Is it just me or are all breastfed babies cranky and miserable??

[fluffandnonsense]

Just to clarify I am hugely pro breastfeeding. I personally think the benefits to baby and mum outweigh a lot of what I'm about to say but I fin the evidence hard to dispute. To give background I fed my first child to 3 weeks and due to severe PND and massively sore bleeding nipples I stopped and bottle fed. Something I hated doing and cried non stop for days about. 2nd baby was breastfed till 14 months when she weaned but she was clingy. She screamed if I put her down, she screamed in car seat/pushchair and lived in the sling. She wouldn't go to anyone else and fed every 40 minutes day and night. Her cluster feeding could last 10 hours at a time. But I did it and I'm proud of what we achieved. My friend has just had a baby and has been breastfeeding and her baby has been much same as my DD, not settling, screaming etc. She pumped some milk and fed her in a bottle and hey presto different baby. She's now content, alert, going down for sleeps etc and my friend has decided BF is not for her which I totally understand. So why? Why does putting it in a bottle (even breast milk) make the babies so much happier and settled? All of the bf babies I've known have been constantly on the boob and unsettled. Whereas the bottle fed babies are always much
more content.

It makes me sad because I think the bf relationship is such a special thing BUT with my next child due in a matter if weeks I'm wondering if I'm just making life hard or myself?

Nope. Both breastfed here. Both until 2. Tandem fed for over 6 months. Both boys happy, chilled out and not clingy. Fed on demand which worked out every 2 hrs approx as young babies

My friend's DD was ebf. Slept through the night from 6 weeks and the most chilled baby ever. My DD was a screaming, unsettled baby until 7 months when we finally got her silent reflux meds sorted out. She was bf initially and then ff and then I relactated and she was mixed fed. She screamed for hours regardless of the feeding method.

Oh I did night wean early if that makes any difference. After 3 months I fed a dreamfeed around 11pm, then didn't feed until morning.

My ds was ebf and a very happy baby.

Mine were ebf and chilled too. It's just different babies being different.

Ds was ebf, had colic for a brief while but was chilled from air 8 Weeks onwards (still bf and chilled at 19 months).

I had two happy bf babies. Except for things that make all babies cranky and miserable of course (tired, ill, teething etc).

Babies have their own personality from the start. Some never seem happy, some are ridiculously cheerful and then everything in between

I don't think it is as easy as bf = difficult baby.

Milk comes out of a bottle quicker and with less effort than bf so it is easier to reach that snoozing stuffed full after Xmas dinner type feeling, so often bottle feeding leads to longer sleeps etc.

You also have to look at what you consider 'content' and 'happy'. Like when someone compliments you on a plane about how well behaved your dc are - what they actually mean is, they didn't disturb me, gave me some peace etc. Is that what we want out of having dc? I hadn't been around babies a lot til I had one and thought they would be smiley some of the time like on adverts, mine was bloody miserable and highly strung.

Some babies/people are very active and vocal, sometimes called "high needs". Parenting them is hard work but using a sling and so on is the recommended way to get through it, they need more from you, more attention and more comfort. You just have to ride it out.

DS was a lovely, easy-going breastfed baby. I think some people have unrealistic expectations of newborn behaviour though if wanting to be held and fed frequently is "clingy and unsettled".

IME "difficult" babies are still difficult if they switch to bottles. I think a lot of it is down to the mother's perceptions/anxieties though. Most of my friends/family have had fairly normal, easy babies - breastfed and bottlefed - but I think that is also related to a laidback approach.

Well, all 5 of mine have been clingy, co sleepers. All have been carried around in slings, hated being put in buggy or car seat etc. All have been rocked, cuddled, fed to sleep for at least the first year. I wouldn't say they were miserable. Hard work, but very contented, happy little babies, as long as they were responded to immediately.

The 4 eldest (13,10,5,3) all now sleep independently (from age 2) All settled well at school/nursery. All stay with sitters and are far from clingy. All of them confident, outgoing children who are very sociable.

Little one is only 7 months, so we'll see.

2 of them were bottle fed formula milk, 2 of them breast fed for 16 months. Little one still breast feeding.

Not sure my 'evidence' is any more telling than yours.

Yep, mine were.

