how many feeds at 6 months?

[sleeplessinderbyshire]

my dd2 is 6 months. started weaning around a month ago and loves her solids which is the polar opposite of her older sister. i am back to work 4 days a week in 2 weeks time and aiming to keep breastfeeding and expressing as i did for dd1.

dd2 has always had far fewer feeds than dd1 and now often refuses the breast but is keen to eat solid food ( am sure she gets way more than the necessary 16oz milk a day though)

at present we seem to do this

545/6am breastfeed then back to sleep
8am up for day
830 breakfast - porridge/fruit/toast
10 ish nap
1130 offer breast (has refused the past 4 days so might drop this)
1230 lunch - finger foods puree and yoghurt
130ish sleep
3-4 up and play
4 offer breast if not wanted sooner after nap
530 tea - tea (yesterday fish carrot and parsnip followed by fromage frais)
630 bath
7ish bed with long snugly feed
1-3am breastfeed (when she wakes)

is this around normal? dd1 fed every 2-3 day and night til well over 9 months and even now eats far less than dd2 (which is why dd1 is 2nd centile and dd2 is 50th i guess! )

Thought the recommendation was to keep all bfs at this age and to bf an hour before offering any solids. Perhaps you could talk to a BFC about solids and bfing and your return to work.

spoken to HV about it and she says to be led by the baby and that 3 solid meals a day and morning and night BFs is enough. she point blank refuses milk (breast or bottle) unless she is hungry for milk (so if we try losing a solid feed she just goes without rather than breastfeeding even if I offer the breast all the time she just looks at me like I have gone mad)

anyway I am offering the breast an hour before solids - before breakfast (at wake up), late morning (1hr before lunch) and afternoon after nap (ie before tea) she also gets milk on demand any other time she wants (but that is hardly ever)

I have pretty much the same routine with my 7.5 month old DS. Before we started solids he BF very frequently throughout the day. Now, he is down to BF on wake up, sometimes late morning, mid afternoon, bedtime and 1, sometimes 2, night feeds. This has been our pattern for the last month or so. Only the wake up and bedtime BFs are good long feeds. I have tried to get him to take more milk during the day to see if he will cut down on night feed but to no avail - he BFs on his terms!

fleecypjs, that is so helpful