Long feeds

[Lilliana]

My dd is 10 weeks and bf. She did go 3 hours and then half hour feed during the day and then went 4 or 5 hours at night.

Now she will only go 2 1/2 hours max (often less) in the day and is feeding for an hour. Sleep has got worse too, now will go 3 hours max and often won't settle back onto basket - last night she fed about every 1 1/2 hours for an hour.

She has slow weight gain and I'm worried she is not getting enough milk from me but really don't want to ff.

Has anyone got any tips - my boobs never seem to leak, is there anything I can do to increase production. Is there anything I can do to make feeds quicker?

Lilliana, what you describe sounds well within normal....there is an idea that babies' feeding should always follow a 'feeds getting further apart as baby gets older' pattern but while this happens with some babies, with others it just doesn't.

Adults often have something to eat or drink every couple of hours :)

For whatever reason, she has increased her frequency and needs more comfort at night - trying to fight against this with a young baby increases stress for both of you and one option is to go along with it while it lasts. Co-sleeping is often a good way of making life easier for you (following rule for safety, natch).

Most women find their breasts stop leaking as bf gets established, so this is very normal.

To feed for an hour is prob longer than average at this age, but there are always going to be some babies who feed longer and some shorter than average :) To deliberately shorten her feeds could be upsetting for her, and it's likely this is just a phase that will sort itself out, anyway.

Would it help to go to a bf support group and meet other mothers - this can sometimes be useful so you become aware of the wide range of normal.

Is the HV concerned about her weight? Some babies grow more slowly than others - again, that's not something worrying in itself.

Thanks so much for replying tictok.

Glad that it doesn't sound too abnormal. Don't mind feeding her as and when but didn't want to get her into a routine that I would regret later - will go along with what she wants and see what happens.

I went to our local bf group for the first time this week and found a much more comfortable position to feed in (for me but dd also seems more comfortable- less pulling and going on and off) Will keep going for a while as did find it a nice atmosphere and the leader was lovely. Not many people there but hopefully will meet some more over the weeks.

WRT weight the HV is keeping a close eye as she has dropped 2 percentile lines but accepts that she is generally a happy, settled baby, regular wees and poos and is doing everything developmentally that she should be so not overly concerned I don't think.

All sounds good :)

My DD2 was like this. At 10 weeks she used to take at least 40 minutes per feed and was feeding every 2 - 2.5 hours. Much of the problem was that the feeding made her very sleepy so she ate very slowly. Now at 20 weeks, feeds are much shorter (she doesn't fall asleep any longer, but gets very distracted which brings its own problems!). She will also now go 2.5 - 3 hours between feeds. Still feeds a lot at night though!