But so were my FF and mix-fed ones

I blame their father's DNA...

I bf dd1 for three weeks she was cranky and miserable the while time :o

All the breast fed babies u have met were cranky or un put downable. However I very much doubt that a few friends babies are an accurate picture.

I've also met cranky bottle fed babies too.

Whatever a breastfed baby does is NORMAL as babies are designed to be breastfed. A ff baby may not have the attachment with mum so be happy to sit in a pram and not need carrying, also will be fuller from a heavy formula on their stomach but if you observe the differences in the two as they get older. Attachment is vital to future development

My ds was ebf till about 15 months and family and friends have commented on how calm and settled he is. He's now 2 and barring the odd tantrum, he's still pretty laidback and calm. That may just be his personality or the bfing but I intend to feed his little brother (due this month) in the same way.

Mine were happy not crying all the time but I did carry them and feed on demand ( bf)

My dd was a dream, would lie on her playmat for over an hour contentedly from weeks old.
DS would scream to be picked up after a minute.

No difference in feeding, both ebf!

I think that is a tricky argument though lilyaldrin.

I felt pretty laidback (considering I'd just given birth) until my ds started screaming and just wouldn't stop. He got harder and harder work and I felt worse and worse. Yes there was more stuff going on but the fact that he was a 'difficult' baby made me more stressed.

He is still challenging as a pre-schooler and I hate that people put his behaviour/personality down to me being not laidback enough and having pnd. And I do hear that from people, I'm not being paranoid.

I think it does depend on the baby, the mother and the breastfeeding relationship.

I've had friends who EBF and have very chilled babies.

Others who FF were more high maintenance.

I EBF my DCs until they were about 3 months old before introducing some formula. They were both velcro babies. They were both more settled/slept better after that but whether that was the formula or simply them getting older is difficult to say.

I think it is complicated. Anecdotally most bf babies seem to need their mums a bit more. BUT I am not sure this is a bad thing and I actually think it's a little sad if a baby is "trained" to not get comfort from mum.
This is not meant to disparage bottle feeders, plenty of whom are just as hands on and available as bfs, but the option is obviously there to be more detached from your baby.

My own baby was exclusively bf AND slept through the night from about 6 weeks (she wouldn't be put down before that, I didn't fight it though) - so obviously not all babies are the same! (She also stopped sleeping at 5 months, so don't hate me -she's never been a boob monster at night though.) Also perhaps some people bf longer because they CAN'T get the high-needs kid off the boob? i.e., which caused which? Also I know a few people who stopped bf because of fussiness/clinginess and baby was just the same or even worse and are now up making bottles all night, which is the worst of all worlds really. I also know some extremely tricky babies who have been exclusively ff. However in my experience I would agree with you that generally bf babies sleep worse, my own baby seems more the exception than the rule. I am loathe to admit this because I think there is so many obstacles to bf already and I don't like to be negative about it to potential mums. But I think it is good to be realistic about NORMAL infant behaviours.

There have been studies done which show bf mothers get more sleep than bottle feeding ones??

Being depressed or anxious is bound to effect both the baby's behaviour and the parent's interpretation of their behaviour though.

I do think a lot comes down to expectations. The way babies naturally "are" - wanting to be at the breast most of the time, carried close, held by someone most of the time - is at odds with what society currently wants - them to be as independent as possible, to be put down, left alone, sleep long periods, feed infrequently.

Few babies are born knowing how to fit in with the current ideal. So when a baby instinctively wants to be held and fed they are labelled clingy and difficult. The gulf between what the baby is doing and what society is telling the parents it should be doing can be very stressful.

Sometimes, a really big bottle of milk, especially if it is hard to digest cow's milk, will sedate a baby enough to fit into current expectations. Suddenly the baby is "easy".

Nope. Two very chilled happy breastfeed babes.

And I believe that you started this thread a little bit to create a controversy.

Not in my experience. BF three babies -- #1 was a bit "cranky and miserable", but #2 was laid back angel baby (then became a complete stropmonster once she got to two and a half but I don't think you can blame that on the bf) and #3 is very... ahem... strong-willed but not cranky by any means. They all did cluster feeding in the evenings for the first couple of months, mind you. And none of them really liked carseats (it was only #1 who hated them with a fiery passion, though).