Breast-fed baby won't take a bottle...any advice gratefully received!

[NoviceDad]

Hi Mumsnetters,

Sorry, I'm a dad gate-crashing the forum, but my wife and I are in need of some advice. Our 6-week old daughter is breastfed and we are trying to get her to take the bottle so that I can help out with the night-time feeds. However, she just won't take it which gets her more agitated when she's hungry! We use the Medela 'Calma' teats at the moment but they just don't seem to do the trick and certainly don't live up to their name at the moment. Any tips would be much appreciated, thank you..!

I managed to get my bottle refuser onto Mam bottles. They have a flattened oval silicon teat with a silky feeling. It doesn't look like the Nuk teats which look like a cherry one with a slice off.

I forgot to say, Boots and Mothercare stock them (or did)

Try the Tommee Tippee natural bottle the wide teat seems to mimick the feel of the breast. My Ds was bf until 2 and we had a job and a half to find something to give him his milk in the evening. Although he was drinking everything else out of a cup he wouldn't take milk out of a cup. I think it was a comfort thing. Since he was talking by then he was able to tell us that it was like mummy.
Some babies just won't go for bottle while mum is around. You may have to feed her in a different room. DS would not have a bottle if I was in the room.

We also had success with mam bottles. DC1 was a bottled refuser until we tried these. I think it helped that she already took mam dummies so the tests had a familiar feel.

Also: keep trying! I was too cheap to try loads of different teats so tried every night for a while and after 3 weeks she got the hang of it.
Dd was 12 weeks or so.
By way of teaching her I developed an odd but useful trick where I breastfed for 30seconds and then whisked the nipple out and shoved the bottle in. If timed mid suck she would keep just feeding as tho nothing happened, tho scowl a minute later when she realised she'd be had! It helped her learn how to suck on a bottle. 3 weeks was how long it took for her to take it normally without the 'boob trick' and thus from my partner.
I know a few people who struggled with this. For some the answer was different teats, for others no teat seemed to work initially but persistence always won out eventually.

Tommee Tippee closer to nature worked for us.

Also....keep trying, the baby will crack eventually! It might be easier for someone else to try, if you can take your wife away for a bit?

Don't leave it. The longer you leave it, the more the baby will hold out!

Hi Novice, are you giving your DD formula or expressed breast milk? If it is formula perhaps see if your wife could express some milk and try her with that. It may be that she doesn't like the different taste rather than the bottle itself.

We struggled massively with this - but kept trying different bottles until it clicked. Although the main answer for us was the fact that he didn't want my milk out the bottle, but formula instead...?! I think it took the association away from it being mummy's milk but not coming out of mommy which really hacked him off! If you are willing to try, give formula a go to see what happens. All babies are different so whilst people can suggest specific bottles, I really think it is down to the individual baby and you may have to try several to find your solution. Stick with it though, but don't get stressed as I did - it doesn't help anyone, esp not baby. X

Hi NoviceDad,

Congratulations on your daughter! :-)

Lots of bottle recommendations here but I'm going to add another one called Breastflow Early Years (you can buy from Amazon). We've used these with our son and he goes from boob to bottle with no problem. This bottle is supposed to be the closest teat to a real breast as it works in the same way (baby has to lick it to get the milk rather than suck like other bottles which can cause nipple confusion).

Definitely worth a try (you can buy one bottle rather than a pack so that you don't waste too much money if it didn't work).

Good luck

Also, when feeding from a bottle, please two fingers in the side of her face as she is used to feeling skin on her face when feeding.

Had the same problem..tommee yippee closer to nature, went with anti colic system and a size 3 teat but you may need a smaller teat size for newborn. Ask your oh to go to a different room while you feed. Maybe try a feed during the day when lo not hungry just to get used to teat

Should read tippee:-)

I've known lots of bottle refusers who have taken the breastflow bottles. They are brilliant.

If she really won't take a bottle in a few weeks try a cup, DD wouldn't entertain a bottle but took expressed from a doidy cup from about 10 weeks.

Congratulations on the birth of your daughter. I just want to add that my son suddenly started taking a bottle when we made it really warm- so try different temperatures too. Good luck!

Hi all, thank you so much for your suggestions, we really appreciate it. There we were thinking that we didn't have a fussy baby ! Will keep at it though and hopefully the bottle will prevail! :-)