW big well done on that I am in awe of you for managing that with two DC) knowing that you tried.

I switched when DD2 was 4 weeks old. We came home from hospital taking all ebm by bottle but then DH went back to work and I was struggling to express with a busy 2 yr old to look after as well.
I'd been putting her to the breast a few times a day from birth but didn't have the confidence to do it until a friend suggested that I should just try it and see how it went. I decided to give us a week. We survived the first week and gained 4 oz so I thought lets try another week and so on.
We kept to one bottle of ebm a day so she didn't forget how to bottle feed.

We're now at 16 weeks and still breast feeding. I won't lie, it's been really hard (constant feeding, slow weight gain etc), but about 2 weeks ago it all seemed to click and I'm enjoying it much more now and I'm so glad I tried it!

Thanks for the advice.. I am going to have her weighed today and then I will start having a go.... As you say one feed a day may be a good starting point.. Perhaps I will try the one when her sisters are normally at school. Thanks for the ego boost, blossom, it has been hard but I have a very supportive DH. Also this is very important to me because DD2 was a very poorly baby and I didn't persevere with her... it is the reason I am so determined to keep going... I will keep trying to do latching...

Like Blossom suggests I started by replacing one feed then built it up over a week or so. I have a lovely HV who supported me throughout and came to weigh DD every week or so in the early days. I know some wouldn't recommend frequent weighing but I needed it for my confidence and DD was only 5lb 6 so I really didn't want her to loose weight if the breast feeding wasn't working.

Your doing a fabulous job expressing for this long! I don't think I could have managed anywhere near 12 weeks. Good luck this week, I know I always would have wondered if I hadn't tried.

I feel your pain OP. DS had exclusive EBM for 8 months and although I was tempted on so many occasions to try him back on boob I never had the nerve (long story) so if you have the guts...go girl!
P.S. certain I couldn't have done excl ebm if I'd had other DCs. I salute you.